Open eBook Forum usability study findings published

By Planet eBook Editor
April 4, 2002

The first results of the Open eBook Forum's usability study, carried out by Open eBook Forum Research Fellow Harold Henke, have now been completed and are online and available for public consumption. According to the original announcement the study is to result in "a series of white papers designed to assist publishers, retailers, and manufacturers with their focus on eBook trend lines and customer needs."

Overall it appears as though feature-wise the industry has done its homework and has done a good job in providing the sort of functionality readers expect when they use electronic reading software and hardware. Features centered around those already in popular use by book and eBook readers.

The 163 survey participants came from a range of places, including eBook conference attendees, trade organizations involved with the promotion of eBooks and ePublishing, published researchers of eBooks and associations and groups involved in the creation or use of eBooks.

Top Ten Most Desirable Features

  1. Open to Last Page Viewed
  2. Title Page
  3. Text Search
  4. Bookmarks
  5. Table of Contents
  6. Page Numbers
  7. Bookshelf -- ability to categorize, index and search across a group of eBooks
  8. Electronic Updates -- update an eBook automatically via the Web or a network
  9. Personalization -- ability to modify such things as color, font size, layout and so on
  10. Progression Bar -- a simple line that indicates linearly where a reader is up to in an eBook

First Sale Rights

Unsurprisingly one of the key discussion points in the survey results was one of the key issues facing the eBook industry: how to deal with the concept of first sale rights in the electronic space: how to deal with users wanting to able to use an eBook on multiple devices, to donate, lend and even resell.

The report is available for download once you have completed their survey.