NEWS 2000
Mibrary Announces Finalists for the Inaugural Alan Kay Award for eBook Innovation Winner to be Announced at Book Tech West Conference
by Gayle Fee and Laura Raposa
NEW YORK, Nov. 21 /PRNewswire/ -- Mibrary, the roaming digital library software company,
today announced the finalists for the company's first annual award recognizing the largest
contributor to the advancement and popularization of electronic books. The winner of the
will be announced prior to the keynote address at the BookTech West 2000 conference in
San Francisco on December 11. Mibrary's award is named for Dr. Alan Kay, widely considered
to be a founding father of the eBook.
The finalists, from which the winner of the Alan Kay Award for eBook Innovation will be
chosen, include:
* Stephen King's Philtrum Press: For the tremendous exposure he gave to the electronic
book format through the release of his best-seller "Riding The Bullet", as well as
publishing his newest novel, "The Plant" exclusively in electronic installments.
* Gemstar (NASDAQ:GMST): For the company's development and licensing of two of the most
popular dedicated electronic reading devices, the REB 1100 and the REB 1200.
* Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT): For the company's Microsoft Reader and ClearType
technologies, which brought ebooks to over 1 million consumers in the past six months
alone.
"It is a great honor to be mentioned in connection with this award," said author
Stephen King. "The e-book revolution has been one of the most exciting things to
happen to me in the last two or three years, and I am delighted to think that I
have had even a small part to play in changing the way the culture reads and expanding
the market place for good books."
The winner of this annual award will be selected by popular vote at the Mibrary Web
site http://awards.mibrary.com. Final balloting to determine the winner will conclude
at midnight on Friday, December 1st.
The winner will receive the Steuben Pillar Crystal created by noted designer David
Dowler. In addition, Mibrary will make a $5,000 contribution in the name of the
winner to the Association of American Publishers' "Get Caught Reading" program.
"The future of publishing -- both electronic and print -- depends on how well we
capture the imagination of a new generation of readers, and that's what 'Get Caught
Reading' is all about," Pat Schroeder, president and CEO of the American Association
of Publishers said at the outset of the voting. "We're delighted that Mibrary has made
support of 'Get Caught Reading' an integral part of this new award that recognizes
special contributions to the development of eBooks."
"We're excited to see who will eventually be named the winner of Mibrary's first Alan
Kay Award for eBook Innovation," said James Alexander, Chief Executive Officer of
Mibrary. "Each of the three finalists have contributed immensely to popularizing the
ebook and proving that it is a viable route for the publishing industry."
About Mibrary
Mibrary provides roaming digital library software and infrastructure delivering
convenience and portability for consumers while giving online retailers an automated,
outsourced option for delivering high customer satisfaction at a reasonable cost. The
Company's hosted application and deployed infrastructure are built around its patent-
pending Mibrary KeyChain(TM) technology. Mibrary KeyChain is a pervasive computing
solution that helps consumers manage their entire digital content collections in one
place while providing access to this content anytime, anywhere through tethered or
wireless devices. Mibrary and Mibrary KeyChain are trademarks of Mibrary.com Inc.
Visit http://www.mibrary.com for more information about the company.