Mar 8
So I just have to draw your attention to this amazing post from Craig Mod on book design and e-book design (more specifically the iPad). It’s a lovely, intelligent, almost meditational, piece. Highly recommended reading, as are many of the considered comments underneath.
And on a reading note, I am currently reading Naming the Bones by Louise Welsh, for review, courtesy of Text Publishing. Review in a few weeks!
Feb 2
You may have heard over the weekend that Amazon and publishers Macmillan have been engaged in a staring contest. If you haven’t here’s a general roundup from The Millions, plus a great piece of opinion on the whole shemozzle from John Scalzi. Shots are being fired from all corners. Has the iPad release become the assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand?
On a similar note there is an interesting Financial Times article on DRM and e-books.
And if you’re thoroughly sick of all that palaver, Mr Nobody is back! I’m sure I remember the original Mr Nobody book but who knows where and when I’ve seen it. And The Well Read Kitty reports on the impending release of New Zealand titles in the Popular Penguins series (yay!).
On my personal reading note I finished Wolf Hall. No more will be said until review is posted.
And I started reading The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman!
The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet
I rather enjoy reading opinions on e-books and e-readers from other people, mainly because a) they’re often much cleverer than I, and b) they’re in countries where these devices are actually available (on that note see Lance Wigg’s post this morning about the continuing lack of Kindle availability in NZ).
On that note then this is a great down-to-earth article from Publishing Perspectives about the practical issues of reading e-books. Digital publishing design seems to have a long way to go – at least from the point of view of the big publishing houses. They had better start listening. The potential to make digital books objects of beauty has to be huge and could be the deal-breaker for many readers (yours truly included).
Speaking of objects of beauty the cover for the new David Mitchell title, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, has been released… historical Japanese plot… David Mitchell… oh my….
Here’s a small bugbear that has been brewing in my mind this weekend regarding many of the e-book reader reviews and comments I’ve been reading recently. It seems like every man and his dog is releasing an e-reader at the moment, guaranteed to be the next Ipod and render books obsolete for good! Ahem. Yeah, whatever.
Wait, I have two bugbears.
Okay, firstly can we please stop comparing e-readers to CDs/Ipods/whatever and using some old chestnut argument along the lines of “can’t stop progress” for being the reason why we need e-readers? They aren’t the same thing. Here’s a very basic explanation: the model of vinyl record played on record-player, CD played on CD player, MP3 file played on MP3 player has remained a consistent model the whole way through all technological changes around playing and listening to music.
Technology has not changed this basic concept, even if it has improved on it (music becoming digital and portable). You have an object, digital or analogue, that holds the music, then you have another object that plays it to you.
This isn’t the same concept as reading. You have an object with writing, you read it. No intermediary device (digital or not) is required. Digitising books produces some new possibilities but it doesn’t introduce enough improvements on the basic concept of a book for the solo reader, and it is a huge step backward for many features (ownership, resale, lending). At least in the current way of thinking about e-readers and digitised publications.
Secondly, the news that’s coming through is taking on a lot of this form “E-reader X in negotiations with Publisher Y for content”. Disaster ahead. One of the best possibilities for e-readers is in subscription (paid or not) style content – magazines/newspapers, the podcasts of reading, if you will. If certain e-readers are locked in to certain content providers…. well done everyone, you’re basically destroying your own industry. If you want to read these newspapers – well your choice is this device. Want to read many different periodical titles? Tough luck if they’re supplying content exclusively to the device that you don’t own.
As for books – will we get to choose devices based on what publishers they have access to? Buy this device if you like Random House books but you’ll never be able to get Penguin titles on it. It’s bad enough that we currently have devices that allow you to purchase from one retailer only. How many $500PLUS devices do we get to waste money on?
I get that content has to be delivered for these devices and that agreements need to be made – but exclusivity? Doesn’t it sound like we have lots of fun times of “jailbreaking” e-readers and pirating content ahead?
I’m not entirely Luddite, I just would like to be convinced.
So ends the BookieMonster Monday Rant…
Interesting little article in the Guardian about the Kindle and the many legal questions over ownership when you buy a Kindle (and books for it).
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/nov/08/amazon-kindle-licence-orwell
The couple of comments are rather interesting reading also.
My thought? Here’s my book. I bought it, I read it, I lent it to a friend, I put it on my shelf, I read it again, I moved and took it with me, I kept it for years, I donated it to a charity. How are we improving on this experience, again?
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