Amazon.co.uk acaba de lanzar (28/10/2008) la campaña promocional Author’s Choice, que consiste en una página donde los autores indican cuáles son sus 10 libros preferidos, y en el caso de autores expertos en algún tema en concreto, los 10 títulos que consideren esenciales sobre el tema en cuestión. Author’s Choice, una nova eina promocional d’Amazon.co.uk Iolanda Bethencourt

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by Cassie, Publicity Assistant

A. David Moody is Professor Emeritus of the University of York and the author of Ezra Pound, Poet: Volume 1: The Young Genius 1885-1920. In the following piece, Moody looks at the Pound’s opinions on democracy and the economy, showing us that Pound’s opinions in the 1930s line up fairly well with the pundits of today.  This piece is also timely since October 30th is Pound’s birthday and he died on November 1, 1972.

I am finding it hard to pin down a feeling I have these days as I read the pundits on the current financial crisis and hear echoes all the time of what Ezra Pound was writing in the 1930s. But Pound was called a crank for his beliefs.

“The provision of finance is a utility, just like the distribution of water and energy. Yet this public good is in the hands of private sector managers who have done a disastrous job.”
(Guardian (London), editorial comment, 9 Oct. ‘08)

“The City has become a ghetto where greed (never mentioned) is all but an absolute good.”
(Andrew Phillips (Lord Phillips of Sudberry), City solicitor, Guardian 16 Oct. ‘08)

“Financiers have organized themselves so that actual or potential losses are picked up by somebody else—if not their clients then the state – while profits are kept to themselves.”
(Will Hutton, Observer (London), 27 Jan. ‘08)

“There is a chance to make finance once again the servant of the public, as it should be.”
(Larry Elliot, Economics Editor, Guardian (London), 15 Oct. ‘08)

“The Bank of England can directly create sterling assets (that is, print money) if it needs to”—i.e. it does not have to “borrow” from the banks it has just had to bail out.
(Gavyn Davies, partner in Goldman Sachs, Guardian (London), 9 Oct. ‘08)

“[The government] pays interest to private organizations for the use of its own credit . . . So that actually the government is getting itself into debt to the banks for the privilege of helping them to regain their stranglehold on the economic life of the country.”
(Senator Bronson Cutting, New York Times, 20 May 1934 – from a speech Pound commended.)

Pound might have written all of those things, if in his own terms. (”Leveraging” was not a current term in the 1930s, so he used plain terms: banks were lending money they did not have, to their own profit and the public’s loss.) As early as 1919 he was trying to understand how it was that, in a democracy, power to secure to the people “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” was not with the people, but with those few who owned and controlled the people’s credit and who were capable of exercising it against the common interest. And he was already arguing that it is the function and responsibility of the state, that is, of the government appointed by the people, to create and to regulate the nation’s credit, and to prevent it being usurped by private interests.

Pound’s prophetic critique of anti-democratic capitalism became a major theme after the 1929 Crash and the Great Depression of the 1930s—and it led to his being falsely accused of being himself anti-democratic. But in this time of financial crisis, and with it being near to the anniversaries of his birth and death (born 30 October 1885; died 1 November 1972), it is fitting to celebrate the now undeniable fact that, while he did go wrong in some ways, Pound was fundamentally right about the damage done to the whole society by unrestrained greed in the financial system, and about it being the responsibility of governments to issue and to control credit. It would be a good moment to read and to take the point of his cantos 31-51, particularly those about the American bank wars of 1829-35 and 1863.

employing means at the bank’s disposal
in deranging the country’s credits, obtaining by panic
control over public mind” said Van Buren
(Ezra Pound, Canto 37)

Further quotations:

“Banking should be treated as a utility.”
(Martin Wolf, Financial Times)

“The reckless greed of the few harms the future of the many.”
(Will Hutton, Observer (London), 27 Jan. ‘08)

“The sin of usury, diluted in the 1500s, should be brought back—usury, reaping that which one did not sow.”
(Ann Pettifor, political economist, Guardian (London), 11 Oct. ‘08)

“It is not money that is the root of the evil. The root is greed.”
(Ezra Pound, Gold and Work, 1944)

“Hopefully our democracies are strong enough to overcome the power of money and special interests.”
(Joseph Stiglitz, formerly Chief Economist of the World Bank, Guardian (London), 16 Oct. ‘08)

“The state can lend money.”
(Ezra Pound, Canto 78)

“It is an infamy that the STATE in, and by reason of, the very act of creating material wealth should run into debt to individuals.”
(Ezra Pound, New English Weekly, 5 July 1934)

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Slashgear reports a different approach to ePaper, this one produced by Sharp. It's an eight-color liquid crystal display that can freezes static images after the juice is switched off. Sharp foresees a variety of markets for it such as grocery displays: by hooking the screen up to a Wi-Fi, store managers can readily adjust prices displayed to customers. It could also be competitive with emerging e-book applications once the cost comes down and some other issues, such as temperature distortion and power consumption, are resolved. The technology doesn't sound competitive yet with eInk but given Sharp minds, that could change fast. Read about it.

RC

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And speaking of screen technology, check out Samsung's flat panel display; at 0.05 mm, it's so thin it actually flaps!

As reported by Gearlog, "The OLED display was made by using polysilicon TFTs and low-molecular organic EL materials. The panel is then sealed using a technology that employs sputtering method and doesn't use glass substrate. Samsung's flapping OLED display has a 480 × 272 pixels resolution, 200cd/m2 luminance and 100,000:1 contrast ratio. Just imagine watching movies on paper-thin displays in the future!"

Translation: A screen so thin it flaps!

RC

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Some months ago Random House, S&S and other major houses said they were buying dedicated e-readers for certain editors, sales reps and others.

Have the new gizmos worked out? Which brand is most popular? And how are publishing people using them?

Sony Reader most popular among publishers

"In general," reports Publishing Trends in the November issue, "e-reader users are happy with the device they currently own." Typically that’s a Sony because of the quantity discounts the company offers, unlike Amazon.

Also, unfairly, as both PT and I see it, some publishing people are worried about people spying on them. I do think the Kindle has privacy risks, but not in this case—I doubt Amazon is taking time to snoop on manuscripts and book proposals, the main app for publishers.

E-books’ other most popular uses

Other popular uses are purchased e-books (40 percent of respondents compared to more than 80 percentage for manuscripts and proposals), newspaper articles (more than 30 percent), magazine articles (20 percent) and memos and other internal documents (about 10 percent).

The Kindle’s wireless, of course, can be useful for sharing material, and Sony itself will release a wireless model in the near future.

G Phone not well enough integrated with Google Books yet

In a separate PT article, Ariel Aberg-Riger recounts her mixed experiences with a Google Phone and says of Google Book Search: "On the phone, you just float around the page as you would online, only tinier." She’s expecting "more seamless integration between the mobile platform and GBooks as both continue to improve."

Er, isn’t it time for Google to be thinking about a reflowable format like ePub—in line with all the company’s ballyhoo about standards-love? FBReader, which can read ePub even if the app currently lacks CSS capabilities, is already gearing up for the GPhone.

Meanwhile Aberg-Riger, apparently a multi-device gal who prefers all-in-one-convenience and flexibility, observes: "I will never, ever buy a dedicated e-reader a tirade for a different day, but I could imagine myself downloading books straight to my phone. And therein lies the future."

Interesting stat: 70 percent of publishing people surveyed by PT have yet to read an e-book.

Publishing Trends subscription information: Here. Highly recommended—for covering the substance, not just the flash, of the publishing industry!

Amazon Kindle, E-books and all that, EPub, Google, Uncategorized, amazon, book publishing, e-book, e-book ergonomics, e-books, e-books and other digipubs, ebook, ebooks, kindle | No Comments »

Presentations from the Institutional and National Services for Research Data Management Workshop at the Oxford Said Business School are now available.

Here's a selection:

• The Archaeology Data Service, A Subject Specific Digital Repository
• A Grand Challenge for the Information Age
• Legal Issues Relevant to Digital Repositories
• Tools for Managing Research Data: the Data Audit Framework (DAF) and DRAMBORA
• The UK Research Data Service (UKRDS) Feasibility Study

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Apple ne peut que jouer un rôle crucial dans le développement du livre électronique de nouvelle génération. Les premiers Macintosh, avec un petit écran en teinte de gris ne nécessitant aucune accommodation des yeux par rapport au papier, affichant pour la première fois sur ordinateur des caractères lissés noirs sur fond blanc, et proposant des applications spécialement conçues pour les auteurs, comme Hypercard, ont été les machines de prédilection du monde de l'édition. Il suffit pour se le rappeler d'ouvrir le somptueux "Livre des polices".
L'évolution vers des ordinateurs plus complets et complexes a peut-être freiné le développement d'un marché de masse du livre électronique, mais ce n'était que temporaire. Le succès foudroyant de l'iPhone le démontre: des centaines de millions de contenus diffusés depuis quelques semaines et aussi divers que Le Monde à composition adaptée, un manuel interactif d'anatomie prodigieux, ou un cours de SVT mis au point par le professeur lui-même. Le Macbook Air, quant à lui, préfigure ce que sera l'encyclopédie du futur.

Quelle est la place des dispositifs à base d'encres électroniques?

Pour de nombreuses raisons physiologiques (la lecture dense n'est possible que sur papier, bien que le cerveau soit plus mis à contribution pendant une navigation Internet), énergétiques, écologiques, économiques (un Macbook Air coute 1700 euros), l'imprimé reste largement plébiscité. L'encre électronique lui apporte des caractéristiques uniques en le rendant réinscriptible, communicant, résistant, intelligent et personnalisable, de haute définition, avec des tailles de quelques millimètres à des mètres carrés.

Ainsi, les ingénieurs taïwanais et américains nous ayant démontré que toute l'électronique mobile deviendra à terme semi-flexible, il y aura d'un coté des dispositifs hybrides comme ceux d'Apple ou de Nintendo, et de l'autre de nouveaux objets de lecture et d'écriture très divers à base d'encres électroniques et de substrats variés.

Quel avenir alors pour les lecteurs génériques de livres électroniques, tel le Sony Reader? Nous en débattrons le le 14 novembre prochain aux Rencontres Tebaldo.

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JISC has released a two-part study of digital preservation policies: Digital Preservation Policies Study and Digital Preservation Policies Study, Part 2: Appendices—Mappings of Core University Strategies and Analysis of Their Links to Digital Preservation.

Here's an excerpt:

This JISC funded study aims to provide an outline model for digital preservation policies and to analyse the role that digital preservation can play in supporting and delivering key strategies for Higher and Further Education Institutions. Although focussing on the UK Higher and Further Education sectors, the study draws widely on policy and implementations from other sectors and countries and will be of interest to those wishing to develop policy and justify investment in digital preservation within a wide range of institutions. We have created two tools in this study: 1) a model/framework for digital preservation policy and implementation clauses based on examination of existing digital preservation policies; 2) a series of mappings of digital preservation links to other key institutional strategies in UK universities and colleges. Our aim has been to help institutions and their staff develop appropriate digital preservation policies and clauses set in the context of broader institutional strategies.

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How many e-books exist already with embedded music soundtracks? I’ll guess that some are out there despite a claim by Electric Book Works that Moxyland is the first e-book with one. But I could be wrong.

"The soundtrack was compiled by African Dope Records to suit the mood and feel of the book’s storyline," says Arthur Attwell, EBW’s publishing director.

Futuristic plot

The plot is set "ten years in the future" in Cape Town and brings together such characters as "a roguish slacker living off his mom" and "a brilliant corporate programmer and AIDS baby" who is "just bored enough to risk everything by hacking the system that makes her privileged lifestyle possible." Author is Lauren Beukes.

Less Flash, please

I wish EBW luck, and the writer, too, but meanwhile I hope it will stop relying so heavily on Flash for the promo site for Moxyland. Come on, folks. The cool cyber people adhere to relevant tech standards.

Had it not been for the abominable .SWF, I could have pasted in some character descriptions and picked up the large graphic without resorting to a screen capture.

PDF format for book itself

The format of the book itself is PDF, into which the soundtrack is embedded. I’d be curious to know if the ePub standard—either the present incarnation or an enhanced one—could be eventually be used. Might some of the same technology for the disabled also work for coordinating music and text via ePub? To EBW’s credit, ePub is already among the company’s main formats. I hope the International Digital Publishing Forum will listen to suggestions from EBW and other innovation-minded publishers as the group develops ePub.

Meanwhile if you want to enjoy Moxyland on your Kindle (iffy with converted PDF and lacking native ePUB), forget it. Same for most cellphones, I suspect. The Tower of eBabel still looms high. I wonder if the PDF will serve up music on the Sony Reader PRS-505 and PRS-700, which can handle PDF text reasonably well. Can the Sony machines at least display the words from Moxyland?

Some wrinkles in Moxyland: "Scaleable pages for easy reading, embedded music controllers, suggested tracks, electronic bookmarks, hyperlinks and sticky notes." These features are hardly unique, but interesting.

Fun question: What music would you like embedded into your favorite book (book title?), and why? Or do you hate the idea for file-size reasons or others? Think that text and music should stand by themselves? And what about the royalty issue? The more trimming a book has, the less for writers in most  cases or at least many.

E-books and all that, Uncategorized, e-book, e-books, e-books and other digipubs, ebook, ebooks | No Comments »

Cassie Ammerman, Publicity Assistant

Happy Friday! And Happy Halloween! It’s been a really great week for fun and interesting links, which means you guys get the benefits today. Hopefully these will keep you occupied as you slog through the day, anticipating the revelry tonight. I’m actually skipping the Halloween festivities this year, so someone out there have a drink for me!

I found this one last week and was so excited about it I had to save it to share with you guys. How cool is this? There’s a new state of matter.

National Novel Writing Month starts November 1st! Here’s your chance to sign up and write that novel you’re always talking about.

Not only do stars make “noise,” but they sound like….the theme from the original Star Trek!?! How cool is that?

People in the book business (myself included) are always asking what makes you buy a book. But what makes you decide NOT to buy a book? For me, it’s comparisons. “Reminiscent of…” (insert some literary heavyweight) sounds like the author has no originality.

It’s the 104th birthday of the New York City subway! And it’s more congested than ever, which I can attest on my daily hour-each-way commute…

Some fun (or not so fun) robot links: First, creating a truly evil robot; second, we already have robots on the ground in the Middle East, and apparently they’re doing a good job.

Who said bookmarks have to be boring, plain pieces of paper?

How many of the 100 most common English words do you know? I won’t admit my score here…

Literary character themed Halloween party! Check it out if you’re in New York.

I admit it; I’m a Tetris fanatic. So the sight of this fills me with nerdish glee.

It seems like I see something like this every week. Here’s another library I would love to have someday…

You guys are probably tired of news from Mars, but I’m not! Now there’s evidence that Mars had water for a lot longer than we thought.

And finally, in the spirit of Halloween and for those of us who didn’t get to carve a pumpkin in real life, there’s virtual pumpkin carving!

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