Remediated Books & Their Text
Published by Christy Dena April 16th, 2006 in Uncategorized, HCTI, Text Art, Publications.
We’ve mentioned other examples of books that are remediated online, like the Wanted microsite comic with rich media games I posted about, Jeremy’s post about the Puma catalogue, and the Lycette Bros. work. Here are a couple of non-fiction remediated books to add to the mix:
NXTbook Media’s 2006 Streaming Media Sourcebook
NXTbook Media “optimize” print for the web. This book is a digitised version of the print edition of the 2006 Streaming Media Industry Sourcebook. The book is navigated with a page turning simulation, just like the others we have seen. But it also has animated video advertisements and the authors reading out their articles. The subject of the text is also interesting as it offers a well assembled snapshot of streaming media.
if:books’ Card file of McKenzie Wark’s G4M3R 7H3ORY
if:book (Institute for the Future of the Book) are offering Wark’s latest book on game theory in an online card file format and RSS feed, to encourage feedback.
The idea is to nest Ken’s work in the social network that surrounds it, made visible in the number of comments and topics posted. This accomplishes something fairly radical, shifting the focus from an author’s work towards the contributions of a work’s readers. The integration between the blog and forums, and the position of the comments in relation to the author’s work emphasizes this shift. We’re hoping that the use of color as an integrating device will further collapse the usual distance between the author and his reading (and writing) public.
The ‘book’ is “an examination of single-player video games that comes out of the analytic tradition of the Frankfurt School (among other influences)” (listserv post from Joseph Matheny). Ironically, the chunks of text make it difficult for me to assemble the whole work in head, but I’ll keep delving as it looks wonderful…
Christy,
Thanks so much for mentioning NXTbook and for pointing out the Streaming Media Guide. We’re always encouraging our clients to use as much of the functionality of our product as possible and we were thrilled to see Streaming Media come up with some really great applications.
Marcus
No worries Marcus. You’re doing great stuff.
Christy,
Not sure if we are focusing on the remediated books themselves or the platforms and underlying technologies used to remediate them. It seems worth mentioning some other platforms that might make a roundup of multimedia ebook platforms. Where Eastgate’s Storyspace focuses on elaborate structure management, Night Kitchen’s TK3 emphasizes presentation of multimedia content (samples). Also worth considering are the many programs inheriting the legacy of Hypercard (such as SuperCard and Revolution) and on into e-learning production software such as Macromedia Authorware, which engineers learner choice through a “flow line.”
Also of note: the if:book page-card stacks are a javascript / XHTML mockup - however I believe that their end goal is to make the interface not a one-off, but a javascript-powered skin for a CMS that will manage text and comments as a book is being written… if:book has chosen Wordpress. I wonder if they would be interested in sharing their card-based interface either with skinning artists or writers interested in using it to power other content….