Florida Polytechnic University has just opened, in a building designed by Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, a completely bookless library. Available to all the students is a catalog of 135,000 e-books that can be consulted in an impressive, completely empty room equipped with internet connections and librarians to help the students.
...moreVideo game anti-heros. Technology is making everything beautiful. One way technology is making everything awesome (as discussed above): A video of deans losing their cool. Another opinion: Get technology out of school. Forget your soul. What happens to your e-books after you die? Tom Hanks has an app that taps into typewriter nostalgia. You can […]
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Prize-winning writer and Authors Guild Vice President Richard Russo discusses publishing in the age of ebooks, the continued relevance of the Guild, and the Amazon-Hachette conflict.
...moreMove over, e-books—there’s a new innovation in reading technology! The folks over at MIT have developed a wearable book that lets the reader experience the character’s emotions while they read. Check it out!
...moreAll hailed the e-book for its innovations in technology. Embedded links, comments, and multi-media elements were what is supposed to kill the physical book. This recent essay at Salon contends that now that e-books are essentially being stripped down to resemble physical books, the real book is now considered a luxury item. “But those examples […]
...moreRumpus contributor Micah Perks has a new eBook out on Shebooks called, Alone In The Woods: Cheryl Strayed, my daughter and me. Micah Perks’ candid short memoir takes an insightful look at women and the wild, the wildness she experienced as a child on a commune in the Adirondack wilderness, the ways women and wildness […]
...moreIn 1946, George Orwell wrote an essay called “Books vs. Cigarettes,” trying to figure out which habit cost him more and whether books were simply out of some people’s financial reach. For the Los Angeles Review of Books, Kaya Genç updates the calculations in an essay titled “Ebooks vs. Lattes” (he already quit smoking several years […]
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Miracle Jones discusses all of his various endeavors and how he envisions the future of digital publishing.
...moreYou’re a reasonable reader. You like the aesthetics of an old-fashioned paper-and-glue book, but you’re not averse to turning the virtual pages of an e-reader either. If that description sounds like you, here’s a DIY project you might like: making an old book into a Kindle case. (Physical-book purists, do NOT click the link. You […]
...moreOur friends over at The Millions are branching out: in addition to the features on their fantastic website, they’re starting to publish ebooks. The inaugural volume is called Epic Fail: Bad Art, Viral Fame, and the History of the Worst Thing Ever, but judging by the excerpt they’ve posted, there’s nothing fail about it. We’re excited […]
...moreOr, at least, they could if the “humble indie bundle” scheme gains momentum. The Guardian reports on a new method of pay-what-you-can — bundled ebooks that are advertised to “support authors.” But so far the developers have only included well established writers and have not yet caught on to the grab bag style of other […]
...moreAmazon is introducing a new service that presents a noncommittal book-buying option for customers. The company is considering a Netflix-like rental service for ebooks, which unfortunately, only provides more opportunity to devalue books. And this devaluing has only caused publishers to be skeptical of this rental-based selling point for ebooks. Let’s hope it doesn’t do […]
...more“Some computer developers envision tablet computers so flexible that you will literally be able to roll them up and slip them in your bag or pocket — just as you would do with a newspaper or magazine today — and then unfurl them on the train.” eBooks are devolving in the best of ways. Colored […]
...moreYour humble Rumpus Sunday Editor is smitten. Over the last couple weeks, the book blogs have been in form, publishing intelligent, hilarious, insightful, and riveting posts. In a word, they’ve been brilliant. Some, but most certainly not all, of my evidence is below. Maud Newton takes on the way we see E-books. The Hate Mail […]
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