This is a complete reimagining of the Open Book Project, but the original mission remains:

As a society, we need an open source device for reading. Books are among the most important documents of our culture, yet the most popular and widespread devices we have for reading are closed objects, operating as small moving parts in a set of giant closed platforms whose owners' interests are not always aligned with readers'.

The Open Book aims to be a simple device that anyone can build for themselves. The Open Book should be comprehensible: the reader should be able to look at it and understand, at least in broad strokes, how it works. It should be extensible, so that a reader with different needs can write code and add accessories that make the book work for them. It should be global, supporting readers of books in all the languages of the world. Most of all, it should be open, so that anyone can take this design as a starting point and use it to build a better book.

Check out the promo video as well:
https://youtu.be/vFD9V8Hh7Yg

  • cwagner@lemmy.cwagner.me
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    1 year ago

    For those interested, base price to build this might start at $85 based on one estimate linked from the resource.

    It’s crazy how subsidized a Kindle is. I recently paid 60€ on sale for a brand-new Paperwhite. That has a superior display, and requires no extra work. It’s even worse if you look at voice-assistants, On sale, you can probably get 3-4 echo dots for the price of the materials of a single self-built one…

      • Chobbes@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        It's not just mass production and economies of scale. That's obviously a huge part of it, but the cheap Kindle devices are also definitely sold at a loss with the expectation that you're going to buy a lot of ebooks from Amazon which will more than make up for it (and also some of the devices are ad supported).

        • GrappleHat@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          …and we can be sure Amazon finds ways to monetize user data as well (they see your book purchases, downloads, reading habits, etc)

        • naught@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          I keep mine in airplane mode most of the time to avoid getting new ads too often. Also the only ads are on the lock screen which is extremely unobtrusive if you're looking to save a few bucks

          • cwagner@lemmy.cwagner.me
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            1 year ago

            I really enjoy seeing my book cover on the lock screen ;) And just buy the kids version, it’s always ads free but costs the same as with ads.

          • LazaroFilm@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Call Amazon and say the content of the ads is offensive and say you want them to either remove the gambling and adult romance ads or remove it all if they can select. That worked for me and my wife.

            • naught@sh.itjust.works
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              1 year ago

              Has been the same for many years. If they started popping up during reading or something I would not recommend at all of course. Wasn't worth $30 to me and I don't regret it so far these last few years (:

        • GrappleHat@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          There have been ads on Kindle for a very long time. You can optionally pay an extra $15-$20 to remove the ads though.

    • Heratiki@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      I mean those Echo Dots come with a huge hit to your privacy as a cost. Not to mention how susceptible the Echo Dot has been in the past. Hell some expeditious hackers even got the Echo Dot to hack itself.

      • cwagner@lemmy.cwagner.me
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        1 year ago

        As I said, subsidized. But luckily, Home Assistant finally added the last pieces I needed to make a second attempt at building my own. I have the microphones, an old PI3, and some cheap USB speakers to make a proof of concept, if everything works, I’ll get some Pi Zero 2’s or comparable devices, more speakers, and replace the Echo’s.

        • Heratiki@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          Yeah I have an Rpi Zero for interfacing cheaper devices with HomeKit so I feel you. I’m just not going to use an Echo Dot when I already have a bunch of HomePods lol.

        • Buelldozer@lemmy.today
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          1 year ago

          I installed that update just minutes ago! What are you using for your voice satellites?

          • cwagner@lemmy.cwagner.me
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            1 year ago

            As I said, PoC will be done with a Pi3 (which currently has Rhasspy installed from my last attempt :D), if everything works I’ll get Pi Zero2s or something similar.

              • cwagner@lemmy.cwagner.me
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                1 year ago

                Same ;) one thing that was a big issue with Rhasspy, was that I want to play the audio from the device I requested it from (though technically I could live with hard coding the audio player as I only need the kitchen to play music), I'll see how that works with ha.

    • agent_flounder@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      It’s crazy how subsidized a Kindle is.

      No doubt Amazon sells Kindles with a thin margin or maybe even at a loss. But the cost to produce them is also lowered significantly by manufacturing large quantities.

    • The Hobbyist@lemmy.zip
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      1 year ago

      That version is ad-sponsored though, isn't it? If you wanted to get it without ads, I believe you need to pay extra.

      • cwagner@lemmy.cwagner.me
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        1 year ago

        Nah, you buy the Kids version, it’s exactly the same as the normal version, besides a) no ads (but for the with ads price), b) free cover and c) You need to go into settings and exit child mode when you set it up.

      • allstar@lemmy.one
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        1 year ago

        You can ask customer service to remove it for free after purchase, or so I've heard.

        • 2ncs@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I'm pretty sure it's a $30 dollar charge, from when I last looked into it. For that exact price difference you can get a Kobo, which isn't Amazon and doesn't have ads

          • SatyrSack@lemmy.one
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            1 year ago

            If you want to just do it automatically through the settings or whatever, sure. But you can supposedly call up customer service, make up an excuse like the ads are inappropriate for your kid, and they will remove ads for no charge.

          • Heratiki@lemmy.ml
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            1 year ago

            Sadly a Kobo doesn’t support my Kindle library without a good bit of extra steps that, from my experience, can wreck some books.

            • 2ncs@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              That's fair. Fwiw that's the main reason I tried to avoid kindle, so I would be able to take my library where i want and not be tied to Amazon

        • Heratiki@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          Yeah they usually won’t do this unless you’ve owned it for a while or purchased a considerable amount of content via the device. Also depends on how adamant you are about having them remove it.