http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/ Copyright 2008 Wed, 07 May 2008 11:08:57 -0500 http://www.movabletype.org/?v=3.2 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss We're taking ben's leaving as an opportunity to think about the institute's mission and the role of if:book within that context. and most importantly we're trying to figure out the best way to involve the readers of if:book in this... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/05/placeholder.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/05/placeholder.html Wed, 07 May 2008 11:08:57 -0500 Two weeks ago the Instittue for Multimedia Literacy (IML) at USC held a ceremony for the first graduating class of students with honors in multimedia scholarship. two of the students wrote their theses in Sophie. Based on their experience, Holly... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/exciting_announcement.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/exciting_announcement.html Sophie Wed, 30 Apr 2008 05:42:35 -0500 A new research paper by Bruce Mason and Sue Thomas on A Million Penguins, the controversial wiki novel created last year by Penguin Books makes fascinating reading. It includes amongst other delights an analysis of the activities of the contributor... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/fail_again_fail_better_have_fu.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/fail_again_fail_better_have_fu.html research Wed, 30 Apr 2008 05:20:56 -0500 Longtime visitors to if:book have heard about Sophie, the reading/writing environment we've been working on since the inception of the institute in 2004. Version 1.0 of Sophie was quietly released last month. We'll make a number of Sophie-related posts over... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/sophie_vs_powerpoint_and_keyno.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/sophie_vs_powerpoint_and_keyno.html Sun, 27 Apr 2008 17:12:38 -0500 I found this new site, 217babel.com set up by Brighton based journalist and writer William Shaw, to be a nice example of an online fiction that actually gets you reading rather than admiring it awhile and then glazing over or... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/stories_and_places.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/stories_and_places.html web Thu, 24 Apr 2008 05:55:01 -0500 "While businesses based on the sale of paper may or may not be in crisis, those of us with a wider responsibility for ensuring our literary culture thrives have wonderful new tools with which to encourage participation and communication. The... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/floing_again.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/floing_again.html literature Thu, 24 Apr 2008 04:43:32 -0500 The future has only been a topic of interest for a relatively short while. For most of time the future was likely to be pretty much like the past except we’d be dead then and replaced by replica offspring –... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/tomorrow_and_tomorrow.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/tomorrow_and_tomorrow.html future Tue, 22 Apr 2008 04:34:10 -0500 Omnisio, a new Y Combinator startup, lets people grab clips from the Web and mash them up. Users can integrate video with slide presentations, and enable time-sensitive commenting in little popup bubbles layered on the video. MediaCommons was founded partly... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/interface_culture.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/interface_culture.html interface Mon, 21 Apr 2008 10:43:01 -0500 Sebastian Mary and i were talking last week about the need to re-conceive the format of if:book so that interesting posts which initiate lively discussions don't get pushed to the bottom. a few days later i met with Rene Daalder... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/a_new_blog_format_avoids_the_t.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/a_new_blog_format_avoids_the_t.html design Fri, 18 Apr 2008 14:10:36 -0500 I've been making my way through Robert Bringhurst's The Tree of Meaning: Language, Mind and Ecology, which came out a couple years ago in Canada, but which is now getting an American release from Counterpoint. Bringhurst is probably best known... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/a_return_to_orality.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/a_return_to_orality.html bringhurst Fri, 18 Apr 2008 13:14:12 -0500 You've probably noticed that things have been relatively quiet around here lately. I haven't been on vacation or anything like that. Rather I've been figuring out the future, not of the book, but of me. After much personal consideration, and... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/changes.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/changes.html thefuture Thu, 17 Apr 2008 09:37:16 -0500 Kyle Bean, student at the University of Brighton sent me this nice example of his work. More hybrid books on his site http://kylebean.co.uk... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/illumination.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/illumination.html art Wed, 16 Apr 2008 17:04:56 -0500 I was on the underground making my way to the London Book Fair yesterday, hoping to stand out from the crowds of frantic publishers jostling there by carrying over my shoulder the fabulously pretentious “Proust Society of America” book bag... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/a_la_recherche.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/a_la_recherche.html proust Wed, 16 Apr 2008 13:43:01 -0500 J.K. Rowling went to court today to try to stop someone from publishing a lexicon of Harry Potter characters. She says she wants to do it herself, but even if that gave her the right to stop others from doing... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/old_school_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/old_school_1.html jkrowling Mon, 14 Apr 2008 18:51:22 -0500 Wouldn't it be great if textbooks were published online with dynamic comment fields so that students like Matthew LaClair could raise these sorts of issues directly in the margin of the book. imagine what a terrific conversation might unfold and... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/daydreaming_about_a_better_tex.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/daydreaming_about_a_better_tex.html textbook Thu, 10 Apr 2008 16:39:35 -0500 Chances are that unless you're a mathematician or a physicist you don't know anything about TeX. TeX is a computerized typesetting system begun in the late 1970s; since the 1980s, it's been the standard way in which papers in the... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/thinking_about_tex.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/thinking_about_tex.html tex Fri, 04 Apr 2008 14:36:11 -0500 This is the narrative text for an NEH Digital Humanities Start-UP grant we just applied for. Narrative With the advent of the cd-rom in the late 80s, a few pioneering humanities scholars began to develop a new vocabulary for multi-layered,... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/where_minds_meet_new_architect.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/where_minds_meet_new_architect.html scholarship Thu, 03 Apr 2008 22:49:26 -0500 Hence the quiet around here.... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/writing_grants.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/writing_grants.html grants Thu, 03 Apr 2008 09:26:03 -0500 The announcement this morning of the launch in the UK of a new waterproof laptop looks like another nail in the coffin of the traditional paper book, as the new device at last makes it possible to read a downloaded... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/ereads_iwash.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/04/ereads_iwash.html e-books Tue, 01 Apr 2008 02:33:17 -0500 "Je n'ai fait celle-ci plus longue que parceque je n'ai pas eu le loisir de la faire plus courte." Pascal, Lettres provinciales, 16, Dec.14,1656. I used to co-edit Pick Me Up, a cult London digital newsletter. After some years perfecting... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/on_writing_less.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/on_writing_less.html brevity Mon, 31 Mar 2008 09:52:32 -0500 http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/against_reading.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/against_reading.html mikitabrottman Thu, 27 Mar 2008 22:50:47 -0500 At TED 2008, visual cartographers David Sibbet and Kevin Richards produced over 700 spontaneous sketches of the keynote presenters' ideas, using Autodesk visualization tools. These sketches have now been turned into The BIGVIZ, a downloadable 200-page interactive ebook. Parts... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/the_big_book_of_ted.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/the_big_book_of_ted.html visualization Thu, 27 Mar 2008 15:46:42 -0500 This morning, I received an envelope through the post. It contained two chapters of a pulp murder mystery, along with an invitation to a private gathering with the same title as the booklets: Looking For Headless. The gathering will... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/this_is_a_game_no_really_it_is_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/this_is_a_game_no_really_it_is_1.html Games Wed, 26 Mar 2008 14:26:28 -0500 I spent the weekend before last at the Center for Book Arts as part of their Fine Press Publishing Seminar for Emerging Writers. There I was taught to set type; not, perhaps, exactly what you'd expect from someone writing for... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/from_work_to_text_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/from_work_to_text_1.html typesetting Wed, 26 Mar 2008 13:06:03 -0500 A couple of weeks ago, I alluded to a new institutional partnership that's been in the works for some time. Well I'm thrilled to officially announce that the we are joining forces with the NYU Division of Libraries! From Carol... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/major_news_ifb_and_nyu_librari.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/major_news_ifb_and_nyu_librari.html library Tue, 25 Mar 2008 12:46:47 -0500 http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/a_serious_shot_at_screen_readi.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/a_serious_shot_at_screen_readi.html screen Mon, 24 Mar 2008 08:11:41 -0500 Ben posted a few weeks back about an intriguing new interactive project in the pipeline from Penguin. WeTellStories, produced for Penguin by ARG studio SixToStart is now out in the open. Comprising six stories based on Penguin Classics, released one... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/first_of_penguins_interactive.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/first_of_penguins_interactive.html ARG Fri, 21 Mar 2008 13:04:04 -0500 So Noah's just wrapped up the blog peer review of his manuscript in progress, and is currently debating whether to post the final, unfinished chapter. He's also just received the blind peer reviews from MIT Press and is in the... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/expressive_processing_post-gam.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/expressive_processing_post-gam.html reading Thu, 20 Mar 2008 03:27:25 -0500 I want to give a shout out to a wonderful new project by a dear friend of ours. So When Are You Going to Retire? is — or will be, or is in the process of becoming — a... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/so_when_are_you_going_to_retire.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/so_when_are_you_going_to_retire.html publishing Tue, 18 Mar 2008 13:18:40 -0500 http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/issue_magazine.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/issue_magazine.html design Tue, 18 Mar 2008 12:27:23 -0500 The following quote was in AP story i read in MIT's Technology Review this morning about Microsoft licensing Adobe's mobile Flash and PDF software. "Flash content is the most prolific content on the web today; it is the way people... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/hmmm_please_discuss.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/hmmm_please_discuss.html adobe Tue, 18 Mar 2008 05:57:37 -0500 If you're in the New York area, don't miss this. Friday, March 21, 2008, 7-9pm—New York, NY—125 Maiden Lane, 2nd Floor. FOR ONE NIGHT ONLY: Step inside three books, drink free beer and wine, and experience the future of the... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/step_inside_the_books_new_york.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/step_inside_the_books_new_york.html events Mon, 17 Mar 2008 17:31:15 -0500 In case you missed the news last week, Siva has locked up a deal with the University of California Press to publish the North American print edition of The Googlization of Everything. It's due out late summer, 2009. Profile will... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/googlization_of_everything_now.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/googlization_of_everything_now.html googlization Mon, 17 Mar 2008 15:36:10 -0500 It’s mainly the literary world that assumes fictional work to be best when the creation of only one person. Most TV shows, movies, games and comics are created by teams. But though creativity here is not bound by the Romantic... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/in_search_of_jenny_everywhere.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/in_search_of_jenny_everywhere.html comics Mon, 17 Mar 2008 00:12:18 -0500 It's all go on the digital publishing scene in the UK with Penguin launching their first ARG next week - go to www.wetellstories.co.uk for more details, and various big companies plotting experiments. Meanwhile this week Gail Rebuck, chief executive of... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/friday_projections_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/friday_projections_1.html publishing Fri, 14 Mar 2008 04:40:50 -0500 Alex Itin just cross-posted a wonderful new piece on his blog, and Vimeo. I watched it on Vimeo and was struck by the terrific back and forth discussion between Alex and the people who are looking at his work. It's... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/tradeoffs.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/tradeoffs.html Web2.0 Thu, 13 Mar 2008 14:13:09 -0500 Good news. Google has finally released an API (?) for Google Book Search: Web developers can use the Books Viewability API to quickly find out a book's viewability on Google Book Search and, in an automated fashion, embed a link... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/google_books_api.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/google_books_api.html books Thu, 13 Mar 2008 14:03:44 -0500 A quick note to point out Rosa B, a new online publication in French and English from the CAPC Museum of Contemporary Art Bordeaux and the Bordeaux School of Fine Arts. Their first issue, online now, is about contemporary publishing... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/rosa_b.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/rosa_b.html rosa Thu, 13 Mar 2008 07:48:11 -0500 The first two major ARGs to play out, The Beast and ilovebees, surprised their creators: the collective intelligence of thousands of players was taking down in hours puzzles that the puppetmasters had expected the community to wrestle with for days.... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/more_compelling_than_choice.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/more_compelling_than_choice.html ARG Wed, 12 Mar 2008 18:09:04 -0500 Buckle your seatbelts, we may be experiencing a bit of turbulence. We're in the process of migrating our server from Los Angeles, where for the past three and a half years it has resided, at the University of Southern California,... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/migrating_eastward.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/migrating_eastward.html technical Mon, 10 Mar 2008 00:23:59 -0500 Faber chief executive Stephen Page’s article in yesterday’s Guardian outlines some straightforward ways of taking advantage of social media, on-demand business models and so on in the interests of sustaining Faber into the 21st century. Push out content that brings... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/friday_musings_on_the_literary_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/friday_musings_on_the_literary_1.html print Fri, 07 Mar 2008 17:07:00 -0500 I finally got around to reading Nicholson Baker's essay in the New York Review of Books, "The Charms of Wikipedia," and it's... charming. Baker has a flair for idiosyncratic detail, which makes him a particularly perceptive and entertaining guide through... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/nicholson_baker_on_the_charms.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/nicholson_baker_on_the_charms.html wikipedia Fri, 07 Mar 2008 02:43:34 -0500 First Monday has a new special issue out devoted to unpacking the politics, economics and ethics of Web 2.0. Looks like lots of interesting stuff. From the preface by Michael Zimmer: Web 2.0 represents a blurring of the boundaries between... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/critical_perspectives_on_web_2.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/critical_perspectives_on_web_2.html Web2.0 Thu, 06 Mar 2008 01:13:43 -0500 Back in December we announced the launch of Flight Paths, a "networked novel" that is currently being written by Kate Pullinger and Chris Joseph with feedback and contributions from readers. At that point, the Web presence for the project was... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/flight_paths_20.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/flight_paths_20.html flightpaths Wed, 05 Mar 2008 01:10:13 -0500 We were recently alerted, via Grand Text Auto, to a new hypertext fiction environment on the Web called Hypertextopia: Hypertextopia is a space where you can read and write stories for the internet. On the surface, it looks like a... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/hypertextopia.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/03/hypertextopia.html hypertext Mon, 03 Mar 2008 12:57:41 -0500 "Writers of the world arise! It's time to throw off the shackles of traditional publishing contracts and face a brand new digital future with a brand new set of priorities." So starts an article on the Guardian 'Comment Is Free'... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/fight_path.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/fight_path.html publishing Thu, 28 Feb 2008 10:47:22 -0500 Engagdet points to an award winning Australian student design for an e-book reader that combines the gesture-based "multi-touch" interface of the iPhone with the e-ink display of the Kindle. LIVRE design concept — Nedzad Mujcinovic, Monash University "Interaction happens via... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/student_designer_envisions_a_m.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/student_designer_envisions_a_m.html design Wed, 27 Feb 2008 18:02:17 -0500 On the subject of major traditional media entities and cross-platform experimentation. Over in London last night Chris and I went to the launch event for Bow Street Runner, an online game launched by UK TV broadcaster Channel 4 to coincide... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/channel_4_goes_crossplatform.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/channel_4_goes_crossplatform.html ARG Wed, 27 Feb 2008 14:29:03 -0500 Following on last year's wiki novel, Penguin will soon launch another digital fiction experiment, this time focused on nonlinear storytelling. From Jeremy Ettinghausen on the Penguin blog: ...in a few weeks Penguin will be embarking on an experiment in storytelling... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/penguin_of_forking_paths.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/penguin_of_forking_paths.html fiction Tue, 26 Feb 2008 16:55:00 -0500 The Millions has an interesting interview with the South African-born, New York-resident writer Barry Yourgrau, who recently published a collection of "keitai" (cell phone) fiction in Japan. Known for bite-sized surrealist fables (as here), the hyper-compression of the cell phone... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/art_of_compression_barry_yourg.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/art_of_compression_barry_yourg.html keitai Mon, 25 Feb 2008 13:33:39 -0500 In a sense, Graham Rawle's novel Woman's World, just out in the United States from Counterpoint, is made for the internet. It's the sort of thing that you expect to see on Digg or Reddit: artist spends several years cutting... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/he_do_the_police_in_different_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/he_do_the_police_in_different_1.html graham Sat, 23 Feb 2008 19:08:16 -0500 Borders, in partnership with Lulu.com, has launched a comprehensive personal publishing platform, enabling anyone to design and publish their own (print) book and have it distributed throughout the Borders physical and online retail chain. Beyond the basic self-publishing tools, authors... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/borders_selfpublishing_and_the.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/borders_selfpublishing_and_the.html publishing Thu, 21 Feb 2008 14:16:08 -0500 If you haven't already, check out Siva Vaidhyanathan's excellent Chronicle of Higher Ed piece on privacy and surveillance: a review of several new books treating various aspects of the topic, but a great all-around thought piece. A taste: Certainly the... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/sivas_naked_in_the_nonopticon.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/sivas_naked_in_the_nonopticon.html privacy Tue, 19 Feb 2008 15:52:41 -0500 A thought-provoking "meta-post" from Noah Wardrip-Fruin on Grand Text Auto reflecting on the blog-based review of his new book manuscript four chapters (and weeks) into the process. Really interesting stuff, so I'm quoting at length: This week, when I was... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/conversation_revision_trust.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/conversation_revision_trust.html peer_review Mon, 18 Feb 2008 13:07:54 -0500 An article in Publishing News this week suggests that UK publishers are bracing themselves for the arrival on these shores of the Kindle or a rival to it soon. Much discussion of e-royalties is going on; HarperCollins and Random House... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/eread_all_about_it.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/eread_all_about_it.html publishing Fri, 15 Feb 2008 05:14:33 -0500 I meant to blog this earlier but it's still quite relevant, especially in light of other recent activity on the open access front. Last week, Danah Boyd announced that henceforth she would only publish in open access journals and urged... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/danah_boyds_closed_journal_boy.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/danah_boyds_closed_journal_boy.html academic Fri, 15 Feb 2008 00:46:35 -0500 The Harvard Crimson: The motion, which passed easily at yesterday’s Faculty meeting, grants Harvard a non-exclusive copyright over all articles produced by any current Faculty member, allowing for the creation of an online repository that would be “available to other... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/harvard_faculty_votes_overwhel.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/harvard_faculty_votes_overwhel.html harvard Fri, 15 Feb 2008 00:28:49 -0500 The U.S. presidential primaries in Virginia, Maryland and D.C. are not the only votes to watch today. The New York Times reports that arts and sciences faculty at Harvard are weighing in today on a proposed measure that would make... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/harvard_faculty_cast_vote_on_o.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/harvard_faculty_cast_vote_on_o.html openaccess Tue, 12 Feb 2008 10:45:26 -0500 In the Institute's London office we've been talking about how to get across the message that the book has been through permanent change throughout its history, to knock on the head the simplistic argument of good old page v bad... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/a_brief_history_of_book_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/a_brief_history_of_book_1.html book Tue, 12 Feb 2008 09:57:38 -0500 Over the next couple of days I'll be filling up my brain at the O'Reilly Tools of Change for Publishing conference — taking place, conveniently, here in New York. I'm giving a talk today called Books as Conversations, and participating... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/at_oreilly.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/at_oreilly.html conference Mon, 11 Feb 2008 09:36:26 -0500 The New York Times: In an attempt to increase book sales, HarperCollins Publishers will begin offering free electronic editions of some of its books on its Web site, including a novel by Paulo Coelho and a cookbook by the Food... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/harpercollins_offers_free_eboo.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/harpercollins_offers_free_eboo.html publishing Mon, 11 Feb 2008 09:20:23 -0500 Alongside our research for Arts Council England, I'm also looking at how how new media writers earn their livings and make their way in the world. The Online MA in Creative Writing and New Media at De Montfort University is... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/digital_livings_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/digital_livings_1.html research Fri, 08 Feb 2008 10:09:41 -0500 Philip M. Parker, a professor at Insead, the international business school based in Fontainebleau, France, has written 85,000 books and counting. He's like a machine. In fact, he has a machine that writes them for him. The Guardian has more.... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/book_machine.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/book_machine.html books Thu, 07 Feb 2008 18:34:37 -0500 The image below shows every cross-references in the Bible. Definitely more the eye candy variety of information visualization, but I thought it was pretty. Chris Harrison, the creator, explains: "Different colors are used for various arc lengths, creating a rainbow... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/biblical_interweave.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/biblical_interweave.html visualization Wed, 06 Feb 2008 13:52:13 -0500 Via Ron Silliman, an interesting profile of Edmund Skellings, poet laureate of Florida since 1980 and newly appointed professor of humanities at Florida Tech. A New Englander, Skellings started off as a poet in the Robert Frost mould, and even... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/robert_frosts_digital_disciple.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/robert_frosts_digital_disciple.html poetry Tue, 05 Feb 2008 09:58:01 -0500 Two weeks ago, when the blog-based peer review of Noah Wardrip-Fruin's Expressive Processing began on Grand Text Auto, Bob sent a note about the project to Don Waters, the program officer for scholarly communications at the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/developing_books_with_networked_communities.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/developing_books_with_networked_communities.html expressiveprocessing Mon, 04 Feb 2008 02:22:44 -0500 Some choice quotes from Ursula K. Le Guin's terrific new Harper's essay, "Staying Awake: Notes on the alleged decline of reading" (unfortunately behind pay wall): Books are social vectors, but publishers have been slow to see it. They barely even... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/books_are_social_vectors.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/books_are_social_vectors.html books Fri, 01 Feb 2008 16:48:12 -0500 The intensely homoerotic Buffy and Faith storyline in Buffy the Vampire Slayer was developed partly as a direct response to fanfic writers' interpretations of the show in this light As an undergraduate I read English Language and Literature at... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/the_id_of_writing.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/02/the_id_of_writing.html fanfic Fri, 01 Feb 2008 10:15:32 -0500 The picture is of a Futurizer, based on the kinds of contraption I built as a child from cardboard, balsa wood and string which allowed me to communicate with other planets and centuries. It was reconstructed by a group... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/future_boy.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/future_boy.html transliteracy Wed, 30 Jan 2008 07:48:35 -0500 To mark the posting of the final chunk of chapter 1 of the Expressive Processing manuscript on Grand Text Auto, Noah has kicked off what will hopefully be a revealing meta-discussion to run alongside the blog-based peer review experiment. The... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/expressive_processing_meta.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/expressive_processing_meta.html peer_review Tue, 29 Jan 2008 14:20:30 -0500 Slate takes a look at Grady Harp, Amazon's no. 7-ranked book reviewer, and finds the amateur-driven literary culture there to be a much grayer area than expected: Absent the institutional standards that govern (however notionally) professional journalists, Web 2.0 stakes... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/amazon_reviewer_no_7_and_the_a.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/amazon_reviewer_no_7_and_the_a.html books Tue, 29 Jan 2008 03:21:43 -0500 The Institute for the Future of the Book has been appointed by Arts Council England to undertake research into digital developments in literature. This is exciting news for us, not least because it marks the official launch of our London... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/knitting_the_web.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/knitting_the_web.html uk Fri, 25 Jan 2008 08:13:54 -0500 If you're in the New York City region, this is worth checking out (features Institute fellow Siva Vaidhyanathan): From Free Culture @ NYU: In 1998, university professor Kembrew McLeod trademarked the phrase “freedom of expression”—a startling comment on the way... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/freedom_of_expression.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/freedom_of_expression.html film Thu, 24 Jan 2008 01:33:13 -0500 An exciting new experiment begins today, one which ties together many of the threads begun in our earlier "networked book" projects, from Without Gods to Gamer Theory to CommentPress. It involves a community, a manuscript, and an open peer review... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/expressive_processing_an_exper.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/expressive_processing_an_exper.html peer_review Tue, 22 Jan 2008 05:30:55 -0500 Markers move around the map registering Wikipedia edits in close to real time. Weirdly compelling.... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/watch_wikipedia_happen.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/watch_wikipedia_happen.html wikipedia Tue, 22 Jan 2008 03:59:47 -0500 http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/new_commentpress_version_available.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/new_commentpress_version_available.html commentpress Mon, 21 Jan 2008 11:53:12 -0500 Thurs 13 Mar @ Bishopsgate Institute BOOK FUTURES: Scott Pack (thefridayproject.co.uk) + Chris Meade (futureofthebook.org) + John Lenehan + Shirley Dent (Chair) What does the future hold for reading, writing and publishing? When we all go digital, what will be... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/london_calling_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/london_calling_1.html london Mon, 21 Jan 2008 11:14:57 -0500 I've been meaning to post something for a while about The Reprover, or Le Reprobateur, a hugely impressive work of digital fiction by François Coulon, Paris-based digital writer. It includes excellent cartoons, live video of the main character and a... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/literature_electrique.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/literature_electrique.html e-book Mon, 21 Jan 2008 10:23:55 -0500 An interesting experiment on Vimeo. See what's going on? Via IT IN place.... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/try_reading_this.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/try_reading_this.html reading Wed, 16 Jan 2008 13:27:41 -0500 In the course of looking for something else entirely, I just stumbled upon Emergency Books. It's a (slightly dormant) side project of Litromagazine, a freesheet that publishes and distributes short fiction outside London Underground stations. Emergency Books are, very simply,... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/emergency_books.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/emergency_books.html printondemand Wed, 16 Jan 2008 00:18:40 -0500 digitalculturebooks, a collaborative imprint of the University of Michigan press and library, publishes an annual anthology of the year's best technology writing. The nominating process is open to the public and they're giving people until January 31st to suggest exemplary... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/nominate_the_best_technology_w.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/nominate_the_best_technology_w.html publishing Tue, 15 Jan 2008 08:44:50 -0500 Alex Itin has posted a new "print" of his mind-blowing Moby-Dick animation, "Orson Whales," on Vimeo, which now offers gorgeous high definition streaming. Click the image below.... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/orson_whales_in_high_def.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/orson_whales_in_high_def.html art Mon, 14 Jan 2008 11:01:56 -0500 Last week there was a wave of takedowns on YouTube of copyright-infringing material — mostly clips from television and movies. MediaCommons, the nascent media studies network we help to run, felt this rather acutely. In Media Res, an area of... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/youtube_purges_fair_use_tested.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/youtube_purges_fair_use_tested.html fairuse Fri, 11 Jan 2008 14:18:00 -0500 Just came across something lovely. Video for "Jed's Other Poem (Beautiful Ground)" by the now disbanded Grandaddy from their great album The Sophtware Slump (2000). Jed is a character who weaves in and out of the album, a forlorn humanoid... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/poem_for_no_one.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/poem_for_no_one.html animation Fri, 11 Jan 2008 08:08:45 -0500 LibraryThing now interfaces with the British Library and loads of other UK sources: The BL is a catch in more than one way. It's huge, of course. But, unlike some other sources, BL data isn't normally available to the public.... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/no_longer_separated_by_a_commo.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/no_longer_separated_by_a_commo.html library Thu, 10 Jan 2008 08:06:27 -0500 The NEA claims it wishes to “initiate a serious discussion” over the findings of its latest report, but the public statements from representatives of the Endowment have had a terse or caustic tone, such as in Sunil Iyengar’s reply to... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/reading_between_the_lines.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/reading_between_the_lines.html NEA Wed, 09 Jan 2008 12:13:46 -0500 2008 is going well so far for the Institute in London - I was invited to 10 Downing Street this morning for the launch of the National Year of Reading which takes place in 2008, as one of a small... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/the_year_of_reading_dangerousl.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/the_year_of_reading_dangerousl.html books Tue, 08 Jan 2008 18:48:25 -0500 Last week I received an email from Sunil Iyengar of the National Endownment for the Arts responding to Nancy Kaplan's critique (published here on if:book) of the NEA's handling of literacy data in its report "To Read or Not to... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/nea_reading_debate_round_2_an.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/nea_reading_debate_round_2_an.html reading Tue, 08 Jan 2008 18:39:16 -0500 Natalie Merchant, one of my favorite artists, was featured in The New York Times today. She is back after a long hiatus, but if you want to hear her new songs you better stand in line for a ticket to... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/the_year_of_the_author.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/the_year_of_the_author.html music Mon, 07 Jan 2008 21:16:15 -0500 On New Year's Eve, I got lost in Yonkers trying to take my son's gently-used toys to the Salvation Army. The Yonkers store was the only one I could find willing to take them. The guy on the phone hesitated,... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/the_future_of_the_sustainable.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/the_future_of_the_sustainable.html ebooks Wed, 02 Jan 2008 22:59:28 -0500 What makes me think 2008 will be a big year for the future of the book? Last night in London we went to see the movie of The Golden Compass adapted from the excellent Northern Lights by Philip Pullman. Imagine... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/coming_soon_to_a_laptop_near_y.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2008/01/coming_soon_to_a_laptop_near_y.html film Wed, 02 Jan 2008 03:22:58 -0500 We're all spending some time away from our computers so things will be pretty quiet round here till after new year's. Happy holidays, everyone. Btw, if:book just turned 3!... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/quiet.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/quiet.html Blogosphere Thu, 27 Dec 2007 09:25:17 -0500 The New York Times continues to do quality interactive work online. Take a look at this recent feature that allows you to delve through video and transcript from the final Democratic presidential candidate debate in Iowa (Dec. 13, '07). It... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/anatomy_of_a_debate.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/anatomy_of_a_debate.html visualization Fri, 21 Dec 2007 01:16:48 -0500 Perhaps the only blog featuring a tag cloud in which 'Assistant Post Mistress' looms large, The Travelling Bookbinder in Antarctica somehow seems suitable festive reading for the online book lover. Book artist and travelling bookbinder, Rachel Hazell, is currently working... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/if_all_the_sky_was_paper_and_a.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/if_all_the_sky_was_paper_and_a.html Blogosphere Wed, 19 Dec 2007 06:23:38 -0500 Think you've got an authoritative take on a subject? Write up an article, or "knol," and see how the Web judgeth. If it's any good, you might even make a buck. Google's new encyclopedia will go head to head with... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/a_few_rough_notes_on_knols.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/a_few_rough_notes_on_knols.html google Mon, 17 Dec 2007 17:06:09 -0500 I’ve never liked seeing movies in groups. After two hours immersed in a fictional world I dread that moment when you emerge blinking into the light and instantly have to give your verdict. Personally I want time to mull, and... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/bothered_about_blogging_etc_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/bothered_about_blogging_etc_1.html reading Mon, 17 Dec 2007 06:16:10 -0500 There's something about the work of Herman Melville that brings out the unexpected in his readers. Example can be drawn almost at random. Call Me Ishmael, the poet Charles Olson's lyrical little book on Moby-Dick, is as much a meditation... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/textual_montage_the_documentar.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/textual_montage_the_documentar.html collage Fri, 14 Dec 2007 18:07:01 -0500 The Organization for Transformative Works is a new "nonprofit organization established by fans to serve the interests of fans by providing access to and preserving the history of fanworks and fan culture in its myriad forms." Interestingly, the OTW defines... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/a_safe_haven_for_fan_culture.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/a_safe_haven_for_fan_culture.html fanculture Fri, 14 Dec 2007 10:23:14 -0500 02138, a magazine aimed at Harvard alumni, has a great article about the widespread practice among professors of using low-wage student labor to research and even write their books. ...in any number of academic offices at Harvard, the relationship between... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/ghost_story.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/ghost_story.html writing Thu, 13 Dec 2007 10:55:29 -0500 To make a trifecta of film posts for the day, I'll point out Jonathan Harris's The Whale Hunt. Properly speaking, this isn't a film at all; rather, it's a sequence of 3,214 photographs which Jonathan Harris took over a week's... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/and_cinematic_photographs.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/and_cinematic_photographs.html timeline Tue, 11 Dec 2007 19:53:12 -0500 Talking of cinematic readings, I just came across LA artist Sandow Birk's visually stunning cinematic update of Dante's Inferno. The film was made by laboriously creating a paper 'toy theater' and then shooting in live film, making for another... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/and_literary_cinema.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/and_literary_cinema.html dante Tue, 11 Dec 2007 11:50:12 -0500 Random House Canada underwrote a series of short videos riffing on Douglas Coupland's new novel The Gum Thief produced by the slick Toronto studio Crush Inc. These were forwarded to me by Alex Itin, who described watching them as a... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/cinematic_reading.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/cinematic_reading.html video Tue, 11 Dec 2007 08:36:31 -0500 I'd like to draw your attention to an exciting new project: Flight Paths, a networked novel in progress by Kate Pullinger and Chris Joseph, co-authors most recently of the lovely multimedia serial "Inanimate Alice." The Institute is delighted to be... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/flight_paths_a_networked_novel.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/flight_paths_a_networked_novel.html novel Mon, 10 Dec 2007 00:59:18 -0500 In my other life, in the world of web startups, I often have to contend with people who are steadfastly convinced that everyone lives in the technical future. In this world, everyone blogs, knows what an RSS feed does, has... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/10_types_of_publication.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/10_types_of_publication.html print Fri, 07 Dec 2007 14:42:36 -0500 A pair of important posts, one by Siva Vaidhyanathan and one by Henry Jenkins, call for an end to generationally divisive rhetoric like "digital immigrants" and "digital natives." From Siva: Partly, I resist such talk because I don't think that... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/generation_gap.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/generation_gap.html digitaldivide Fri, 07 Dec 2007 11:48:44 -0500 Chatting with someone from Random House's digital division on the day of the Kindle release, I suggested that dramatic price cuts on e-editions — in other words, finally acknowledging that digital copies aren't worth as much (especially when they come... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/kindle_maths_101.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/kindle_maths_101.html amazon Fri, 07 Dec 2007 09:19:06 -0500 http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/gained_the_world_and_lost_your.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/gained_the_world_and_lost_your.html josipovici Thu, 06 Dec 2007 17:24:27 -0500 We are very happy to welcome Sebastian Mary Harrington onto the "official" Institute masthead. This is long overdue, and merely formalizes what is already without question one of our most important and well established partnerships. But formalized it is. And... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/welcome_sebastian_mary_officia.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/welcome_sebastian_mary_officia.html ARG Wed, 05 Dec 2007 17:50:54 -0500 "Vista de la Biblioteca Vasconcelos" by Eneas, on Flickr A lovely meditation at BLDG Blog on the architecture of storage facilities for unwanted books. Speaks volumes (as it were) to the anxiety of obsolescence that keeps librarians up at... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/the_tomb_of_the_book.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/the_tomb_of_the_book.html library Tue, 04 Dec 2007 18:02:42 -0500 We are very happy to announce that the Macarthur Foundation has just provided a $400,000 grant which will ensure the release of version 1.0 of Sophie in February. Yay!... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/a_grant_for_sophie_from_the_ma.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/a_grant_for_sophie_from_the_ma.html Sophie Mon, 03 Dec 2007 16:14:25 -0500 ‘The cast of mind which searches, which questions, which dissents, has a great history. Each society has given it its own form: religious, literary. scientific. Much of the strength of Blake derives from the twofold form which dissent took in... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/talking_of_poets_and_sparks.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/12/talking_of_poets_and_sparks.html poetry Mon, 03 Dec 2007 08:14:37 -0500 The following critique, which expands upon a comment left late yesterday, is from Nancy Kaplan, Executive Director of the School of Information Arts and Technologies at the University of Baltimore. Analyzing long term trends in Americans' reading habits, To Read... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/reading_responsibly_nancy_kaplan.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/reading_responsibly_nancy_kaplan.html reading Fri, 30 Nov 2007 17:21:31 -0500 Walt Whitman's poem "Sparkles from the Wheel" beautifully captures the pleasure and exhilaration of watching work in progress: 1 WHERE the city’s ceaseless crowd moves on, the live-long day, Withdrawn, I join a group of children watching—I pause aside with... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/sparkles_from_the_wheel.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/sparkles_from_the_wheel.html writing Fri, 30 Nov 2007 17:19:49 -0500 I had dinner last night with an elderly and eminent print collector and art historian. He specialises in the eighteenth century - the period when the quantity of text being produced last exploded by an order of magnitude - and... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/ephemera_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/ephemera_1.html memory Fri, 30 Nov 2007 01:07:47 -0500 It's the season for literacy statistics. The reading performance of children in England has fallen from third to 19th in the world according to a major assessment. The Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (Pirls), undertaken every five years, involved... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/reeding_riting_and_ranting.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/reeding_riting_and_ranting.html uk Thu, 29 Nov 2007 11:49:44 -0500 Matthew G. Kirschenbaum writes an elegant and concise critique of the National Endowment for the Arts' ominously titled new study of American reading trends, "To Read or Not to Read: A Question of National Consequence", which is a sequel... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/the_neas_misreading_of_reading.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/the_neas_misreading_of_reading.html reading Thu, 29 Nov 2007 00:50:12 -0500 Whip-smart law blogger Frank Pasquale works through his evolving views on digital library projects and search engines, proposing a compelling strategy for wringing some public good from the tangle of lawsuits surrounding Google Book Search. It hinges on a more... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/how_to_keep_googles_books_open.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/how_to_keep_googles_books_open.html google Tue, 27 Nov 2007 17:27:52 -0500 An interesting twist in the Kindle story reported at Dear Author: Amazon’s pricing for mass market books has suddenly gone full retail, no discount since the release of the Kindle. When questioned in Newsweek about the low pricing, Bezos said... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/amazon_raises_paperback_prices.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/amazon_raises_paperback_prices.html amazon Tue, 27 Nov 2007 01:01:02 -0500 This past April, as the final season of The Sopranos hit the airwaves, with seemingly the whole country bracing for impact, I'd still never seen a single episode. Gradually, my indifference turned to concern. It felt like every talk... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/the_novelodeon.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/the_novelodeon.html television Mon, 26 Nov 2007 12:40:45 -0500 Thoughtful comments from Siva Vaidhyanathan on the Kindle: As far as the dream of textual connectivity and annotations -- making books more "Webby" -- we don't need new devices to do that. Nor do we need different social processes. But... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/siva_on_kindle.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/siva_on_kindle.html amazon Fri, 23 Nov 2007 13:23:43 -0500 On the Suffolk coast where we stayed last weekend they had been warned of floods comparable to the deluge of 1953 which submerged whole villages and killed hundreds. In the event the high tide wasn’t as high as predicted, although... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/not_drowning_but_waving.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/not_drowning_but_waving.html books Tue, 20 Nov 2007 12:28:15 -0500 A flurry of reactions to the Amazon Kindle release, much of it tipping negative (though interestingly largely by folks who haven't yet handled the thing). David Rothman exhaustively covers the DRM/e-book standards angle and is generally displeased: I think publishers... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/of_razors_and_blades.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/of_razors_and_blades.html amazon Mon, 19 Nov 2007 16:06:36 -0500 Steven Levy's Newsweek cover story, "The Future of Reading," is pegged to the much anticipated release of the Kindle, Amazon's new e-book reader. While covering a lot of ground, from publishing industry anxieties, to mass digitization, Google, and speculations... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/newsweek_covers_the_future_of.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/newsweek_covers_the_future_of.html reading Mon, 19 Nov 2007 09:21:33 -0500 From time to time, the Institute returns to thorny and intractable thought experiments. One that's been kicking around for a long time is what we've called the "Communist Manifesto problem": the problem of representing a book and the conversations it... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/reenactment_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/reenactment_1.html re-enactment Sun, 18 Nov 2007 20:05:32 -0500 Peter Brantley pointed me to an interesting experiment from Pearson Custom Publishing, who is working with faculty at Rio Solado community college in Arizona to print custom textbooks assembled from multiple sources. Inside Higher Ed has details: The result, in... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/build_your_own_texbook.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/build_your_own_texbook.html publishing Fri, 16 Nov 2007 16:21:23 -0500 In CNET news: "Amazon to debut Kindle e-book reader Monday." While it's got more going for it than any of its predecessors or present competitors — wi-fi connection, seamless integration with the biggest online store in the world, access to... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/amazon_kindle_due_out_monday.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/amazon_kindle_due_out_monday.html ebooks Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:54:02 -0500 The Electronic Literature Organization seeks your assistance in selecting "works of imaginative writing that take advantage of the capabilities of the standalone or networked computer" for preservation by the LOC and Internet Archive: The Library of Congress has asked the... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/library_of_congress_to_archive.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/library_of_congress_to_archive.html eliterature Fri, 16 Nov 2007 00:55:30 -0500 I'm not completely sure about the netiquette of blogging about a conversation heard around the digital watercooler, ie on a close-knit community messageboard; but I came across one such recently that made me pause. Paraphrased, the thread started out asking... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/would_you_date_someone_with_no.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/would_you_date_someone_with_no.html books Thu, 15 Nov 2007 01:43:56 -0500 More from the archive, I'm afraid; but I've quoted this so often in the last year that it merits repeating. A video of Jo Walsh, a simultaneously near-invisible and near-legendary hacker I met through the University of Openess in London,... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/why_are_screens_square.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/why_are_screens_square.html jo Wed, 14 Nov 2007 00:21:42 -0500 http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/reading_as_collective_enterpri.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/reading_as_collective_enterpri.html junotdiaz Mon, 12 Nov 2007 20:12:12 -0500 Circulating briskly last week around the blogosphere was an interesting trio of posts (part 1, part 2, part 3) by the thriller writer Barry Eisler pondering how various roles in the present-day publishing ecosystem might evolve—or go extinct—in the coming... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/publishing_after_publishers.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/publishing_after_publishers.html publishing Mon, 12 Nov 2007 02:15:12 -0500 The bulk of this post is from Sol Gaitan, a teacher of Spanish language and literature at the Dalton School in New York and an occasional writer on this blog. Over the past couple of months Sol has been using... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/using_commentpress_with_adoles.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/using_commentpress_with_adoles.html Education Fri, 09 Nov 2007 09:20:04 -0500 I've been digging through old episodes of Black Books, a relatively little-known comedy series from the UK's Channel 4. The show is set in a second-hand bookshop, run by Bernard Black, a chainsmoking, alcoholic Irishman (Dylan Moran) who shuts... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/cooking_the_books.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/cooking_the_books.html print Thu, 08 Nov 2007 11:44:48 -0500 The UK is one of the most watched over societies on earth with CCTV cameras in abundance, and the whole world is waking up to how much retrievable evidence the likes of Google have on us all thanks to... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/post_9.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/post_9.html books Wed, 07 Nov 2007 19:44:56 -0500 Readers of this blog will probably find much of interest in Sucking on Words, a new documentary on conceptual poet Kenneth Goldsmith. Goldsmith, as I've noted before, is the wizard behind the curtain at ubu.com; this documentary, by Simon Morris,... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/the_really_modern_reader.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/the_really_modern_reader.html Kenneth_Goldsmith Wed, 07 Nov 2007 12:33:08 -0500 I recently picked up Amiri Baraka's The Autobiography of LeRoi Jones, as I'd been curious about the trajectory of the life of LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka, a man who pops up in interesting places. His autobiography is a curious work: for... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/a_thought_experiment_reading_i.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/a_thought_experiment_reading_i.html reading Wed, 07 Nov 2007 10:45:28 -0500 Paul Courant is the University Librarian at the University of Michigan as well as a professor of economics. And he now has a blog. He leads off with a response to critics (including Brewster Kahle and Siva Vaidhyanathan) of Michigan's... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/au_courant.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/au_courant.html libraries Tue, 06 Nov 2007 08:33:14 -0500 Anthony Grafton's New Yorker piece "Future Reading" paints a forbidding picture of the global digital library currently in formation on public and private fronts around the world (Google et al.). The following quote sums it up well—a refreshing counterpoint to... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/digitization_and_its_discontents.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/digitization_and_its_discontents.html libraries Tue, 06 Nov 2007 08:14:06 -0500 A nice piece in this month's Wired about "the manga industrial complex" in Japan, and the complex structure of tacitly-permitted copyright violation that powers the participatory fan culture around commercially-produced manga. Though the countless fan publications that take existing, copyrighted... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/anmoku_no_ryokai.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/anmoku_no_ryokai.html copyright Fri, 02 Nov 2007 14:24:41 -0500 In early October R.U. Sirius published a nice piece on 10 Zen Monkeys in which he asked ten writers who have done reasonably well at straddling the print and online realms, "is the net good for writers?". The result is... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/the_words_worth_on_the_world_w.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/the_words_worth_on_the_world_w.html writing Fri, 02 Nov 2007 12:08:33 -0500 J.K. Rowling has maintained an admirably strong grip on the creative lives of her fictional creations and their merchandising over the years, for instance insisting on complete control over the writing and casting of the movies and ensuring that Coca... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/harry_potter_and_the_litigants.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/11/harry_potter_and_the_litigants.html copyright Thu, 01 Nov 2007 15:29:19 -0500 CommentPress, be it remembered, is a blog hack. A fairly robust one to be sure, and one which we expect to get significant near-term mileage out of, but still an adaptation of a relatively brittle publishing architecture. BookGlutton—a new community... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/unbound_reader.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/unbound_reader.html reading Mon, 29 Oct 2007 11:04:42 -0500 Thanks to James Long of Pan Macmillan for this link to the 370 Day Project, a huge wooden book made by South African artist Willem Boshoff: CLICK HERE Boshoff writes: “I have been playing with the concept of secrecy in... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/wood_book_seed_key_water_word.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/wood_book_seed_key_water_word.html art Thu, 25 Oct 2007 06:12:10 -0500 On Salon Machinist Farhad Manjoo considers the virtues of skimming and contemplates what is lost in the transition from print broadsheets to Web browsers: It's well-nigh impossible to pull off the same sort of skimming trick on the Web. On... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/of_forests_and_trees.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/of_forests_and_trees.html design Wed, 24 Oct 2007 11:42:21 -0500 CORRECTION: a commenter kindly points out that the Times jumped the gun on this one. What follows is in fact not true. Further clarification here. The Times of London reports that the Man Booker Prize soon will make the full... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/booker_shortlist_set_free.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/booker_shortlist_set_free.html publishing Tue, 23 Oct 2007 17:53:59 -0500 Observe these gorgeous Rorshach mold blots blooming their way across the pages of old books. A video by Ben Hemmendinger, found on Vimeo. The piece is titled "Edelfäule," which a little Googling reveals to be German for "noble rot" —... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/the_noble_rot.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/the_noble_rot.html books Tue, 23 Oct 2007 16:25:23 -0500 This is welcome. Several leading American research libraries including the Boston Public and the Smithsonian have said no thanks to Google and Microsoft book digitization deals, opting instead for the more costly but less restrictive Open Content Alliance/Internet Archive program.... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/googlesoft_gets_the_brushoff.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/googlesoft_gets_the_brushoff.html library Mon, 22 Oct 2007 13:55:53 -0500 The first machinima festival to be held in Europe took place at DMU in Leicester - and in Second Life - on 12-14 October. This quickly-growing genre fuses film-making and computer gaming to provide a quick and cost-effective way to... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/machinima.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/machinima.html machinima Sun, 21 Oct 2007 04:16:17 -0500 In London next week our first if:book:group brings together a small group of people from the worlds of new media, literature, theatre and playground design to discuss Narrative, Interactivity and Play. New media fiction has been described as writing in... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/playing_with_words.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/playing_with_words.html play Sat, 20 Oct 2007 05:25:29 -0500 It's been a while since we've mentioned Ted Nelson on this blog. Ted Nelson came up with the idea of hypertext in 1963; since then, in his estimation, most of what's happened in computer interfaces and the way we use... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/ted_nelsons_still_on_the_job.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/ted_nelsons_still_on_the_job.html tednelson Wed, 17 Oct 2007 13:32:23 -0500 So much to say about this but for the moment I only have time for a quick link. Our close friend and colleague Kathleen Fitzpatrick just published a must-read paper on MediaCommons, in conjunction with the Journal of Electronic Publishing.... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/commentpress_and_the_communica.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/commentpress_and_the_communica.html commentpress Mon, 15 Oct 2007 10:09:13 -0500 Given this morning's announcement i could kick myself for not having written up this post weeks ago. each summer i choose an "important book" to read on my vacation. this year i decided to re-read The Golden Notebook. When I... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/doris_lessing_wins_the_nobel_p.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/doris_lessing_wins_the_nobel_p.html reading Thu, 11 Oct 2007 08:43:09 -0500 This is a request for comments. We're in the very early stages of devising, in partnership with Peter Brantley and the Digital Library Federation, what could become a major initiative around the question of mass digitization. It's called "The Really... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/the_really_modern_library.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/the_really_modern_library.html library Mon, 08 Oct 2007 01:48:08 -0500 In the wake of Techmeme's new top 100 Leaderboard site listing, IP Democracy wonders where have all the blogs gone? Not only does the list include many old media mainstays such as the Wall Street Journal and New York Times,... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/blogs_or_just_the_media.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/blogs_or_just_the_media.html journalism Fri, 05 Oct 2007 16:49:11 -0500 Allen Ginsberg reading “Howl” in Washington Square in 1966. (Associated Press) Yesterday marked the 50th anniversary of the famous court ruling in defense of Allen Ginsberg's "Howl" against charges of obscenity, citing the poem's "redeeming social importance." The Times... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/howling_in_the_wilderness.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/howling_in_the_wilderness.html allenginsberg Thu, 04 Oct 2007 10:46:37 -0500 If you're in or around new york — this promises to be a fascinating event. Plus Ken will be unveiling a new networked book project. Details further down. 50 Years of Recuperation: The Situationist International 1957-1972 The 2007 Buell Lecture,... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/mckenzie_wark_on_the_situation.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/mckenzie_wark_on_the_situation.html mckenziewark Mon, 01 Oct 2007 15:01:53 -0500 To fans long famished for a new Radiohead album (we've been waiting since '03, with an admittedly lovely Thom Yorke solo effort last year to tide us over), there came today some very welcome news: their latest record, "In... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/radiohead_its_up_to_you.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/radiohead_its_up_to_you.html radiohead Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:25:39 -0500 In an interesting mashup of online social filtering and old-fashioned publishing, Penguin, Amazon and Hewlett Packard have joined forces to present a new online literary contest, the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award. From the NY Times: From today through Nov. 5,... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/penguin_enlists_amazon_reviewe.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/penguin_enlists_amazon_reviewe.html amazon Mon, 01 Oct 2007 11:53:30 -0500 Insularity, editorial abuses, jargon, anonymity, power... some of the difficulties that beset the great public knowledge experiment of our day. Our friend Karen Schneider has a smart piece on Wikipedia's "awkward adolescence." Worth a read. Like a startup maturing into... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/wikipedias_growing_pains.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/10/wikipedias_growing_pains.html wikipedia Mon, 01 Oct 2007 07:45:45 -0500 Moby Dick Chapter 55 or 9200 times E", 2004, graphite on hemp paper, 11 x 9" In one of those odd, blogospheric delayed reactions, I just came across (via Information Aesthetics, via Kottke) a fabulous exhibit that took place... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/eeeeeeeeee_eeeeeee_eee.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/eeeeeeeeee_eeeeeee_eee.html visualization Fri, 28 Sep 2007 11:04:34 -0500 Peter Brantley points to an interesting WSJ piece (free) on the explosion of Japanese cellphone fiction. These are works, often the length of novels, composed specifically for consumption via the phone's tiny screen. In some cases, they are even... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/cellphone_fiction_in_japan.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/cellphone_fiction_in_japan.html reading Thu, 27 Sep 2007 10:13:26 -0500 There's a nice article about CommentPress this week in the Chronicle of Higher Education. Unfortunately, it's subscription only. Here's the link for those of you with access. I'm working on getting permission to offer a full PDF. UPDATE: The Chronicle... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/commentpress_in_the_chronicle.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/commentpress_in_the_chronicle.html commentpress Tue, 25 Sep 2007 13:18:58 -0500 We're very excited to announce that Siva's new Google book site, produced and hosted by the Institute, is now live! In addition to being the seed of what will likely be a very important book, I'll bet that over time... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/the_googlization_of_everything.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/the_googlization_of_everything.html sivavaidhyanathan Mon, 24 Sep 2007 08:44:02 -0500 I’m delighted to be joining the team at the Institute. I’m not an academic but a deviser and manager of projects to promote creative reading, so thinking and doing go together for me. As Director of Booktrust for seven years... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/from_booktrust_to_books_of_the.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/from_booktrust_to_books_of_the.html uk Sun, 23 Sep 2007 17:06:21 -0500 In the first 'Books and the man' post I took the example of Alexander Pope to argue that the idea of 'high' literature is inseparable from economic conditions that enable a writer to turn himself into a brand and sell... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/books_and_the_man_part_iii_the.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/books_and_the_man_part_iii_the.html copyright Sun, 23 Sep 2007 10:00:13 -0500 There are a couple of nice classroom implementations of CommentPress that I wanted to share, one that we set up by request, another done independently. 1. The first is an edition of Dante's Inferno (Longfellow translation) for a literature seminar... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/commentpress_in_the_classroom_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/commentpress_in_the_classroom_1.html commentpress Fri, 21 Sep 2007 14:20:25 -0500 "The Physiological Basis of Medical Practice, 2006", Altered book, 9 x 7-1/2 x 3-1/4 inches. By Brian Dettmer at Haydee Rovirosa Gallery, New York. (via Ron Silliman)... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/altered_states.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/altered_states.html books Fri, 21 Sep 2007 11:12:51 -0500 A couple more small items for the "content is free, networks are valuable" meme... these w/r/t television. First, this LA Times piece on CBS's "new internet strategy": The idea is to let their online material be promiscuous: Instead of limiting... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/the_new_promiscuity.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/the_new_promiscuity.html networks Thu, 20 Sep 2007 14:07:56 -0500 A few good readings to inject into recent conversation here about a post-copyright world (1, 2, 3), and in light of the death of Times Select and the ripple effect that is likely to have across the Web. First, a... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/dis-content.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/dis-content.html publishing Wed, 19 Sep 2007 10:32:36 -0500 Beginning today, i'll be spending at least ten days per month in London where i'll be a senior fellow at the London School of Economics and also joining our new colleague, Chris Meade, with the intention of establishing a London... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/the_institute_sets_up_shop_in.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/the_institute_sets_up_shop_in.html london Tue, 18 Sep 2007 10:51:41 -0500 So in my last post I compared the sentiments expressed in Pope's Dunciad to those of Andrew Keen's The Cult of The Amateur, and suggested some parallels between the eighteenth-century print boom and the explosion of user-generated content in web2.0.... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/books_and_the_man_part_ii_sort.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/books_and_the_man_part_ii_sort.html arikan Tue, 18 Sep 2007 10:28:32 -0500 Placing a long-term bet on online advertising and the power of search engines, the New York Times will, effective tomorrow, close down its two-year-old "Select" subscription service (which was actually making money for the paper) and opened up access to... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/all_the_news_thats_fit_to_search.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/all_the_news_thats_fit_to_search.html newyorktimes Tue, 18 Sep 2007 00:15:46 -0500 I've never been a fan of book trailers, but this disturbing six-minute agitprop piece promoting Naomi Klein's new book The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism is genre-transcending. It doesn't hurt that Klein teamed up with Mexican director Alfonso... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/shock_treatment.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/shock_treatment.html naomiklein Mon, 17 Sep 2007 18:48:04 -0500 The indefatigable Carl Malamud of public.resource.org today sent out a public interest letter to the U.S. Copyright Office demanding that they provide bulk access over the Internet to the catalog of copyrighted monographs, documents and serials, a resource which to... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/you_cant_copyright_copyright.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/you_cant_copyright_copyright.html copyright Mon, 17 Sep 2007 18:40:43 -0500 The photographs of libraries in "Portugal," the current exhibition of Candida Höfer at Sonnabend, show libraries as venerable places where precious objects are stored. The large format that characterizes Höfer's photographs of public places, the absence of people, and the... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/candida_hoefer_the_library_as.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/candida_hoefer_the_library_as.html library Mon, 17 Sep 2007 00:53:45 -0500 The Times has published its first video "letter to the editor," a 10-minute mini-documentary by Charles Ferguson on the decision by L. Paul Bremer and other US officials to disband the Iraqi army shortly after the US occupation began.... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/ny_times_publishes_first_video.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/ny_times_publishes_first_video.html newspaper Sat, 15 Sep 2007 00:02:04 -0500 Alex Juhasz, a prof at Pitzer College and member of the MediaCommons community, has just kicked off an exciting experimental media studies course, "Learning From YouTube," which will be conducted on and through the online video site. The NY Times/AP... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/learning_from_youtube.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/learning_from_youtube.html youtube Fri, 14 Sep 2007 12:20:04 -0500 I just came across oSkope, a snazzy new "visual search assistant" built by a Zurich/Berlin outfit that allows you to graphically browse items on Amazon, ebay, Flickr or YouTube. More than a demo or prototype, it's a fully functioning front... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/visual_search.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/visual_search.html visualization Fri, 14 Sep 2007 02:03:09 -0500 Sorry to sink for a moment into celebrity gossipsville, but this video had me utterly mesmerized for the past four minutes. Basically, this guy's arguing that Britney Spears' sub-par performance at the VMAs this weekend was do to a broken... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/britney_replay.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/britney_replay.html video Thu, 13 Sep 2007 12:09:41 -0500 Not sure if it's been washed away yet, but folks in the Bay Area should keep an eye out for this charming urban hypertext: The mission stencil story is an interactive, choose-your-own-adventure story that takes place on the sidewalks... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/stencil_hypertext.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/stencil_hypertext.html Games Tue, 11 Sep 2007 13:31:24 -0500 We're just a couple of days away from launching what promises to be one of our most important projects to date, The Googlization of Everything, a weblog where Siva Vaidhyanathan (who's a fellow here) will publicly develop his new book,... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/siva_podcast_on_the_googlizati.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/siva_podcast_on_the_googlizati.html google Mon, 10 Sep 2007 19:39:52 -0500 Facing a far from certain future, the New York Times continues to innovate impressively, announcing yesterday a new venture in distance learning with six initial partner universities: the New York Times Knowledge Network. Among other things, this could help pave... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/ny_times_could_open_door_to_bo.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/ny_times_could_open_door_to_bo.html textbook Fri, 07 Sep 2007 15:47:48 -0500 The NY Times reported yesterday that the Kindle, Amazon's much speculated-about e-book reading device, is due out next month. No one's seen it yet and Amazon has been tight-lipped about specs, but it presumably has an e-ink screen, a small... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/ebook_developments_at_amazon_google.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/ebook_developments_at_amazon_google.html publishing Fri, 07 Sep 2007 13:40:16 -0500 While Andrew Keen laments the decline of professionalised content production, and Publishing2.0 fuels the debate about whether there's a distinction between 'citizen journalism' and the old-fashioned sort, I've spent the morning at Seedcamp talking with a Dubai-based entrepreur who's blurring... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/post_8.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/post_8.html content Thu, 06 Sep 2007 13:02:21 -0500 The other day a fellow named Nate Stearns posted a remark on the recent post about using CommentPress in classroom situations. This is a great idea for AP Language and Comp classes where we naturally and habitually pick apart a... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/mlk_in_commentpress_and_an_off.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/mlk_in_commentpress_and_an_off.html commentpress Wed, 05 Sep 2007 00:18:19 -0500 our colleague dan visel married kim beeman on saturday. the wedding in the Boise Botanical Gardens was one of the loveliest i've been to — ever. if you're not familiar with dan's idiosyncratic genius, check out his recent post... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/dan.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/dan.html marriage Tue, 04 Sep 2007 10:54:05 -0500 I've been reading failed Web1.0 entrepreneur Andrew Keen's The Cult of the Amateur. For those who haven't hurled it out of the window already, this is a vitriolic denouncement of the ways in which Web2.0 technology is supplanting 'expert' cultural... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/post_7.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/post_7.html pope Sat, 01 Sep 2007 18:36:25 -0500 A very entertaining podcast by SF writer, Net activist, and uber-blogger Cory Doctorow covering copyright, concentration, print-on-demand, the future of the codex and more. The problem with electronic books, he suggests, is in part that they are extremely good at... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/cory_doctorow_on_concentration.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/09/cory_doctorow_on_concentration.html corydoctorow Sat, 01 Sep 2007 16:19:26 -0500 In these first few generations of personal computing, we've operated with the "money in the mattress" model of data storage. Information assets are managed personally and locally—on your machine, disks or external drives. If the computer crashes, the drive breaks,... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/jp_google.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/jp_google.html google Fri, 31 Aug 2007 13:42:18 -0500 So CommentPress is out in the world and continues to develop in small ways (version 1.3 was put out last week), but there are still only a few observable cases apart from our own projects in which it's been put... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/commentpress_in_the_classroom.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/commentpress_in_the_classroom.html Education Wed, 29 Aug 2007 10:00:28 -0500 danah boyd has written a response to all the conversation generated by her 24 june blog post in which she tried to interpret usage patterns of facebook and myspace in terms of class. i'm not particuarly interested in the original... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/post_6.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/post_6.html Blogosphere Sun, 26 Aug 2007 17:40:48 -0500 "a navigational widget for switching between documents" (Wikipedia) Tab is a simple word, but one that's hard to pin down. It's the first word that begins with "t" in the Oxford English Dictionary, but the OED admits that it's not... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/tab_tab_tab_1.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/tab_tab_tab_1.html tab Sat, 25 Aug 2007 12:00:00 -0500 John Holbo just along this exciting CFP for a seminar he's convening on "e-publishing/intertubes stuff" at the ALSC conference this October in Chicago. An excerpt: What role will the Internet play in publishing, scholarly research, cultural journalism, and literary commentary... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/call_for_papers_the_internet_p.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/call_for_papers_the_internet_p.html academic Fri, 24 Aug 2007 16:19:11 -0500 Monkeybook is an occasional series of new media evenings hosted by the Institute for the Future of the Book at Monkey Town, Brooklyn's premier video salon and A/V sandbox. Monkeybook 3 (this coming Monday, Aug 27, reservation info below)... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/monkeybook3_the_desk_set.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/monkeybook3_the_desk_set.html monkeybook Thu, 23 Aug 2007 13:20:34 -0500 The Scholarly Publishing Office of the University of Michigan Library has just released an interactive, CommentPress-powered edition of "University Publishing In A Digital Age," the Ithaka report that in recent weeks has sent ripples through the scholarly publishing community. Please... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/ithaka_university_publishing_r.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/ithaka_university_publishing_r.html academic Wed, 22 Aug 2007 16:55:38 -0500 Via Slashdot, I just came across what could be a major innovation in science publishing. The National Science Foundation, the Public Library of Science and the San Diego Supercomputing Center have joined forces to launch, SciVee, an experimental media sharing... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/scivee_web_video_for_the_scien.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/scivee_web_video_for_the_scien.html science Mon, 20 Aug 2007 14:25:28 -0500 Once upon a time, a long time ago, I was an editor for Let's Go, a series of travel guides. While there, I learned a great many things about making books, not all of them useful. One of them: how... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/thinking_about_indexing.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/thinking_about_indexing.html index Thu, 16 Aug 2007 21:30:49 -0500 Check out, if you haven't already, Paul Duguid's witty and incisive exposé of the pitfalls of searching for Tristram Shandy in Google Book Search, an exercise which puts many of the inadequacies of the world's leading digitization program into... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/the_bookish_character_of_books.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/the_bookish_character_of_books.html google_book_search Wed, 15 Aug 2007 16:59:00 -0500 From Cathy Davidson at HASTAC: As part of its $50 million initiative on Digital Media and Learning initiative launched last year (www.digitallearning.macfound.org), the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation has just announced support for a $2 million open Digital... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/macarthur_and_hastac_open_2_mi.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/macarthur_and_hastac_open_2_mi.html hastac Tue, 14 Aug 2007 17:29:37 -0500 Starting this week, Google News will publish comments alongside linked stories from "a special subset of readers: those people or organizations who were actual participants in the story in question." John Murrell and Steve Rubel have good analyses of why... http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/google_news_adds_an_interestin.html http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2007/08/google_news_adds_an_interestin.html google Fri, 10 Aug 2007 09:19:12 -0500