Bloggers, amateur photographers and would-be storytellers are being given the opportunity to turn their work into interactive eBooks available on the iOS platform. What's more, they might be able to make money from their endeavours. 

Blurb, a San Francisco-based creative publishing and marketing platform, has introduced the new eBook capabilities which it hopes will enable users to get their work seen by a bigger audience as well as earning a few bucks in the process.

Pocket-lint sat down for a chat with Eileen Gittins, CEO and Founder of Blurb.

“It’s a new outlet for bloggers,” enthuses Gittins. “If you want to make a book, you should be able to make a book, in whatever medium is appropriate to your audience. Blurb makes that possible”

All the tools are provided through Blurb’s online eBook editor, with the ability to embed audio, video and hyperlinks into the virtual pages - all of which can be added directly and easily from a computer or smartphone.

Any material you produce can then be sold (or given away for free) via the Blurb website, with Blurb taking a 20 per cent profit on any sales. Blurb will also help authors submit their eBooks to the Apple iBookstore, though this depends on Apple giving the green light to any submissions.

This idea of people who already have a blog, photo or video collection for example being able to formulate it into a book or brochure and then see a financial return is something Gittins is keen to endorse. 

“People who already have content, instead of thinking, ‘Right, I’m going to write a book’, realise they already have a blog, a video or are publishing pictures to Flickr or Instagram," she says.

“They can then take that content - which today you might not be able to monetise as a blogger - and curate it into a book, which means all of a sudden you have an asset you can legitimately charge for.”

Authors can sell copies of their eBooks through their own websites or blogs, as well as Amazon - though expect a submission charge with the latter.

Should you need hard copies of your eBook, Blurb can deliver physical versions in about a week, depending on how many you order. Any videos you may have embedded into your eBook will appear as still images on the relevant page.

Though the Blurb eBooks are available only on the iOS platform, Gittins told us an Android version was something we could expect in the future.

For more information on how to get your own eBook published check out www.blurb.co.uk/ebook.