“Lovers of print are simply confusing the plate for the food.”
― Douglas Adams
Catching Elephant is a theme by Andy Taylor
![ebookfriendly:
Libraries of the future [cartoon] http://bit.ly/Xo42Af](http://25.media.tumblr.com/979dc143a68bd6d5555f40cc953142b2/tumblr_mifk4uSHgu1rdetn9o1_500.jpg)
Libraries of the future [cartoon] http://bit.ly/Xo42Af
The Book of the Future
Grant Snider
Is This Dedicated Cooking Tablet The Future Of Digital Publishing?
The QOOQ tablet is the first tablet designed for and marketed towards serious chefs and foodies for whom cooking is not just a lifestyle but a skill that you attack like you are training for a UFC Cage Fight. This dedicated tablet is designed to be Kitchen proof with durable moist proof screen that can be wiped with soap and water and used with wet hands. The tablet lays slightly off the ground on legs so it remains above any spills.
But the main thing that makes this device the future of digital publishing is not the functional ergonomic Linux-based tablet, running on a 1 GHz ARM Cortex A9 dual-core processor with a 10.1” mineral glass touchscreen that features LED backlighting. Rather it is the QOOQ content that is accessed online by subscription.
The site silos 3,500 interactive recipes, 250 technique videos, 450 ingredient pages, and 500 wine pages contributed by over 100 chefs. Part recipe aggregator, part magazine, part TV channel and part lifestyle app this is a very interesting experiment in siloing and may be a preview of what the digital publishing ecosystem will look like in the near future. Add social networking and downloadable ebooks for long form reading and as a foodista why og anywhere else? Rather than search for content from big box digital retailers (Amazon and iBookstore) people will pull content from targeted channels that will deliver multiple formats of media from text to video to interactive apps all tailored to you needs, skill level and interests based on you profile preferences. This type of content distribution I think will be particularly effective for non fiction/educational oriented subjects like cooking, crafts, history, sports, etc but also applicable to genre publishing such as romance, mystery and science fiction & fantasy.
In a digital world publishers need to begin thinking about their content as a vast pool of content to be accessed in ways beyond the artificial structure of a printed book. When people say “the app is dead” this is what they mean. With fast steaming access to the internet rather than focusing on individual media formats we should begin as publishers focusing on content and the ability to deliver it in the format appropriate for the task from a single respected subject silo that draws a social community of like minded users looking to participate in a lifestyle. The Digital future is about information delivery not “product” delivery.
Lending A Room Of One's Own
Liyuan Library opted to build near a village two hours outside of Beijing rather than the heart of the busy city. With a concept for a serenity-focused public space in mind, they used the mountain landscape as inspiration. The resulting building is constructed from sticks gathered in the village and lets in only natural light, helping the modest structure blend into its surroundings while delivering a soft ambiance.
In a world where books and other media can be downloaded in an instant the environment with which we consume them may become more important. In the future libraries most important item to lend may be “a room of one’s own”.
In a world where books and other media can be downloaded in an instant the environment with which we consumer them may become more important. In the future libraries most important item to lend may be “a room of one’s own”.
Ray Bradbury relents, allows 'Fahrenheit 451' to become e-book
At age 91, Ray Bradbury is making peace with the future he helped predict.
The science fiction/fantasy author and long-time enemy of the e-book has finally allowed his dystopian classic Fahrenheit 451 to be published in digital format. Simon & Schuster released the electronic edition Tuesday.
The Future of Books According to Science Fiction
From Asimov to Dr Who books have a future, both “e” and print. Ryan Britt writes a nice piece on Tor.com.
The Unintended Consequences of E-Books' Crazy Popularity
It’s no mystery that e-books are super popular. Readers love e-books because they’re incredibly portable and usually cheaper. Publishers love them because the margins are better, and they yield all sorts of useful data about sales patterns. Authors love them because e-books empower them to cut out publishers. Now that the technology is swimming in the mainstream, it’s clear that the books world will never be the same. However, with such a seismic shift in the industry, there have been some unintended economic consequences for other worlds, too.
» via The Atlantic
Metaphor
The metaphor here is the antiquated view of the future (chair) that maps (GPS), books (ebooks), TV and music (I assume there are 45s and VHS tapes in the box) will become kindling (pun intended) in a digital world, more useful for warming a house as fuel than consuming.
But it is worth noting the position of the chair’s left rear leg which is also in the pile signifying the need to burn this dated view of the future and reconsider the value of the fireplace’s contents. Print books are more than the words on the pages. They are works of art and cherished artifacts and totems imbued with the power and memory of those words printed on the page.
Ebooks are an incredible technological development and they can deliver the meaning of those words faster and to countless more than print books ever could but it is only print books that allow us to posses and display that meaning as an icon on the shrine of our bookshelves, coffee tables and nightstands.
(Source: buddhainteriors)
In 2001 shortly before his death writer Douglas Adams produced a series for BBC Radio entitled the “Hitchhikers Guide to the Future” on how new technology will change our lives: he said in the future books would not be printed in thick black ink but in “intangible streams of electrons we receive through the internet”. Lovers of print were simply “confusing the plate for the food”.
