Playster online entertainment service

Posted on November 8, 2015 by WordsAndPeace

A new online entertainment service is coming to life, it’s called

PLAYSTER

WHAT IS IT?

An all-inclusive digital multimedia streaming platform (website and App), possibly the first to offer all of the following together:

Playster 2

HOW MUCH DOES IT COST?

$9.95/month if you choose one media type – unlimited use
$24.95/month for the bundle of 4 medias – unlimited use
30-day free trial

www.playster.com
www.facebook.com/playster
https://twitter.com/PlaysterMedia

WHAT DO I THINK ABOUT IT?

I was granted free service for a few days to try it and tell you what I think about it, especially about their ebooks and audiobooks

the reader is nice, with ability to change font size, and with Table of Contents for your ebooks
very convenient to choose the media you want on the same service, with built in players, so you can read ebooks, listen to audiobooks or watch movies all with the same tool – you do need to download a special player for Games
the service is new and somewhat still in Beta, and it will expand, so I noticed it has lots of popular books, but not exactly that recent
thus the New Releases section is not impressive so far, but again I believe this is going to change
I was asked to focus more on books, but I did have a look at the Movies. I noticed there’s no Classics category! The list of Documentaries is very poor. Again, the database is surely going to grow on a regular basis

I’d like to give more details about a few other features.
The Search function is a very important tool for me, like the Catalog of my Public Library for instance. If you just like browsing and reading whatever comes up, then no problem, enjoy.
But if you are like me and spend time looking fr specific authors or titles, know that the Search tool needs some more refining:

I tried searching for Kate Morton, a favorite author of mine. She has a brand new release, The Lake House that I recently reviewed. I believe her to be a very popular author AND an excellent writer, so I thought it would be a good test. Well:
“Morton” gave me Merton – I do love Thomas Merton, but seriously there is NO connection between both authors, apart from a different vowel in their last name. It also gave me Mormon…
so then I tried Kate Morton. It gave me other Kates, but not the one I was looking for!
I was getting worried they had no books by her! I finally found one!: The Secret Keeper.
When I clicked on The Secret Keeper, it said it was in the categories Fiction, Literary (good!), and from there clicking on that category, I was able to find other books in the same genre.
But it’s weird that when you are on the Main page for Categories, the Literary Fiction category is not present. Neither the historical fiction category either, if I remember correctly.
One neat thing if you type a title in the General Search, you get results from all the medias included in the service.
It would be even better if these results were classified by media. Instead, they seem to be randomly mixed up, with a few ebooks first, then audiobooks, then movies, then again ebooks, as an example.
Another detail, hilarious or totally irrelevant, depending on how you look at it, is the Suggestions offered when you add a book to your library. For instance, I added “Recipe for Murder” (by Nancy Drew), and the read-alike suggestions I got were books with Recipe in the title…

So to make a long story short, I think this service has a lot of potential and I’m sure down the line they will expand their databases and smooth out the issues I highlighted here.

In the meantime, and if you are on a small budget like me,
are you aware your local public library has amazing digital tools available for you for free, from the comfort of your house?
I teach online to students from all over the country, in fact all over the world. And talking with them, I’m amazed at how many people have no clue what’s available in their own public library – and they pay for these services with their taxes.
Go have a look at your public library website. Most libraries in the US, even tiny ones, have a page with online services.
Mine offers ebooks, audiobooks, music, magazines, movies, newspapers, and classes – no games (which Playster has), with a choice of different platforms for some of these.
They even have a digital multimedia streaming platform, it’s called Hoopla, and it offers ebooks, audiobooks, music, and movies! With a great selection, and it’s free when you access it trough your library website.

I’M CURIOUS, ARE YOU USING
ALL THESE DIGITAL SERVICES FROM YOUR LIBRARY?
ARE YOU HAPPY WITH THEM?

Learning About Audiobooks – Audiobook Week Discussion

Posted on June 21, 2013 by WordsAndPeace

Day 1: 2012-2013: My audiobook year
Day 2: How Do You Choose Your Audiobooks?
Day 3: Audiobook Week Mid-Week Meme
Day 4: Audiobook Tasks

Today’s prompt is:

Where do you learn about great audiobook titles?

I learn about great audiobook titles:

mostly through all the bloggers I follow. That’s where I know if it’s better to read a book or listen to it – Ready Player One was the best example for that
through Audiobook Jukebox, which posts reviews of bloggers – mine are there. A great website where you can as well receive audiobooks for free to review
through Jen’s Friday meme Sound Bytes: she posts an audiobook review, and you can link any audiobook review you wrote that day or that week
through the yearly Audiobook Challenge, hosted by Teresa

Nothing really original, I bet you are all going to mention these in your answers

Buy your audiobooks? Share your secrets with the rest of us!

First, let me say I have never bought an audiobook, and actually I extremely rarely buy any book.

I have a fantastic library, which is part of a group of about 80 libraries, and still if the book I want is not there, I can get it for free with inter-library loan, from any other library, public or even academic, in my state!

No desire or need to use audible or the like.

So the first place for me to find audiobooks is my public library, either on site, with books on CDs or playaways; or through the online databases, we have 2: Overdrive and OneClick Digital, which allow me to listen directly on my ipod touch. I would think by now, almost all libraries, if not all, have probably something like this available on their website.
I also receive audiobooks from publishers for free, for review, Bring Up The Bodies was the latest – through Audiobook Jukebox!
Sometimes I want to listen to classics, and there are good free services. I would recommend Librivox. You can get these books through a free app on your i-devices, I use Book Player. It has a large library included

Nothing really original here

We’d particularly love to know what narrators or publishers are active in social media or do a great job communicating with listeners.

Thanks to Twitter, Goodreads, and Facebook, in the order of how much it happens for me, it has become so much easier to get in touch with authors, publishers, and narrators, and to get their prompt answer and feedback. Orlagh Cassidy (@OrlaghCassidyFN) has been great at interacting with me as a book blogger, even re-tweeting some of my tweets not directly connected with her.