Feels like time is flying, and here we have yet another week of what feels like administration. While the Apple DevForums were still offline for most of the week, I spent days seemingly on research. What I discovered was that in order to sell books on the iBookstore I need to have an ITIN from the IRS in America. The IRS’ website says that these can be obtained through a worldwide network of accountancy firms, but when I contacted one, I got a call back to tell me the programme had been cancelled. Further research with the Australian US Consulate website revealed that I can obtain one of these directly, but I need to have a copy of my passport (which I have to mail to them along with the photocopy) verified by them in order to meet the necessary identification requirements.
This of course means I have to have a current passport. Mine expired a couple of years ago, so a big new expense just popped up. I’m applying with the ArtStart administrators to modify my funding agreement in order to shift some funding away from a couple of things that aren’t so necessary in order to cover this.
The DevForums finally came back online halfway through the week, so I was able to ask some questions I had, and I’ve been working on my second exercise for my photography course. The primary lesson for this week was white balance, so I ended up doing 3 sets of images – shooting the same subject and going through all the white balance options on the camera under 3 different light settings. It was a good way to get a handle on what colour light from various sources is, and how cameras attempt to compensate for it.
The week has ended with finally locating a good, plain english, no assumed prior knowledge guide to constructing EPUB ebooks. It’s astoundingly difficult to find this sort of information – everyone seems to either assume too much, or parrot some specs, or be trying to get you to buy their book on the subject. So, I’m now starting to get a handle on how I can most easily translate my comics to the EPUB format, and once that’s done, I can get The Metaning out as a saleable product.