Buzz About Blio
Blio in the Press
CNET, Jan 2010 | CES: Ray Kurzweil tries to build a better e-reader
“The Blio software allows for a number of interesting enhancements over standard e-books. In one example, Kurzweil shows a children's picture book of the “Three Little Pigs” with the book synchronized to the human-narrated audiobook. As the audio goes on, the word being read can be highlighted. That, Kurzweil says, allows children to improve their reading more quickly.”
Engadget, Jan 2010 | Blio e-reader software hands-on
“Regardless, of where the Blio software ends up we really dig it and it approaches digital reading in a whole new way. [...] Blio software aims to preserve the traditional book or magazine format by keeping its layout, fonts, images, but also to meld it with digital interactivity.”
NPR, Jan 2010 | Blio: Perhaps The Future Of Books?
“A company called knfb Reading Technology is about to launch eReader software called Blio. I watched a demo of Blio this afternoon. Demoed on a laptop and iPhone, I was impressed. eReaders like the Kindle and the Nook only let you see the book in black and white. Blio brings back the color. It's perfect for children's books.”
PCMag, Jan 2010 | Kurzweil's Blio: A Killer Ebook Reader For Windows
“In addition to all the readers features you would expect, like adjustable font sizes and downloadable books, Blio is designed to take advantage of the color screens found on iPods, netbooks, and laptops. The Blio format enables publishers to embed Web content directly into pages, so that new content can be dynamically.”
IDG, including NetworkWorld, Industry Standard, PC Mag, Jan 2010
Blio E-Book Platform: No Reader (Yet), But Great Graphics
“Where Blio really shines is in its ability to display beautiful graphics on a PC monitor. In a demo at the Microsoft CES booth, a heavily illustrated children's book looked terrific on an LCD monitor—as did pages from a medical anatomy textbook. ”
Seattle Times, Jan 2010 | CES: Blio isn't doing an e-reader device, but it is making software
“Another company is vying to make an e-reader, but it is taking the software route. Unlike the software on devices from Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble, the Blio reader shows books in full color and takes the interactivity beyond navigating pages and shopping for books.”
ZDnet, Jan 2010 | Blio might be the most exciting announcement at CES
“The one highlight of Steve Ballmer’s keynote was his announcement of the new Blio software from Ray Kurzweil, the mind behind Kurzweil Educational Systems and their range of assistive technology. While Blio could certainly have implications in the assistive tech realm, this could finally be the application that brings rich, interactive e-textbooks to a variety of devices.”
CES, Jan 2010 | Steve Ballmer Demos Blio During Keynote Presentation (Video)
“Blio takes ebooks and reading on your PC to a whole new level.”
CNBC, Jan 2010 | Kurzweil Unveils ‘Blio’ (Video)
“Ray Kurzweil, the tech guru who invented voice recognition, shows CNBC’s Jim Goldman his next big thing: Blio.”
Financial Times Tech Blog, Dec 2009 | The future of eReaders by Ray Kurzweil
“The futurist Ray Kurzweil has come up with a major advance on eReader software that consumers can try out as early as next month. Blio, available free for the PC and iPhone, offers features such as 3D page turns and a bookshelf where readers can rotate books to see backcover and spine.”
Wired News, Dec 2009 | Blio: Ray Kurzweil Reinvents the Book
“Ray Kurzweil, whose Singularity theory has become a cult hit, gets into the e-book fray by launching a new free e-reader software designed for PCs and iPhones.”
MacNN, Dec 2009 | Kurzweil preps e-book format for iPhone, tablets
“Well-known futurist Ray Kurzweil is about to introduce a new e-book format specifically optimized for devices like the iPhone or tablets. Called Blio, the standard is intended to overcome the limitations of digital text by allowing for complex image and text formatting, such as diagrams, without sacrificing the ability to search the text. It would support full color and allow text-to-speech much…”
The Huffington Post, Dec 2009 | Kurzweil’s Blio Brings Color And Pictures To eReaders
“Ray Kurzweil, who thought up pretty much everything, ever, has entered the e-book fray. Due to debut at CES in Las Vegas next week, Kurzweil’s Blio comes from a completely different angle than the current e-ink readers.”
Engadget, Dec 2009 | Blio seeks to take digital reading in a new, more inclusive, and colorful direction
“As if we didn’t have enough pretenders in the ebook space, here’s Ray Kurzweil with a new format of his own and a bagful of ambition to go with it. Set for a proper unveiling at CES in a week’s time, the Blio format and accompanying application are together intended to deliver true-to-life color reproductions of the way real books appear. Interestingly, the software has been developed in…”
Gizmodo Australia, Dec 2009 | First Look At Blio, Ray Kurzweil’s Tablet-Friendly Ebook Format
“Blio, officially debuting next week at CES, lets you read your ebooks as they’re intended to look on paper. Clearly, Kurzweil is signalling his choice of tablets over e-ink, and his first shots are definitely persuasive.”
Gizmodo, Dec 2009 | First Look at Blio, Ray Kurzweil’s Tablet-Friendly Ebook Format [Ereader]
“Blio, officially debuting next week at CES, lets you read your ebooks as they’re intended to look on paper. Clearly, Kurzweil is signaling his choice of tablets over e-ink, and his first shots are…”
Press Releases
KNFB Reading Technology, Inc., Jan 2010 | KNFB CEO Ray Kurzweil Unveils Game-Changing eReader That Delivers Full Color, Multimedia Functionality Across Various Platforms (PDF)
“Blio is without peer when it comes to the reader experience,” said knfb Founder and voice-recognition inventor Ray Kurzweil. “eBooks should be more than digital copies of a printed page. But the e-readers on the market today have been stuck in neutral and don’t offer the reader or the publisher what they want or need. So we moved the experience from the boring 16 shades of grey text to an exciting level. And we do it without adding another costly piece of hardware to lug around.”
The eReader Revolution
The Idea Logical Blog, Dec 2009 | Baker & Taylor has the next big thing in ebooks. Really!
“Based . . . on the (Blio) demo we saw from [K-NFB Reading Technology, and] Baker & Taylor... the presentation is the best I've ever seen. The type is crisp and sharp, it has full multiple-media functionality (video, graphics, TTV, links to the web), and it does tricks, my favorite of which is that you can see (on a PC screen) many pages at a time dealt out like a deck of cards. Then you find the ones you want and hone in on them. There are many ways to use that capability, particularly for an illustrated how-to book or a textbook.. . .If the ebook rendering and toolkit put to shame everything that has been done so far (and they do), the same is true of the retailing presentation. The virtual books look like physical books on a shelf. They have spines. You click on one and pull it down, rotate it, open it, and flip through the pages. . . .Blio is raising the bar for all. . .”
PC World, May 2009 | Bye-bye Kindle, E-reader Screens Coming for Netbooks
“Netbook makers will soon play a larger role in the e-reader market...designed to work in three modes: a black-and-white e-ink mode for reading text documents and e-books, and two color modes, designed for use indoors or in bright sunlight, that are more suitable for Web surfing and video playback. ...Beyond the screen, netbook users will need e-reader software, which is already available from several companies...”
Ad Week, Oct 2009 | E-Readers, Will They Save the Publishing Industry?
“...there's reason to believe that the audience for e-readers will grow significantly in coming years... Stirring up even more buzz are heated rumors that tech giants Apple and Microsoft are set to produce competing reader/mini computing devices that will take the category to another level.”
Computerworld, Dec 2009 | Seven trends are conspiring to usher in a tsunami of tablets
“The rise of e-books: Everybody is talking about e-books. And although dedicated e-book readers will always be with us, most people will read electronic books with cell phones and touch tablets. Ignore the naysayers. Tablets will be great for reading books. You'll even be able to turn the page by flicking your finger across the top right of the page, kind of like a paper book...”
Financial Times, Aug 2009 | E-book advocates point to a content evolution
“Forrester Research expects the US e-reader market to grow from 1m units to 12m by 2012 as new devices offer wireless connections, touch screens and, in time, color displays.”
The Wall Street Journal, Nov 2009 | Condé Preparing E-Reader Version of Wired
“...most existing e-readers don’t allow for color or many...design elements. Wired editor Chris Anderson said, the next wave of e-readers and platforms...will incorporate the rich design and ‘lean-back elements’ that are...chief strengths.”