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Today I read a wonderful post over at INDX//mb. The post states:
I have been trying to decide who I should link to when I link to books — Wikipedia? Kobo? Google? Who links where reminds me of what a powerhouse Amazon’s affiliate program is. I wonder if their first mover advantage is insurmountable? It seems so. No other retailer is even trying to build inbound links from across the web. And if a new entrant needs 10x the money and effort to unseat the incumbent, then the B&Ns, Indigos, and Borders of this world can’t afford it.
As a reader who blogs, this question resonated with me. Most the time when I’m talking about a book I link to Amazon, and when I’m talking about a writer I link to Wikipedia. But is there a better source of information about books / authors? Later on in the same INDEX//mb post this appears:
Which brings me to The Open Library. There stated mission is “One web page for every book.” I am keen to link to TOL and I am eager to contribute edits where I can. The problem I have with it is the lack of a canonical page for the work rather than the book or the edition… For now, and perhaps forever, I will be linking to the best attempt at the canonical page on the net, at LibraryThing.com. (I just wish they added a TOL-style wiki.)
I spent some time poking around The Open Library site, and I’m kind of fascinated by it.
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The second item I wanted to call some attention to is a post over at the O’Reilly Tools Of Change blog about something that I think is a bit of very exciting technology created by a company called Ricoh Innovations. The post states:
How It Works
According to Jamey Graham, Distinguished Research Engineer at Ricoh, RI’s technology is similar to that of QR codes, but uses the natural patterns of an object or a page as opposed to a barcode. “Over the last few years we’ve developed algorithms for indexing & recognizing visual patterns. Using an Android or iPhone device, readers can snap a picture of a region on the page (text or images, or a combination) and they will be presented with online material just as if they’d scanned a barcode.”
With RI’s visual search system, areas of a page are mapped and linked to corresponding content. RI has developed both cloud and mobile versions of their device recognition engines, and are hoping that publishers will recognize the opportunity that their particular approach to visual search can offer to the reading experience — bridging the physical book with online media.
Ricoh recently launched their first app to accompany the soon-to-be-released novel by Matt Stewart, The French Revolution (Soft Skull). The app, dubbed the “French Rev,” links pages in the book with web-based content including videos, recipes, and music. Geo location data alerts readers to mapped locations from events in the book (set in San Francisco) such as Coit Tower, Pier 39, and the Golden Gate Bridge.
http://toc.oreilly.com/french%20rev%202.jpg
The linked nature of the web seems to be finding its way into traditional printed text. The linking of text in books to information about real life locations and web based information is something that I think people should really be keeping an eye on. This is the kind of locative media coming to life that William Gibson wrote about in his novel Spook Country. Very exciting stuff.
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The Penguin Blog wrote about their reissue of The Spy Who Came In From The Cold by John le Carré as a Penguin Modern Classics. The blog states:
First published 47 years ago, and being reissued today in Penguin Modern Classics, le Carré’s ‘Spy’ still has the power to make you uncomfortably aware of the mechanics operating in the pit of your stomach. His relentless, unflinching and unforgiving vision of the world reminded me of the moral wasteland that permeates McCarthy’s scalpathon ‘Blood Meridian’ and leaves you with an overwhelming sense that no matter how good the good guys are; the bad guys will always win.
I’ve never read anything by le Carre but this discription, and the beautiful cover art (seen below) of the reissue has made me want to give him a try ASAP.
This cover art is really amazing. It is simple and has a very classic look to it. As I was scanning (rather than reading) the blog, it was this cover art that drew my attention.
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