Posts Tagged ‘Books’

The Advantages Of Audio Books

With the incredible advantage of listening to your favorite book instead of reading it, the popularity of audio books has now gone through the roof. There are now more and more book titles with audio book versions.

Think about it – with audio books you can now save that extra time you spend reading a chapter on your favorite motivational book each morning before you leave for work. Apart from saving extra time, you are gaining extra knowledge in the process.

You can simply put it on to play while you prepare for work or even play it in your car on your way to work.

No wonder children, adults and even oldies have fallen head over heels in love with audio books.

Below are some of the specific advantages that audio books have over normal hardcover or paperback books:

– Audio books are more cost effective to produce than hardcover and paperbacks. More so, those who love to conserve nature insist that if all books are audio instead of hardcover and paperbacks, this will save more trees and keep the earth better than it is today.

– You can select the exact track you want to listen to instead of flipping through several pages in the case of normal books. This saves a great deal of time and makes it very comfortable for you.

– You can listen to audio books while doing other things in the house, while commuting to and from work or even while jogging. With an audio book someone else does the reading, while you do the absorption.

– You can listen to an audio book when it’s dark (example – when you are out camping and you’ve got no lights) but you can’t read a book when it’s dark. So, with an audio book you can go on vacation and still enjoy what the audio book has to offer.

– You can save the time you spend reading to your kids each night before they sleep with an audio book. Unlike a normal paperback or hardcover book that you have to read to your kids, with an audio book you can simply play it for them until they fall asleep, thereby saving you the time.

More so, audio books that are specifically for children are more fun than your reading can be. You probably were not trained to talk like a rabbit, right? But most of the narrators of children’s audio books were trained to read in ways that children love.

Get More Out of Life – 6 Places Where you Should Listen to Audio Books

Technology is increasingly enriching our lives in ways which only a few years ago we would not have dreamed of. Who would have believed that not only would we slow down the destruction of trees and forests used for making paper and cardboard for hardcover and paperback books by developing the ability to “listen” to our books instead of “reading” them?

Seriously? Oh yes, through the introduction of audio books.

Audio books enable us to do other things at the same time, particularly physical activities for which we do not need our minds, for example household chores, walking the dog, working out, jogging etc. while still listening to the book.

More and more people are seeing the benefits of audio books and are buying their favorite books in this format.

If you are considering trying audio books but maybe still wonder about how and when you would ‘read’ them, here are 6 of places you can enjoy an audio book:

1IN BED – Sometimes we feel unwell or off colour and may just want to spend the day or a few hours relaxing in bed; or maybe we go to bed at night and simply want to lie till until drifting naturally off to sleep.

This is a great time to listen to an audio book: You have no bother with putting on the lights, holding the book, flipping through the pages or the effort of reading the book itself. You just lie there and relax while the entire book is read to you!

2IN THE KITCHEN – while doing household chores such as washing the dishes, general cleaning, or even preparing a meal. Many of us find these tasks somewhat tedious, certainly the chore of washing the dishes.

This is a great time to listen to an audio book because your hands are busy but your mind is receptive; instead of feeling listless and bored you can fill your mind with the pleasure of listening to a book of your choice.

3–GARDENING – Another mainly physical activity when much of the time e.g., weeding, mowing grass etc – we don’t have to tax our brains. You can also listen to audio books while gardening and have the pleasure of your book along with the satisfaction of getting the job done.

4EXERCISING or JOGGING – Weights, aerobics or simply jogging leave your mind wide open but your hands, legs and even your entire body busy. This is a great time to enjoy an audio book.

A lot of us tend to exercise, whether for minutes or even hours while their minds do nothing. But listening to an audio book during this time will ensure you don’t waste those periods of time.

Talk about killing 2 birds with one stone – exercising your body and mind at the same time!

5–COMMUTING – This may be in your car or the bus or train ride to work. Many people lose a great deal of time doing nothing while commuting to and from their jobs – and the sheer boredom of it can make them feel tired and irritable.

Why not use that time to listen to an audio book, especially one that develops your mind and/or improves your professional and business skills? Listening to audio books that improve your skills can significantly help you develop career; more useful than simply sitting there or even listening to music.

6AIR TRAVEL – You may not believe it, but there are people who spend more time in the air (or waiting in airport s!) than on the road. As with more traditional commuting, this can be wasted and frustrating time which can be put to good use.

If you are a regular or even an occasional air traveler, consider the enormous benefits you would get listening to audio books, especially those that can improve your academic or work related skills; or simply listening to a favourite novel. Great distraction for the kids too if they’re travelling with you……

These are just a few situations arising in many of our lives where audio books can provide entertainment and/or the opportunity to improve our professional skills; there are many others which you may well have thought of as you read this text.

Audio Books: How To Download Them To Your Mp3 Player Hassle Free

Are MP3-technology portable players only good for playing cool tunes downloaded from the net? Far from it. They offer an alternative and a convenient listening addition to audio books on tape or CD.

What used to take days or weeks of waiting for the mail carrier to deliver your audio books on tape or CD, it now takes no more than a few minutes. You can be listening to your favorite MP3 books straight away. And it’s going to get even better, easier and quicker, judging from the giant advances in audio and web technologies in recent months.

The hard-core audiobook listeners may take a while to “convert” from using tapes and CDs to an MP3 format. The sheer convenience, perfect control and the size choices MP3 players offer, the “change-over period” is likely going to be a short one.

So, if you are a budding MP3 book pioneer and want the latest portable audio technology conveniences, they are waiting here to serve you without having to spend a fortune or extra time to do it right.

To download audio books in MP3 format to your computer and over to your MP3 player, look at the exact steps you need to take to do it quickly and easily.

Just note the following instructions use Windows Media Player – Version 10 as an example.
Let’s assume you are already good at downloading files from the web onto your computer.
Let’s also assume that you already own an MP3 player, but don’t know how to do this transfer correctly yet.

1. If you are using an older version of Windows Media Player and need to upgrade, surf over to Microsoft and download it at http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/download. Follow the installation instructions.

2. Download the MP3 books to your computer. It is a good idea to create a separate folder, say in “My Documents” folder and name it “My Audio Books”. It allows you to keep your audio book downloads all in one location. Done it? Good.

3. Now, connect your computer (switched on) to the MP3 player using the USB cable supplied with your player.

4. Once the connection between the two is live, your computer will show that it has found a new piece of hardware. If it doesn’t say this, just unplug everything in the above sequence and try again.

5. Is it working now? Okay. Open your Windows Media Player and open the audio book MP3 file you want to copy. This will open your audio book in the main display area of Windows Media Player.

6. Add the audio book to the Sync List of your Windows Media Player.

7. Go ahead and click on the Sync tab on the Windows Media Player. It brings you to a pull-down arrow menu on the left-side box of the Sync tab. Make sure you select the choice “Removable Disk (E)”, or the name of your MP3 player as the source where the audio book will be copied to.

8. Do you see a display with the choice to “Start Sync” right now? Great! Go ahead and click on it. Once you’ve done this, the Windows Media Player will let you know that it’s sending the audio book to your MP3 player.

9. As soon as the sync (or copying) of the audio book file is complete, you can check to assure it is on your MP3 player. See it there? Excellent. One more step to go.

10. To finish this process properly, ensure you click on your PC’s hardware icon (found in your system tray – in the right bottom corner – usually a small icon with a green arrow) to “Safely Remove Hardware”.

Don’t remove the USB cable until you get a clear signal saying “Safe To Remove Hardware”.

Removing the USB cable without following this step may damage both your computer and the MP3 player.

Note:
Are you using an older version of Windows Media Player? Even so, you can still follow the steps above. The only major difference is that instead of having “Sync”, you will have “Copy” in the menu. You can click on it and follow the same steps above to have your audio book copied to your MP3 player.

If you have a portable MP3 player that uses a drag-and-drop file method instead of Windows Media Player synchronization, then the steps are easy to follow. Simply connect your player to the computer as above. Open the player’s window by clicking on its name or on “Removable Disc (for example E or F) under “My Computer” icon.

Then, open the MP3 books folder (the location where you have them saved) in a separate window. Keep both windows open side-by-side. Now, left-click, hold and drag the audio files over to the open window of the portable player. Once you release the left mouse button, there will be a short file-transfer moment. Done? Now, your MP3 books are on your player, ready for you to enjoy listening to it.

So, can you play back the audio book from your MP3 player now? If you have followed the steps, you should hear the audio book playing on your MP3 player. If you have difficulties, you can watch an easy-to-follow video that shows you how to do it at http://www.mybigaudio.com/help.html .

How to Find & Download Audio Books your Ears Will Love you For!

Discovering a specific audiobook title or audio books on a particular subject or from a certain author is a perfect example of an areas which the Internet has made so much easier and quicker.

Even very obscure and specialist subject audio books can be located with relative ease – If you know how top go about it…Interviews with ex slaves from the post US Civil War south…Yes, they are there and you can get them if you want to listen in. By comparison mainline romamtic fiction, thrillers and business audio books (for example) are dead easy!

25 years ago if you were searching for a particular book you’d have had to visit a book shop or Library and might have spent hours searching through a huge collection of books, files and catalogues especially for rarer titles – with no guarantee of finding it, even with the assistance of the shop assistant librarian. And if it wasn’t in stock then hard luck you’d just have to wait.

BUT THOSE DAYS ARE GONE! Now you can simply use the Internet to find whatever information you want.

If you are looking for a particular audio book, you can just visit any of the major search engines like Google and type the book title you are looking for with the word “audio book” included. This will immediately steer you in the right direction.

Alternatively, you can get the particular audio book you are looking for by going directly to bookstore websites. Some of the best bookstores on the Internet include: Amazon, Audible, Barnes & Noble and franchisee’s of audio books to download specialist SpokenNetwork.

These online audio book stores have special facilities on their sites which will enable you to find the specific title you are searching for.

The procedure is very similar to using the search feature on your favorite search engine. However it is more focused and way faster, as it is searching only the database of the particular bookstore rather than the wider and less focused search across the entire database of websites.

To try it just visit any of these online audiobook stores and enter the title and/or author name you are looking for. If the site is one that does normal books and CDs etc. Also, if they sell products other than audio books be sure to include the term “audio book” in your search query.

If you exhaust these options and are unable to find that audio book that you are looking for, visit one of the many book forums on the Internet and ask for the advice of other book enthusiasts.

Or try communities like Squidoo, Hugpages and LiveJournal where enthusiasts for just about anything you can bimagine hang out and share..well anything! You’ll be astonished that there are many people out there who know a lot and are willing to share.

Going deeper than this there are also huge numbers of specialist websites with audio books, samples, interviews, spoken word and poetry on a simply giant range of subjects.

The example I gave at the start of interviews with slaves does exist. Others include out of copyright audio books, political transcripts by the million and endless amateur recordings of popular works some of which are superb. There are thousands of these sources and I have listed many on my site.

Is Now The Right TIme To Ride On The Audio Books Trend

Avid book readers can now “listen”to their books while they are commuting to work or to school! Learning while you are traveling! With the advancement in digital technology,book readers are now downloading their favourite books from popular audio bookstore to their iPods and other MP3 players and it has become the next hottest trend in US and UK.

The audio books industry is the next big thing to watch out for! In UK, over $124 million worth of audio books were sold in 2004 and in Germany, over $120 million in 2005. Experts say that this year the market is expected to rise by 20% in Europe, and audio books seem to be even more popular in the USA.

According to the report from digital trends,research firm iSuppli is predicting that shipments of MP3 players are expected to rise by nearly a factor of four from 2004 to 2009 which means total MP3 player shipments will expand to 132 million units in 2009.

What’s more! According to a recent survey, in the USA a person is driving an average of 1 hour and 13 minutes daily, which means over 440 hours a year for each driver, or 11 full-time work weeks. This is huge! Imagine how many things you could learn during this time by simply having your MP3 player with audio books at hand.

Audio books is going to be the next hottest areas in publishing thanks to their convenience and ease of use

But why are audio versions a convenient way to “read” a book?

Audio books is a fast and convenient way to bring fun and expression in our books. It also help people in the development of hobbies, and enriched their knowledge such as foreign languages and other hobbies. People can remember faster when it is narrated to them.

Audio books will greatly enriching our lives, both personally and professionally.

1) You can listen to an audio book anywhere and everywhere and you can even do other things at the same time. You can listen when driving to and from work, when walking the dog, cycling, working around the house or at the computer, exercising, and so on.

2) If you love reading but don’t have a enough time, It really saves a lot of time especially when you truly want to enrich your knowledge by reading many books but just simply don’t have the time to sit down and read a book. You can listen at home while you are doing your housework, cooking, commuting to and fro from work.

3) Audio books are good for older, ill or recovering people and can be a wonderful gift for someone in a nursing institution. There are inspirational, motivational and spiritual audio books that could keep them positive and motivated about life. A positive mental health has an amazing energy to heal physically.

4) Audio books is a miracle to blind or people with impaired vision and disabled people. Everyone should have the chance to experience to enrich their knowledge and enjoy the wonders of a good book.

The most important skill a child can ever acquire is probably the ability to read and improve their vocabulary and communications when they listen to audio books while following the story in the paper book Audio books has narration and sound effects and can certainly instill your child’s love for reading and expression.

You can select a vast range of audio books from the following categories:

Arts & Drama Biography Business Crime & Thrillers Fiction Foreign Language Study Health & Recreation History Humor Juvenile Misc Radio Shows Religion & Spiritual Self Help TV & Film!

Business Professionals: Are You Part Of The Download Audio Books Trend Yet?

Are you are a business professional? Then you are among the busiest of people in this world. They are often on the go during almost every waking hour and simply do not have the time they need to sit down and read a good book, let alone read a business book.

Typically, as you are a business professional you can have so many things going on all at once, it is difficult sometimes to even find time for family and friends let alone reading, which is where an audio business book comes in extremely handy.

If you have not started to download audio books from the internet you are missing a real treat. They are providing many business people with a great opportunity to use their time in a really effective way.

Today, your questions about audio books are answered. We will explain just how they can help the busy professional.

Can an audio business book help me manage my time?

Absolutely. With audio books, you are making the most of your time and effort. It takes a great deal of time to read a book page by page. How many people do you know that have the ability to read and drive at the same time? Is it really all that easy to eat and read at the same time? How about walking and reading or exercising and reading? None of which are particularly easy or even possible. So instead of having to take time out of your busy day for reading your book, now you can listen to an audio business book.

What formats do audio books come in?

What is great about audio books is that they cater to everyone, with the different varieties of formats available. For example, thanks to MP3 format you can download them to your MP3 player and listen while you walk, exercise, eat, and ride the subway or carry out almost any activity really.

With CD format, you can pop the CD into your portable CD player, your car CD player, or your home CD player and listen while you are on the way to work, doing your household chores, or exercising as well. The cassette format is still very popular today, but to download audio books has become so easy and fast, not to mention cheap that they are overtaking in the CD format in popularity.

How does an audio book help a professional?

Well, if you think about it, you often need to learn new skills and information that pertains to your business. Perhaps you have a client that speaks only a foreign language, instead of your native tongue. Well, there are audio books available that can help you learn a foreign language, all the while you are getting your work done, or making the most out of the little free time you get.

What types of audio books are there?

When it comes to the download audio books for business, there are many different varieties, such as foreign language, management, marketing as well as books on different programs, software, and techniques. A lot of research materials for projects and meetings can be found on audio books as well. An audio business book allows you to make the most out of your workday and personal time, which is something a busy professional does not get a great deal of time to enjoy.

Mp3 Audio Books – Traditional Mediums of Knowledge

Today, we shall apprise you with the world of MP3 Audio books. To begin with, an audio book implies a recorded spoken program that does not contain music. The growing popularity of portable music players like the iPod has given a push to the audio books market. The MP3 audio books include a set of literature that is recorded in a digital form. This digitally recorded form is subsequently downloaded into an MP3 player. These info-packed audio books are available at a very affordable price in different genres. Quite often, an audio book is created using the text-to- speech software.

MP3 Audio books are fast replacing the traditional mediums of knowledge like audio cassettes with study material from books, magazines and other reference sources. One can easily use a portable audio player to record and store the MP3 books. What’s more, one can even play and re-play them any number of times whilst commuting from and to one’s work place. One can listen to these MP3 files while remaining on the move as in one can listen to them at any time and from any place. One can listen to an MP3 audio book using his computer, mobile phone, Personal Digital Assistant, Compact Disc MP3 portable player, Play Station Portable, an iPod or even a DVD player.

These MP3 audio books are specially useful for educating young children. It has been observed that many times children tend to forget what they are taught in the classroom. Regular use of these digital books can aid them to recall their lessons in a short period of time without any hassle. These days more and more number of parents are using these digital devices to teach their children in a fun-filled way. In addition to this, a number of schools are using these digital books to teach blind students with unbelievable positive results.

Many self-help audio books ranging from public speaking to learning the art of meditation are available in the market. A huge number of online stores are selling mp3 audio books to the customers on a variety of subjects. The Audio Books have received wide public appreciation.

The History Of Audio Books

It’s really amazing that you can get the exact value listening to an audio book while doing your normal chores as you would reading it.

Certain experts even say information sinks in more when we are not paying direct attention to them.

But when did this audio book phenomenon really start? In other words, what’s the history of audio books?

From all indications, audio books look like a very recent invention, right?

WRONG!

It is very easy to make the assumption that audio books are a recent invention because of the mention of CDs, downloadable digital formats, MP3s, PDAs and other technological jargons each time audio books are discussed. But audio books started a long time ago.

To know how long audio books have been, it is pertinent to understand exactly what audio books are.

Forget about any other jargon you have heard, audio books are simply books that are recorded to be heard, instead of read.

That being the case, such recordings of books in audio formats have been around for a very long time. If you want to be specific, it is safe to say they were first introduced over half a century ago.

It could even be longer, if you include the Library of Congress recordings made especially for the American Foundation for the Blind and distributed free throughout the U.S.

However, according to Robin Whitten, the editor and founder of the only magazine which is dedicated solely to the audio book industry:

Audiofile–http://www.AudioFileMagazine.com, Caedmon (now a subsidiary of Harper Collins Publishers) can be credited to have started the recordings of literature as far back as 50 years ago.

Going further, he said Caedmon was just a small company way back then in New York, which started recording the audio of great authors and poets of the 1950s. Specifically, he said one of the earliest recordings were by greats such as Dylan Thomas, T.S. Eliot, Fitzgerald and Robert Frost.

What happened then was that they were simply recorded while doing their own works and made as vinyl records.

But these early recordings can arguably pass off for the first collection of audio books ever.

However, the transition of these book recordings into audiocassette tapes didn’t happen until the late 1970s up to the 1980s. From thence, it blossomed until audio books in audiocassette tapes came to be accepted by all and sundry.

For whatever reason however, the audio book phenomenon didn’t really kick off until the 1990s.

And with the transition from audiocassette technology into CDs, more people have become interested in audio books.

With the advent of the Internet and its paraphernalia, audio books have now transited from vinyl records, audiocassette taps and CDs into downloadable digital formats that can be listened to with a desktop computer, laptop computer, PDAs, etc.

If you are still interested in “going back in time” you can get the original book recordings that started this audio book industry.

Impossible?

Not really.

Some of those early 1950s analog recordings by Caedmon which were performed by the greats of those days can be purchased today on the Internet.

For example, recently I was able to browse the Internet thoroughly and found the original recording of “The Lord of the Rings” as read by J.R.R. Tolken.

You can find that classic you have always dreamt of in audio book format if you search hard enough on the Internet.

Buy Audio Books Online: Join the Revolution That is Currently Taking Place

Audible.com is perhaps the best place from where you ought to buy audio books online, because here you can find books on romance, history, literature and a whole lot of other categories as well. So, if you are looking for a book such as King’s Oak that has been written by Anne Rivers Siddons, Audible.com will provide you with an excellent option. To help you in buying the right audio books online, Audible provides a small description about the book and this in turn will help you make up your mind as to which audio book to buy and decorate the bookshelves in your home.

Audiobooksonline.Com Is A Good Source

Another good option as far as buying audio books online goes is to check out audiobooksonline.co.uk. Among several categories for you to choose from there are biographies, fiction, comedy, children’s, classics, non-fiction, crime and bestsellers as well as business. You can be sure that whatever your interest is this is one place from where you will be able to buy audio books online that will surely suit all of your needs.

It is places such as Audible and Audiobooksonline that makes the buying process very simple as they will provide you with an easy ordering system and along with a wide range of audio book selections to choose from; it is little wonder that people generally start to gravitate to these sites whenever the urge overcomes them to buy audio books online.

For those who have an unbridled passion for reading and who also have very little time to spare in order to read their favorite novels or books, audio books are surely the best solution for their reading requirements. Places such as Audible and Audiobooksonline have gathered together the best selection of audio books – is it on CD, tape or even ready to download – and so you will easily be able to buy audio books online from them and then use your ears to listen to the narration of the book even whilst driving, doing normal household chores or even whilst performing exercises.

The fact of the matter is that even if your little one wants to read Horrid Henry or you want to enjoy a gripping crime thriller; buying audio books online makes perfect sense; not only will your child stay busy and out of trouble, but you can also feel the excitement as the action unfolds over the speakers of your Mp3 player or audio system.

If you have savored the enjoyment of being able to listen to audio books online, you will no doubt have become a convert to this new form of reading. It follows that you will also try and convince your friends and family members to also follow suit. The fact of the matter is that once you have bought audio books online you will always be able to find the time to go through your favorite novel – even while being busy with other chores. So, why waste time pouring over pages of a paperback; join the new revolution that is taking place today and find a new and rich world of entertainment in the audio book.

Behind the Scenes Creation of Audio Books

Many people have discovered the joys of listening to their favorite fiction authors on audio book, but not many realize the great detail and behind the scenes preparation that goes into the recording and production of an audio book. The total length of the audio book versions of the immensely popular “Harry Potter” series, for instance, is 117 hours and four minutes. According to officials at Listening Library, the Random House division that publishes the audio books, it would take five days to listen straight to all seven books. The final audio book in the series, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” alone, s 21 hours, 38 minutes long and consists of 17 CDs or 12 audio cassettes. The narrator for all seven “Harry Potter” audio books is English actor Jim Dale, who has won Grammy awards for his performances of more than 200 characters in the fiction series. He holds the record for creating the most voices in an audio book in the Guinness Book of World Records. Recording audio books is tricky, says Dale, who only saw his material two or three days before his recording was to begin. And he never knew where the story was going as he never got the chance to read the entire book before he started. On a good day, Dale read the audio books at a rate of 18 to 20 pages an hour, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. with several breaks to protect his voice. It usually took ten days to complete the audio book recordings. The published print version of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” is 784 pages, and it required almost two and a half weeks to record the audio book. The publishers kept digital files of all the voices Dale used so that he could recreate them for each audio book. But he had to take into the account the aging of the main characters Harry, Ron and Hermione, who started out as 10 and 11 in “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” and who are now 17 and 18 in “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.” For new characters, Dale used a tape recorder to record one or two sentences in a new voice and noted the place in the text. At the studio he would rewind until he found the right voice and play it back to refresh his memory before recording the audio book. The producers were great sticklers to being absolutely verbatim to the text of the audio books, and Dale admits there were many mistakes, especially when he stumbled on words not on the author’s list. He would have to record it in context in several ways to account for every possible pronunciation. “If she says ‘someone laughs, ha, ha, ha, and I do four ha’s,’ I am stopped and told, ‘Just do three,” says Dale.