Observe the observer

How To Run A News Site And Newspaper Using WordPress And Google Docs - 10,000 Words

2011-06-23T07:56:00.001-07:00

The workflow integrates seamlessly with InDesign, meaning the paper now has one content management system for both its web and print operations. And if you’re auspicious enough, you can do it too — he’s open-sourced all the code!

Posted via email from Tim's posterous

Randomness at play

2011-06-17T09:29:00.001-07:00

I liked how this

http://www.npr.org/blogs/pictureshow/2011/06/17/137221886/yes-those-people-ar...

Led to this:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/01/arts/design/01tino.html

which led to this:

http://www.futureofthebook.org/blog/archives/2010/03/against_writingthis_prog...

and now I feel so much smarter.

Posted via email from Tim's posterous

2011-05-18T06:07:00.000-07:00

You are a dog ....

2011-05-06T09:02:00.001-07:00

I just read a blog post from Eoin Purcell where he uses the saying 'people don't know you're a dog online' to make a point. It occurred to me that with google talk, skype, social networking etc.,that that old trope about nobody knowing you're a dog online just isn't true anymore. The internet is not about being anonymouse anymore. The digital space has changed dramatically since the time of the cartoon that Purcell mentions was drawn, (New Yorker 1993)

Of course the point he was making was about how backlist competes with frontlist because now no one knows that it is backlist. It just is. And while I agree that digital distribution has changed the game for frontlist and backlist I still think that pubdate is extremely relevant and that it will be pubdate that influences purchases. Pubdate is what creates backlist and media is going to still push/review new over old. So while backlist is no longer constrained by material space it is still very much constrained by it's actual original existence and the way dialogue happens around books.

Posted via email from Tim's posterous

2010-09-02T19:47:00.000-07:00

This was cool: http://www.thewildernessdowntown.com/

2010-08-13T06:33:00.000-07:00

Words:

ebooks format and perception

2010-07-09T08:01:00.001-07:00

Hi there:

A couple of problems I wanted you to be aware of. I was enjoying reading The Girl Who Played with Fire on my iphone with the kobo app. Then I upgraded to the 4.0 kobo app and you lost my bookmark. A bit of a pain with an ebook for sure but I forgive you.

Then I was reading along when I came to a passage that is supposed to be an icq exchange with Plague and Salander and the text in tags ran off the screen. I changed the font size to the smallest possible but it still didn't fit. I would have loved looking at the epub to see what was what but I didn't. Not sure who is at fault here - your conversion or publishers but I can say I blamed your app. Also, wondered how I get a new ebook if there is a fix for this? (As an aside I did go to the source! the pbook to see what I was missing)

Anyway I know there is a lot of crap that goes on in ebooks but because this is such a high profile ebook I thought I would write.

Oh yeah, you lost my bookmark again when I went back in the book to find where the passage was so I could take a photo of it (attached)!

Posted via email from Tim's posterous

If you want loyalty don't piss me off ...

2010-05-11T09:02:00.001-07:00

I recently read a tweet from @NicholasHoareTO and there was something about it that bugged me.

The tweet went like this:

"Dear customer, please don't use our store and staff to put together your online shopping list. :("

First of all how do you know dear store and staff that that is the reason a list is being made? I use my iphone and write notes about books I see all the time and I never or at least rarely order them online - and so what if I did? Don't you sell books online? Well you have a website but I can't order anything from it so perhaps I will just "steal" "your" catalogue and order them from somewhere else? Is that what you want?

Secondly, yes I am your customer - I might even be following you on twitter and you might even be pissing me off with your snotty tweets therefore I may not buy those books from you after all.

I know you have a reputation to keep up Nick Hoare but if you are going to use social media and your website presumably for the good of your business - don't complain when others use you to benefit their consuming. Be gracious, be helpful and all that other stuff that good retailers do who want to gain customer loyalty and then perhaps you will get customer loyalty.

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

The real story behind Stieg Larsson and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - Times Online

2010-05-06T10:00:00.001-07:00

It has gone on rising. On a French beach last summer Mark Lawson, the critic, noted that “almost every sunbather of every nationality was reading one of Larsson’s novels in the numerous translations”. His three books, the Millennium trilogy, have been filmed in Sweden, and Hollywood is planning its own versions.

via entertainment.timesonline.co.uk

This is the kind of reporting that will no longer be available when people are reading on their iphones, ereaders and such - like the way I read Girl with a Dragon Tattoo and am now reading The Girl Who Played with Fire.

That aside - pretty good article on the author Steig Larsson who died at the age of 50.

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

2010-05-04T19:15:00.001-07:00

What a view.

Apollo 11 Saturn V Launch (HD) Camera E-8 from Mark Gray on Vimeo.

2010-05-04T08:26:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a big fail on the part of Amazon and all of the other ebook providers, but mainly I suppose the fail was on the part of the publishers. I only think of the Kindle as the fail because this is what I had at my disposal as an ereader other than my iphone and computer. I have had the Kindle since christmas and I have yet to use it for anything other than a conversation piece.

Well as I said below, yesterday my daughter was home "sick" from school and slightly bored. (In actual fact the Kindle is hers - she was given it by one of early early early adopter friends and when she got it I thought cool, I can use that.)

So back to the story. She was home "sick" and we decided we should get the next installments in the series we were reading - Anne Mazer's Sister Magic. A fun read, lightly illustrated with line drawings and not something you need to have hanging out taking up shelf space. Perfect, I thought, finally a use case for the Kindle. In my oh so confident fatherly voice I told her we could get the series and start reading right away. Here I was willing to invest in about 5-6 books at one stop! Talk about impulse shopping.

Well the Kindle disappointed, Amazon disappointed, did publishers ever disappoint? No, not unless I pursued the reason why the ebooks weren't available. And this has to be a concern for any ebook vendor out there - perception! Who gets blamed when a book is not available?

Now I happen to know the behind the scenes story with agency pricing and publisher preparedness for the digital age but my impulse was still to think the Kindle sucks! Not only could I not get these books I wanted, but I also couldn't find about 4 other titles I wanted to read in digital. I am on an apocalyptic bent of late. I saw a table display at an Indigo store filled with fascinating titles like Slynx, and Battle Royale - and decided I would read these books in their digital format. Somehow it seemed appropriate to think the apocalypse would be brought to me on my iphone. I did decide to check Kobo first, Stanza's catalogues next and finally Amazon (don't like Amazon drm and that is that). Nowhere to be found -(note - I did not blame the iphone for not having the books).

The apocalypse would have to be provided by trees if at all. I may just forget this latest trend in my reading and if I do too bad authors, too bad publishers and too bad bookstores - my money is going to go toward investing in a good concrete bunker and a subscription to popular mechanics.

2010-05-03T06:08:00.001-07:00

ebooks wherefore art thou ebooks?

Old age is something that crawls up on you. It can appear as hair loss, muscle mass decline, lung capacity limited, chronic back ache or underserved demographic in the ebook market.

With all the talk of dedicated ereaders being targeted at older people I find it odd that I am unable to find the books I want to read. Maybe this has absolutely nothing to do with my age but just my reading habits and the reading habits of my children.

It was not long ago that I over-enthusiastically commented in a tweet that I thought it was interesting how the conversations around the digitization of publishing were no longer about content but about price etc. Well I admit here that I was naive. It is still about not having content. I have avoided using the kindle because I don't like the drm. I don't like being tied to their device, even though I can synch up with the Kindle app on the iphone and my laptop and apparently on the ipad as well. But still come on Amazon what is it with this silly propriatary format? You really should know better. And that aside where are the books I want to read!

In the digital world I find I am mostly being sold romance books or business books or classics. But when you step outside of the digital mainstream you are in a wasteland. I just recently was influenced by a display in a bookstore that showed a lovely theme of reading that I was willing to delve into, but for practical reasons -including the aforementioned old age and a recent back problem, I wanted ebooks. I have been able to be a more focused reader on my digital devices than ever before. Don't know why I just am. So I could see myself ripping through these titles -but alas not to be. I just can't find the books anywhere. And who do I ask to special order them for me?

Another disappointment came when my daughter was home sick from school and we wanted to continue reading a new series we had discovered. We have avoided the ebook world for kid's books thus far because the books we were reading were richly illustrated but this series would have worked perfectly on the kindle. Yes I was even willing to buy the books from Amazon in the infamous "60" second download to get going - but once again not to be had. And again who the heck to ask to get a special order around here? No one!

So ebooks - publishers, I beseech you and wonder at your dismal failure to reach the masses with your so called vaunted content. Get your content out there so we can read it when want where we want how we want!

2010-04-30T08:08:00.000-07:00

More about me and my reading:

I am struggling with my reading right now. At the side of my bed I have the last in the Harry Potter series - you know that book about those wizards and muggles and things? I bought this trade paper copy of the book at Hanukkah to give to my nephew but he already had read it so I kept it. Mind you I had bought a hard cover of the book when it first came out and my wife read it then we gave it away to my mom - who is a voracious reader.

I finally picked up Harry after just having read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo on the iphone and I have to say I was torn and maybe even disappointed. Here I thought -ok back to the format I love -pbooks. But what I am experiencing is how crappy pbooks can be. I am finding the type dim, the margins crowded, the feel of the paper inadequate and the binding threateningly flimsy, not to mention I don't always have this book with me.

So what I am finding is that I want to read on the iphone again! I tried to prevent this, god knows I tried -but really the reading on the iphone is so much better than especially this trade paper version. I feel ripped off that I bought this piece of crap that probably won't make it through one reading. Sure I can loan it out but there won't be anything to loan out. And in that spirit of loaning without expectation of getting the thing back - I would just have to buy another copy of this book again anyway.

So what is my point? ebooks ebooks ebooks. Get me the content - I am ready to pay. Get me the ipad - I am ready for a slightly bigger screen. Get me out of Kindle drm prison! Let me read anywhere on any device and get me away from these smelly lousy paper things!

2010-04-26T05:04:00.001-07:00

There is an occupational hazard in my role as the retail liaison for BookNet Canada - this hazard is that I have to go to a lot of bookstores. This is a hazard because inevitably I end up buying far too many books. There is something seductive about seeing all of these beautifully designed objects placed in seductive positions on lovely shelves.

This past week I went to the University of Waterloo bookstore and since I was in Waterloo I later dropped in on Words Worth Books - a general trade bookstore. Although I was tempted to buy something at the University I did escape wallet intact. But I was blown away by the aggressive position that the bookstore is taking toward ebooks. The university is in an enviable ,or unenviable depending on how you look at it, position of being embedded in a highly sophisticated technology environment. This means they need to stay up on technology and to this end they have been running an espresso machine (for books not coffee) as well as selling mobile phones (they are a rogers dealer and licensed to sell!) Soon the university will be selling ipads and ereaders alongside their laptops and iphones -and oh yeah blackberries too. If the ipad had been in Canada I surely would have been hooked and bought one here.

We all know that the road is not that smooth for this kind of mix of products - books and ebooks. However early signs indicate to the managers of the store that students want bundles and that ebooks do not cannibalize pbooks but actually enhance the reading experience by making those books available at all times in all places. Who wouldn't want to be dancing up a alcohol enhanced storm at ....... and suddenly when the conversation has room to happen and the arguements begin to fly being able to whip out your medical reference text and supporting your position?

My next stop was the general trade bookstore. The difference between visiting an academic bookstore and a trade bookstore cannot be too finely stated. I sat leisurly in an office discussing a wide range of issues at the university and then left two hours later while at the general bookstore I inserted comments in between customer transactions at the bookstore till. Comments about ebooks, or software, the digital catalogue project and more. Occasionally I just had to back away from the till to let the late lunch rush load up on books, which was quite impressive to see. I would wander the store, load up on books of my own, then back to add another point - harried bookseller saying hmmm, ok hmmm, edespair, hmmm, ok - more edespair.

But at the end of it all, and the point of this blog post, was that I left the store with four books and three of them would be highly unlikely to see any life as an ebook. In the hopes of spreading a veneer of hope for the booksellers I said as I bought the Andy Goldsworthy and the humungous kid's books that these are books that will never be ebooks. Hmmm, said the bookseller -edespair!

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

Clay Shirky

2010-04-07T07:14:00.001-07:00

The most watched minute of video made in the last five years shows baby Charlie biting his brother’s finger. (Twice!) That minute has been watched by more people than the viewership of American Idol, Dancing With The Stars, and the Superbowl combined. (174 million views and counting.)

via shirky.com

It is phenomenon like this that blows me away. And apparently according to Clay Shirky is blowing complex business models away. Interesting article comparing the collapse of complex business models to the fall of complex societies.

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

2010-04-01T10:25:00.000-07:00

What I Learned on my Trip out West:

I just got back from Vancouver and decided it might be interesting to look at my book purchasing behaviour while I was away.

Two things have to be mentioned first off. The first reason for my trip was to talk to the MPub class at SFU about BookNet Canada. The second reason was to pay some visits to some book retailers. So, God forbid I had to go to bookstores.

Let me start off by saying that I love buying books for gifts. I can always grab something and I know if I can't get to read it mayself, there is surely a present to be given away soon enough. But when I was packing I was torn. Should I buy some ebooks to read on my iphone? Or should I pack some books? I usually pack at least 3 books when I am travelling. One thing I noticed just now is that I didn't even consider loading up the Kindle. I don't use the Kindle. I like reading books on the iphone or on paper. Mind you if I could buy the book from anywhere and read it on anything who knows how that might play out.

Well a certain retailer was having a huge party. People were going 2party like it was $9.99. I absolutely loved that campaign. Who ever came up with it, committee or otherwise, is pure genius. So much is captured in those simple numbers. I bit. I bought 3 books from Kobo - three current books: Nikolski, and then the Steig Larsson books. And here is the funny thing about that - I have already bought both those Steig Larsson booksin hardcopy as gifts and have had Nikolski out of the library - so is that ebooks cannibalizing pbooks? I don't know.

Once I got out west to all of those great bookstores I had to go to, believe me I was tempted in every one to drop a bundle. But I only had one suitcase after all. In a fit of home sickness and nostalgia I did buy the beautiful Family Fare cookbook by Gordon Ramsey. One look through those rich photos of food and the approach of Easter around the corner I had to have it. I had to have that book in that format from that store. No ebook could fill that need.

My next purchases were made after a performance of sublime handselling at the Vancouver Kidsbooks in Kitsilano. First off what a gorgeous store, well situated with great buyers. My hat is off to you, as well as my credit. I bought 8 kids books that I had never heard of, never seen and if I had ever seen them there was no one to tell me why I should buy them for my kids. It was art. When I went to buy the whole series I was told no don't do that give it a try first. When I said I didn't think my local store back home would have them, I was asked didn't I want them to have them, don't I want to tell them about this great series and get them to stock it and share them with my community? I thought -wow, yes I do.

Here is one last point and then I will stop. What did I read while I was away? I read the Steig Larsson book on the iphone. I read it in the plane, I read it at 1 in the morning when I couldn't sleep, I read it sitting in the park looking out over the bay, I read it in the cafes where I was eating my lunches, on the Sky train, in the many cabs I took, I read it everywhere. I had my phone on me where ever I went and so I had my books with me too, as well as the entire twittersphere, all the news I could ever want, a calculator, my gps, my local tour guides - I had it all.

No here is a funny part even though I said I wouldn't write anymore about this. Coming home I dutifully put my phone on airplane mode, and started to read my book. The woman beside me was reading a huge trade paper by Dianne Gabaldon. I looked at that book and smugly thought I am so glad I don't need to pull out a book like that and lug that thing around. The next second the stewardess came by and told me to turn my iphone off? I looked puzzled at her -what could she mean? It is on airplane mode. Does she really want me to turn it off -off? Never. But I realized she saw me reading a screen full of text and assumed I was online reading email or a blog or something. So I closed kobo because I am polite and I was confused - turned to the guy who had his iphone "on" and we both shrugged. I never thought a day would come on a plane when I would be asked to turn off my book

2010-03-02T19:01:00.000-08:00

http://www.nycgraphicnovelists.com/2010/03/talking-comics-with-scott-mccloud.html

2010-03-02T18:52:00.001-08:00

Check out this website I found at ow.ly

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

2009-10-01T13:10:00.001-07:00

Dan Brown Ebook Sales May not be the tipping point.

2009-09-22T18:22:00.001-07:00

According to AP, Doubleday announced Tuesday that hardcover, audio and e-book sales for "The Lost Symbol" topped 2 million copies for its first week of release in the United States, Britain and Canada. The total is "well over" 2 million for English-language editions worldwide, according to Doubleday spokeswoman Suzanne Herz, who declined to offer a specific number. Herz did say that around 5 percent, or 100,000 copies, of "The Lost Symbol" were sold as e-books (http://finance.yahoo.com/news/New-Dan-Brown-novel-tops-2-apf-2025745368.html?x=0&.v=1).

via posterous.com

p.s. Please help BookNet aggregate ebook sales!

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

2009-09-22T11:53:00.000-07:00

QR codes are fun:
download a barcode reader to read this:

Tim is now following you on Twitter! hahahahaha(evil laugh)hahaha

2009-09-18T18:29:00.001-07:00

Tim (Kirtim) is now following your tweets on Twitter.

A little information about Tim:

197 followers
666 tweets
following 172 people
The Twitter Team
Turn off these emails at: http://twitter.com/account/notifications

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I don't or haven't paid too much attention to my tweets and yet tonight while experimenting I decided to check my updates and - lets just say the number 666 came up! Yikes.......I quickly tweeted and prevented sure damnation.

Posted via email from Tim's posterous

Interview: Peter Collingridge - Read my inovel - Scotsman.com News

2009-09-18T08:19:00.001-07:00

After seeing Enhanced Edition, Apple featured it online. Now books by Philip Pullman and David Simon, creator of The Wire, are planned.
"Supermarkets sell three books for the price of two. Value is being shipped out of books. We want to add value," says Collingridge.

via news.scotsman.com

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

VIA Rail Services Cut in Preparation for Strike

2009-07-22T18:26:00.001-07:00

via blogto.com

This picture is why it is so nice to commute by train to Toronto. It is also the reason why you might want to book a trip across Canada in the summer by Via , not because you think after all of your hard planning and weird happenings your coveted sleeper car for two seven year olds and their parents is going to be canceled because 340 people can stop this service in Canada.

I don't know how I feel about that -right now quite angry! Keep those points a coming Via I will be able to travel across and back next summer. A kind of doubling up, because now Air travel will go up.

This by the way is a great study for risk management. I suppose if I knew all about the climate of Via I could have seen this coming. However, as it is I found out about this late.

Someone on the train tonight said so did you call via? I said why? And she said oh not because you can do something about it -something like that anyway. But of course I have been following twitter all day and finding out all kinds of stuff.

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

Bits of Destruction Hit the Book Publishing Business: Part 2

2009-07-17T03:24:00.001-07:00

Here is a bookstore owner's nightmare. Customer walks in; browses around; has grand old time in this temple of knowledge; peruses a book that costs $27; takes out Kindle and orders it for $17, right there in front of your nose, using your wi-fi connection. Aaagh!

You wake up sweating at 3:00 in the morning.

Have you noticed all of those best-seller books stacked up at the front of your local bookstore? Did the retailer buy them hoping to sell them all? Of course not. They are relying on a variant of the age-old practice of "sale or return." Publisher have agreed to take back unsold ones for credit. As this article on Bloomberg states:

"Returns date back to the Depression, when publishers implemented the practice as a way to ensure that bookstores would continue stocking new books."

Now that we are in a major recession, or micro-depression, or whatever we're calling it these days, surely this practice will continue. Well, probably not. Digitization, whether via e-book or print on demand, makes it unnecessary. And publishers simply cannot sustain it. Approximately 25% of their books are being returned. Think of what that does to their profit margins.

How can retailers survive if they have to decide what to buy based on their forecast of what will sell? The answer is, they can't. No one can forecast fickle consumer taste. With retailer's profit margins being what they are, one small error could lead to an operation's failure.

But they have to stock their shelves with something, right?

Not necessarily. Have you noticed that bookstores are becoming more like coffee shops and coffee shops are becoming more like bookstores? And that both have wi-fi?

Retail bookstores might look more like community hang-out spots in future, with the following:

Good (but expensive) coffee and snacks,

Free wi-fi,

A few best-selling books and DVDs (under the sale or return policy),

A way for patrons to order any book in the universe, while taking a cut of the transaction.

This last possibility is not hard to imagine. The customer could have the book delivered to the bookstore if they will be passing by again soon or, for a little extra (plus guilt for the bigger carbon footprint), their home.

These coffee shop/bookstores could even host virtual "Meet the author" sessions on a big screen, with back-channel chats going on via Twitter. And they could host book clubs for both face-to-face meetings and online gatherings.

If the "local printer" model becomes a reality, book delivery would be immediate. We can even imagine digital printers setting up shop in the back of coffee shop/bookstores?

That sounds like fun for readers, authors, and store owners. But for students and the unemployed, the walk to the local library seems all the shorter.

And what about big-box bookstores in malls? Nope. Sell your commercial real estate and big-box retailer stock. That will get ugly.

via readwriteweb.com

Article by Bernard Lunn envisions (albeit not a full business plan) the future bookstore.

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

‘Tis Better to Lose a Sale Than Sell an eBook? | Booksquare

2009-07-14T19:28:00.001-07:00

At least they’re being honest about it. They’re worried that ebook sales will negatively impact the potential for this title to hit a bestseller list. They’re worried that the difference between earned digital royalties and lost print royalties is too vast. Apparently, ’tis better to have no sale at all and all that.

via booksquare.com

Too bad bestseller lists aren't based on sales of digital books as well.

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

Seth's Blog: Malcolm is wrong

2009-06-30T19:01:00.001-07:00

People will pay for content if it is so unique they can't get it anywhere else, so fast they benefit from getting it before anyone else, or so related to their tribe that paying for it brings them closer to other people. We'll always be willing to pay for souvenirs of news, as well, things to go on a shelf or badges of honor to share.

via sethgodin.typepad.com

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

Book Glutton and Random House team up | TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home

2009-06-29T18:13:00.001-07:00

We’re intrigued by the concept of social reading and want to give online book clubs the unique experience of reading and discussing our books in real-time.

via teleread.org

Experimenting with social reading.

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

Malcolm Gladwell reviews Free by Chris Anderson: Books: The New Yorker

2009-06-29T11:58:00.001-07:00

the digital age has so transformed the ways in which things are made and sold that there are no iron laws.

via newyorker.com

Tipping Point author vs. Long Tail author -may the best sound bite win!

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

"Coraline: Knitting Little Itty Bitty Outfits"

2009-05-29T11:45:00.001-07:00


Coraline: Knitting Little Itty Bitty Outfits You may realize Coraline is stop motion animation and with that comes each puppet in the film and beyond that, someone has to outfit them! Would you believe one woman knitted all of Coraline's sweaters and gloves?! Hard to imagine, yea? Take a look! More on Action-figure.com!

Posted via email from Tim's posterous

Mary Roach on 10 things you didn't know about orgasm

2009-05-22T14:32:00.001-07:00

Posted via email from Tim's posterous

The Digital Economy

2009-05-21T19:07:00.001-07:00

My first ever copyright infringement. I am hoping it is Scribd and not me who is the law breaker in this case. I have since replaced the offensive book with a book called The Digital Economy Fact Book.

Posted via email from Tim's posterous

Frank Lloyd Wright Lego Sets | Gadget Lab

2009-05-21T07:48:00.001-07:00

via wired.com

lego keeps rocking my world...

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

2009-05-19T07:49:00.000-07:00

Cool site called scribd.com allows you to embed books and more.
The Digital Economy Fact Book 9th Edition 2007 The Progress & Freedom Foundation is proud to publish the ninth edition of The Digital Economy Fact Book. As information technologies permeate the world economy, it becomes more challenging to condense pertinent information into the Fact Book. In addition, we have tried this year to provide a more thorough overview of activities involving communications, media, e-commerce, and threats to the digital economy than in past years, and we have included more international data than we have in the past. As a result, this year’s Fact Book is longer than previous editions.

Publish at Scribd or explore others: School Work How-to-Guides & Manu internet 2007

2009-04-29T12:02:00.000-07:00

We need information to provide better services!

Gapminder has been providing great visualizations like this for a while and now Amazon and Google are getting in on the public data mining game:

* Since Google's acquisition of Trendalyzer two years ago, they have been working on creating a new service that make lots of data instantly available for intuitive, visual exploration.

* Select public data sets are hosted on Amazon EC2 for free as Amazon Elastic Block Store (Amazon EBS) snapshots. Amazon EC2 customers can access this data by creating their own personal Amazon EBS volumes, using the public data set snapshots as a starting point.

Elizabeth May's New Book

2009-04-07T11:45:00.001-07:00

Elizabeth May

Elizabeth May is an environmentalist, writer, activist and lawyer. She is the author of seven books and the recipient of numerous awards, including the Order of Canada medal. Since her 2006 election as leader of the Green Party of Canada, she has led the party to an unprecedented level of support among Canadians. May and her daughter, Victoria Cate, divide their time between Ottawa and New Glasgow, Nova Scotia.

Losing Confidence
Power, Politics and the Crisis in Canadian Democracy
Format: Trade Paperback, 280 pages
Publisher: McClelland & Stewart
ISBN: 978-0-7710-5760-1

A ringing manifesto for change from Canada’s Green Party leader and Activist.

We Canadians are waking up from our long political slumber to realize that there will not be change unless we insist upon it. We have a presidential-style prime minister without the checks and balances of either the US or the Canadian systems. Attack ads run constantly, backbenchers and cabinet ministers alike are muzzled, committees are deadlocked, and civility has disappeared from the House of Commons. In Losing Confidence, Elizabeth May outlines these and other problems of our political system, and offers inspiring solutions to the dilemmas we face.

“We no longer behead people in Canada, but Stephen Harper’s coup d’état cannot be allowed to stand, not least because of the precedent. Any future government can now slip the leash of democracy in the same way. This is how constitutions fail.” - Ronald Wright

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#TOC notes toward more notes

2009-02-13T10:12:00.001-08:00

Certainly one of my big realizations during this conference was how quickly things change in the digital domain. Something that seemed revolutionary and bleeding edge 6 months ago sounds stale or naive today. For instance Sara Lloyd of Manifesto 2.0 fame gave a presentation based on that article and it come across a little bit as resting on your laurels, so the insights from that article had come and gone already.
There were a number of instances like this which prompted Tim Spalding of LibraryThing to say over lunch that he wishes there were a level 2 or some kind of flag that indicated the level of the panel/presentation. I concur.

Tim O'Reilly:
"the best way to predict the future is to invent it" Alan Kay

Tim O'Reilly had a lot of reasons to be excited and at least one of the reasons was the financial collapse. According to Tim difficult times breeds creative solutions, and history bears this out.

Ironically Tim had technical difficulties when starting his presentation which maybe can be used as the metaphor for our times. We are having technical difficulties! But Tim takes these technical difficulties in stride and continues to experiment wildly out in the digital space. In fact Tim is so optimistic that he thinks by 2011 ebooks will be 50% of O'Reilly revenue! That is not a drop in the bucket.

Here are the top reasons that Tim is excited about what is happening:

People are reading a lot
Curation still matters
The rise of Social Media allows you to reflect and amplify - talk about the issues that matter to you.
People are paying for access to information
Content Ubiquity

Out of all of the experimenting that O'Reilly has been doing they have found that:
Safari is their 2nd biggest channel next to Amazon and yet market share is same for print copies

Participation Drives Revenue

    * Books from Rough Cuts doubles the sales for finished book in Safari
    * Collaborate!

Mobile reading is taking off

    * iPhone App outsold print -but print book still the category bestseller
    * it is additive - margin is same
    * Doubled price to 9.99 and sales dropped by 4x -w went back to lower price
    * Googles Algorythmic pricing is exciting

Challenging Notions of Free:

‘MAN, I WANT A COPY OF THIS RESEARCH from "Economics of Free" panel at Tools of Change #toc’ @Doctorow on twitter

A poorly named panel that was really more about piracy and DRM. Both Random House and O'Reilly are experimenting with free content to see if sales are affected when you give away the same book. Mac Slocum from O'Reilly summed it up by saying that piracy is a 'zero sum game'. The short coming of the study was the amount of data and particpants. More research required! However, a rough cuts version of the study is going to be available and not only Cory Doctorow wants it.

Article in the Guardian on Piracy

Lexcycle: Lessons Learned

Presenter: Neelan Choksi COO of lexcycle
"if ebook world had a TigerBeat equivalent: This month's issue would have Neelan Choksi on the cover (and on fold out poster)." @KatMeyer twitter

After introducing himself and the Lexcycle team as a bunch of java geeks Neelan began his presentation by saying that when we look back at ebooks we will see 2008 as the inflection point. Why?

Indicator of mainstream: the holy grail - the Oprah effect: Stanza downloads went through the roof when Oprah mentioned ebooks.

Lexcycle conducted a survey to discover the primary usage of the Stanza reader and found the following:
    * In bed 31%
    * Commuting on bus/train 29%
    * In waiting areas 13% (*parenting note: read to your kid to help prevent them from seeing the candy aisle)
    * At home 12%
    * At work 5%
    * At a bar or cafe 5%
    * On an airplane 5%
    * 2 write-ins mentioned In the bathroom

Since the launch of the Fictionwise store on Stanza they have found the average selling price of a title is 10.25.

Lessons learned:

    * Its all about the people who are reading
    * Quality matters: you get noticed when you're the top dog
    * Every reader is unique give them lots of options to cutsmize their reading
    * every device is unique things that work for one device may not work on another device
    * listen to the user they are happy to tell you what you are doing worng
    * give your readers a voice
    * too much friction in purchase registration - every time you remove friction from the purchase experience sales go up

Publisher Lessons

    * calls to action need to be clear and contextual
    * KISS
    * Hold your technology providers (conversion houses) responsible
    * Keep experimenting
    * Have a budget for marketing e-books
    * Support EPUB
    * Support DRM-free

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

#TOC Challenging notions of free

2009-02-11T09:35:00.001-08:00

Mac Slocum, Brian O'Leary

Document and assess prior work
Address data quality
Analyze and share

Findings

Not binary: Piracy is not Good or Bad

Measures must evolve: data based on print sales

Book industry does not appear to parallel other media

P2P threat may be overstated

(*I saw this article today on the guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2009/feb/09/kindle-ipod-books-piracy)

Sample Matrix: 20 variables and many permutations

Random House: An initial look at sales impact

Free downloads were correllated with but didn't cause sales
Found that free downloads didn't hurt sales

Mac Slocum: "It's a zero sum game"

If you are concerned about piracy make sure you pay attn. to where it's happening (rapidshare vs torrents)

Avg. results in small sample were 'up'

range of possible outcomes

It looks a little bit like retail sales - the seeds peaking and dropping off.

Surprises in research

number and range of under the radar free exp available for analysis

strong interest among trade pubs

some strongly positive correlations

low volume of p2p incidence

lag time on p2p seeding

Next steps:

Random house:

Matrix offers 20 possible options and even more permutations
16 books covered in this pass but several with only a limited set of data pts
More promising opportunities to test:

Young adult
backlist for series
Trade nonfiction

Three useful cautions:

Correlation isn't causality (noisey environments that these exp took place in)
Larger samples may uncover an existing skew
what works today may not work as well at some future date

! Rough Cuts research paper coming soon

mac@orelly.com

brian.oleary@magellanmediapartners.com

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#TOC Tim O'Reilly

2009-02-11T08:59:00.001-08:00

"I have heard an angel speak" reference for Nick Bilton

Reasons to be excited:

Will O'reilly withhold books from the Kindle because of the DRM? They release it in lots of formats

Starts by talking about the financial crises, somethign TED did not do at their conference

The G bible era was not a good time War of the Roses,

Then Constantinople fell

Lament for a passing of the Cathedral (Victor Hugo)

instead society built 'Cathedrals of learning'

"It's as if we had a supercomputer and billions of pur processors had been offline" Tabarrok, Alex at TED
Billions of people are dealing with ideas instead of daily bread
Maps of the internet are increasingly looking like maps of neurons
Guttenberg did not imagine Jane Austen let alone James Joyce - we cannot imagine where the interntet is going to take us
100 million books >500 pages in Google book search. The web has already generated 1 trillion web pages
Stimulus Watch site popped up a week ago. Put together in a matter of days can drill down to line items
Phones are everywhere ( this has come up a lot here at TOC =Africans with cell phones)
Have to Imagine a world where information is everywhere
Sensors coming into our daily lives changing the way we get information: Pizza and phone example -

People are reading a lot

Web pages are still a lot of text
Compete.com for analytics compare Good reads, Shelfari, Librarythings (1million uniques readers on Good Reads)
Twitterholic shows Stephen Fry as most popular on twitter : he is an author!
Have to do more for authors than used to

Curation still matters

Clay Shirky Power Laws weblogs, and Inequaltiy (graph)
Every new media always has a head and confers status all the way down
Twitter evangelism from Tim O'Reilly - main reason to get in is to get in the head of new media and bestow status

Using Social Medai

Reflect and amplify - talk about the issues that matter to you.

People are paying for access to information

It isn't just advertising
internet access fees 25.8 billion
Music 2.3 billion
Games 1.8 billion
People are paying for basic cable

Content Ubiquity

Make your content avalialble wherever your readers are
DRM is bad
Share what you learn so we can all get better faster together

Sales ratio of downloadable electronic formats on oreilly.com

PDF/mobi/epub bundles:
PDF is biggest chunk
epub next
then Mobi

Predicts 2011 will show ebooks as 50% of revenue

Safari is 2nd biggest channel next to Amazon and yet market share is same for print copies

Participation Drives Revenue

Books from Rough Cuts doubles the sales for finished book in Safari
Collaborate!

Mobile reading taking off

iPhone App outsold print -but print book still the category bestseller
it is additive - margin is same
Doubled price to 9.99 and sales dropped by 4x -w went back to lower price
Googles Algorythmic pricing is exciting

"best way to predict the future is to invent it"

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

#TOC lexcycle lessons learned

2009-02-11T06:18:00.001-08:00

Presenter: Neelan Choksi COO of lexcycle

e-books inflection point hit in 2008

IDPF talks about 44 million as the wholesale number but there is a lot of confusion/ignorance regarding the numbers for the whole market

Indicator of mainstream:

The Oprah effect: Stanza downloads went through the roof when Oprah mentioned ebooks

iPhone distinctions

International reach
color display
multi-funtion device
Built-in wireless
No external light required
App Store

Primary Usage (%)

In bed 31
Commuting on bus/train 29
In waiting areas 13 (parenting note: read to your kid to help prevent them from seeing the candy aisle)
At home 12
At work 5
At a bar or cafe 5
On an airplane 5
2 write-ins mentioned In the bathroom

Since launch of Fictionwise store:

Average title price point 10.25

Promotions

Pan Macmillan Excerpts

first to notice Stanza

Random House Free Titles

Back list of certain authors
excerpts from forthcoming boks

Harlequin

4 free minis

Oreilly experiment

The missing Manual = 200 images that render beautifully

Lessons learned:

Its all about the people who are reading
Quality matters: you get noticed when you're the top dog
Every reader is unique give them lots of options to cutsmize their reading
every device is unique things that work for one device may not work on another device
listen to the user they are happy to tell you what you are doing worng
give your readers a voice

too much friction in purchase registration - every tme you remove friction sales go up

Publisher Lessons

calls to action need to be clear and contextual
KISS
Hold yur technology providers conversion houses
Keep experimenting
Have a budget for marketing e-books
Support EPUB
Support DRM-free

Posted via web from Tim's posterous

#TOC Scott Berkun

2009-02-10T09:34:00.001-08:00

How Progess Happens

Presented by Scott Berkun (Berkun Consulting). Talking about change is easy - making change happen in most organizations is ridiculously hard. But there are things we can learn from the history of technology, political revolution and change, and there is a playbook we can reuse to help us avoid easy mistakes and seemingly popular, but actually self-defeating approaches.

* american revolution example: no new tools to bring about change

* there is no change possible until someone stakes their reputation on doing something different.

* You can not make change without power

Change creates work
It requires thinking
we have to talk and listen to each other
it raises questions we'd prefer to avoid
it puts us at risk of embarrassment/death

Maslow and heirarchies of needs

Traditions protect against change

Idea Killers (see more at Scott's blog)

we've tried that before
we've never done that before
that's not how we do things here
how can you justify the costs
how will this become profitable
our existing custumers will not like this

suggested reading: Structure of Scientific Revolutions: Thomas Kuhn

-paradigm shift-

Revolution is a bad word
people who are clear about the change they want state what the problem is that they are trying to solve

Power
committees prevent change because they average out decision making = mediocrity

Tactics

Power
Persuasion: whose support can you earn
Intuition: What can you anticipate

Case Study Chester Carlson & XEROX

Playbook for Indivduals:

Pilot
show Succcess
find allies
ask for more resources(stake reputation)
repeat
coup

Entrepreneurship is a similiar process

Playbook for managers

Palov lives (we do what we're rewarded for
Hire for change (Age & Psychology)
Accept some ideas you do not like
Encourage interesting failures
Only you can provide cover fire

Question: How do you get the power you need to create the change you want:

unethical book: 48 laws of power

ideally find your allies.

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some social insight?

2009-02-10T05:38:00.001-08:00

Yesterday I sat in on about four workshops at the Tools of Change conference (#toc). Before I got to the conference I tried to think about what would have most value for me and the industry. Anyway to make a long story short I decided to do the XML track of workshops. Needless to say it was a mistake. The intro workshop turned out to be for people who had never even heard of XML never mind used it in web apps. But I couldn't be rude and just get up and leave. I would hear it out a bit, meanwhile I opened tweetdeck and started following the #toc twitter feed. I was astounded that toc had started to trend fifth and sixth in popularity on twopular.com. What I especially notice was a lot of noise coming out of the Blogging and Social Media workshop. No one was tweeting in the XML workshop. I tweeted how boring the workshop was and someone replied from the Brogan workshop that there were lots of seats there and I should come over. I did.

Here was my realization when I got to that workshop. Chris Brogan was driving the rating on twopular or at least the workshop was. Everyone in this workshop was live blogging and tweeting away. The audience was responding back to Chris as the presentation went on. I had seen this phenomenon with Chris when I did an O'Reilly webinar with him a couple weeks back. At that time I was blown away by the chatter that was going on in the discussion. It was non-stop. I've done a lot of webinars but have never seen anything like it. The amazing thing was Chris was keeping his focus and interacting with those comments at the same time.

Now Chris is not saying anything revolutionary. He is talking about blogging, using twitter, engaging the audience, using the crowd for insight. But this message continues to burn through the publishing world like a bush fire. Forget XML and ebooks, Chris is pushing the envelope to integrate all content and do mashups using the simple tools of social networking. Of course you need the technical frameworks and environments for all of this stuff to work but for it to really work the technology has to become invisible. Technical experts don't really like to make their technology invisible and so I think sometimes they don't "get" what is happening in the social networking world. What is more important to publishing? Standards, XML, ebooks, all of that. But what gets people engaged? Twitter, blogging - the platforms for the individual to broadcast their message, even if that is only retweeting someone.

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The Composer is Dead

2009-02-06T11:56:00.001-08:00

Daniel Handler

Daniel Handler (more commonly known as Lemony Snicket) talks about his collaboration with composer Nathaniel Stookey on The Composer Is Dead, a musical "whodunit" commissioned by the San Francisco Symphony, and introduces a few of this musical murder mystery's prime suspects.

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2009-01-20T13:24:00.000-08:00

The body and electronic tatoos:

Post your snowman stories: Snowman Project

2008-12-18T08:14:00.001-08:00

Dawn Matheson lives in Guelph, Ontario, Canada. Her latest project is called Project: Snowman. She is collecting snowman stories for the project at her blog: http://www.pigeon28.com/blog/

Here is a link to a story in the Guelph Tribune about the project: http://www.guelphtribune.ca/news/article/155895

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Dear Snowman

2008-12-17T20:04:00.001-08:00

Where have you gone oh snowman? Did you drown?

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Snowmen

2008-12-10T10:16:00.001-08:00

We are the snow men. Leaning together. Headpiece filled with snow.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Liz Noble Invitation - Group Sale & Show - Saturday, December 13th!

2008-12-08T04:39:00.001-08:00

13 Havelock St Toronto, Ontario - group sale and show next Saturday, December 13 from 11am to 5pm!

Please spread the word and drop by for some delicious treats, a glass of wine, and some holiday cheer. Creative works include jewellery, paintings, hats, textiles, upcycled wool and cashmere, and hand made soaps.

Come to shop or just to be inspired by the beautiful creations!

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The party carries on without you

2008-12-06T05:20:00.001-08:00

Details from the evening after 10:00 p.m.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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May you be delighted with light

2008-12-06T05:09:00.001-08:00

Beelightful selling up a storm of beeswax candles.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Well under way

2008-12-06T04:56:00.001-08:00

It is hot in a house full of people:

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Still going strong: minus 3 hours and counting

2008-12-05T12:13:00.001-08:00

squirrel I love you but get out of my house!

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Michelle, Maria and Killer Miller meets Phyllis Diller

2008-12-05T09:41:00.001-08:00

More setup for show, three more artistis setup.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Getting ready for the show: kukucaju setup

2008-12-05T08:00:00.001-08:00

Still so much to do but will be live blogging! Ha.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Digital Ghetto

2008-12-03T03:20:00.001-08:00

Searchengine 2008 - 12 - 01 by Cbc Radio: Search Engine
Download now or listen on posterous

searchengine_20081201_9664.mp3 (7026 KB)

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Bring back the real Christmas (batteries not included)

2008-11-26T03:36:00.001-08:00

I just read an article in the Wall Street Journal called "Online Retail: Dead or Just Resting". What I found funny about this article was a comment someone wrote in lamenting the demise of Christmas as Christmas. No this wasn't a some Christian suggesting we put Christ back into Christ-mas. It was someone reminiscing about the days of yore when Shopping Malls cared. They actually put tinsel up in the parking lot, and had real christmas music playing! Now all you see are plastic santas and experience the same shopping experience as any other day. Oh the irony of commercializing. Don't these capitalists know you need to differentiate the capitalist experience otherwise people will be unhappy. Bring back the real Santa, bring back real (canned) Christmas music, bring back the holiday bustle of shopping in Bricks and Mortar. Please, please won't some corporate mogul get a sentimental, nostalgic feeling for shopping of days gone by and bring back the tinsel in the parking lot!

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15% off at Pistachio opening this weekend, November 21-23

2008-11-21T21:53:00.001-08:00

Celebrate the opening of Pistachio this weekend, November 21 - 23, and enjoy 15% off with their Friends & Family event!

You can save 15% on an assortment of eco-friendly paper, gifts, apothecary, custom stationery, and more at either of our Pistachio locations. Present the attached coupon in-store to save.

And join us for the grand opening of Pistachio Yorkdale
Enjoy this discount and join us on Friday, November 21, for the grand opening of the latest Pistachio location at Yorkdale Shopping Centre! Festivities begin at 7 p.m.
Don't forget to bring the kids! Santa arrives at Yorkdale on Friday, November 21 as well! Holiday fun and savings for all!

Happy Holidays!

Download now or preview on posterous

Pistachio - 15% off Friends & Family.pdf (158 KB)

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Loving Kindness

2008-11-21T21:50:00.001-08:00

I went to hear Sharon Salzberg lecture this evening. I am just realizing now the impact the evening has had on me. A room of 300 or more people all meditating on every sentient beings happiness, peace and contentment, freedom from suffering and experience of loving kindness. I am feeling the love. I can only imagine those who are doing the whole weekend are going to be on fire afterward!

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New Business Model for Publishing?

2008-11-20T12:06:00.001-08:00

Over at www.concordfreepress.com a free-conomy model with a twist. Here is what they have to say about it:

Our first book—Give and Take by novelist Stona Fitch—isout and circulating through the world. We're distributing 1,500 copiesfree via online requests and our network of independent bookstores. Inreturn, we ask readers to make a voluntary donation to a charity orsomeone in need. And we ask them to pass the book on, so that everytime the book changes hands, it generates more contributions.

"The nonprofit publishing house Concord Free Press operates on an unusual Robin Hood-style publishing model."
–Los Angeles Times

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Liz Noble's paintings

2008-11-18T11:50:00.001-08:00

05.Perched
06.detail 1 Perched
07.detail 2 Perched

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Future of the Book

2008-11-13T03:34:00.001-08:00

Doris Lessing's The Golden Notebook, a collaboration between Apt and The Institute for the Future of the Book, is now live. This is a pretty cool looking project with comments by 7 women shown in the margin. This project is an attempt to develop conversation in a more conversational format on the web.

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Have a happy bat day

2008-11-07T16:52:00.001-08:00

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Ah summertime

2008-11-07T14:36:00.001-08:00

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Filterbox

2008-11-07T14:33:00.001-08:00

I think filterbox is a great idea but I think I need to put better filters on my filterbox. Still way too noisy.

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2008-07-09T06:52:00.000-07:00

How long would you stand in line for free love?

Reading an excellent book on the psychology of free: Predictably Irrational

The New York Times had an article on the author and some of the research that is going on around the idea of free. Apparently we are not all that rational when it comes to shopping - who knew?

In a study on how free shipping affects online shopping, Professor Bell and his colleagues found that when people are offered free shipping on their order if they reach a particular spending threshold — Amazon, for example, provides free shipping on certain items if you buy $25 worth of goods — “they increase their average order size and also increase the time between shopping trips,” Professor Bell said. So it may balance out, right? More is purchased at one time, but less frequently?

Read the rest of the article

Neuromarketing article

2008-07-06T05:41:00.000-07:00

What would Jeff Bezos say?

Over at Harvard Business Review Anita Elberse has published a critique of the long tail based on a study which looked at sales figures from online music vendor Rhapsody, on-demand video vendor QuickFlix, and Nielsen VideoScan and SoundScan services, as well as performing less rigorous analyses on Amazon and other online “entertainment and publishing” vendors.

Needless to say there is a lot of debate going on around this article not to mention a dialogue between Chris Anderson and Elberse both on Anderson’s blog and the HBR site. Over at O’Reilly Kurt Cagle has got into the mix with his own insight into the ‘complex, multivariate structure of the long tail. He has this to say about Elberse’s finding:

This, in fact, conforms remarkably well to William McPhee’s Formal Theories of Mass Behavior, publishing in the early 1960s, which describe the traditional blockbuster pattern of marketing consumption, which argues that statistically, the top 1% of most large segmented markets (such as those found for entertainment products) typically does as well or better than the top 9% after it, and that there is a dramatic logarithmic falloff that makes the tail generally unprofitable.

Harvard Business Review

2008-07-04T14:29:00.000-07:00

Spot the problem:

I'm reading a neat book on the "Cult of significance" . So there is this idea of the "sizeless sciences" the "statisticians" the "doctors" the "scientists", "econonomists", whose quest involves finding statistical significance at the 95% level of confidence - no matter what!

anyway
spot the problem in this statement:

In the next census, you will find that about 30% of people are getting a college education and many more are getting advanced degrees because of something as simple as learning to read at an early age.

To me, I don't think I know what census - I assume America. So too say learning to read at an early age resonates with me, I still don't see why you have to jump to that as the correlation. I am sure based on absolutely no data, that learning to read at an early age is important, (if it is in the right language), there may be other variables involved, like next census where?

2008-07-02T08:51:00.000-07:00

The Observer staff combed the stacks to choose 10 enticing summer books:

Dear American Airlines, Jonathan Miles

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, David Wroblewsk

Rites of Spring (Break): An Ivy League Novel, Diana Peterfreund

Somebody Else's Daughter, Elizabeth Brundage

When We Were Romans, Matthew Kneale

Schooled, Anisha Lakhani

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running , Haruki Murakami

Pharmakon, Dirk Wittenborn

The Wrecking Crew, The Wrecking Crew

2008-07-02T06:30:00.000-07:00

Waterstone' s up 3.3 on same-store sales:
UK chain Waterstone's reported sales for the fiscal year of 564 million pounds, up 3.3 percent on a same-store sales basis and 5 percent overall, while income remained flat at 16.3 million pounds. In the continuing process of absorbing Ottakar's, the chain took a charge of 4.6 million pounds to cover the closure of 11 stores. (Only one new store was opened during the year.)

The company says "the biggest single initiative to help build links with our customers has been the Waterstone's multi-channel loyalty card, which launched in September 2007, and now has 1.5 million cardholders." They also highlight "the successful introduction of new children’s departments and a high quality range of gift stationery into 100 stores, where these new ranges have performed well."

2008-05-30T10:21:00.000-07:00

Lots going on but starting to notice how easy it is to add content to the blog now with all of the tools available. Does this mean more, better richer - No! Just observing.

2008-05-16T13:11:00.001-07:00

Hey, Art!

2008-05-13T19:26:00.001-07:00

2008-05-01T06:56:00.000-07:00

What is new media?

2008-04-30T09:02:00.000-07:00

Bankruptcy Results in Big Loss for Quebecor
-- Publishers Weekly, 4/29/2008 10:20:00 AM

Printing giant Quebecor World released its delayed financial results for 2007 this morning and as expected the company took a big hit due to its January bankruptcy filing. Quebecor recorded a net loss from continuing operations of $2.20 billion compared to earnings of $30.6 million in 2006. Revenue in the year fell 6.5%, to $5.69 billion. Charges associated with the bankruptcy, including goodwill impairment charges, impairment of assets, and restructuring and other charges amounted to $2.1 billion. In addition to the charges, Quebecor said profitability was depressed by lower volume, pricing pressure, underperformaning European assets (which Quebecor is trying to sell) and higher expenses. The decline in revenue was attributed in part to the closing of several older plants in North America.

In a statement, CEO Jacques Mallette said the company has made good progress in restructuring its operations. “I am pleased with what we have accomplished so far,” Mallett said. To finance its operation during the bankruptcy proceedings, Quebecor received $1 billion of debtor-in-possession financing earlier this year, and the company said it believes it has enough cash to operate until it emerges from bankruptcy.

To help with its restructuring efforts, Quebecor has hired Randy Benson as chief restructuring officer. Benson has worked with other large companies in bankruptcy, including Hollinger and Ivaco.

2008-03-18T13:42:00.000-07:00

Google moves ever forward with Google Book Search. I think there new viewer API is very likely an attempt at viral acquiescence - the more people who link the less likely publishers will be able to find a toe hold. Library thing got on it right away.

2007-07-19T07:07:00.000-07:00

Big Brother promise finally fulfilled? Interesting article in the Globe and Mail this morning about PVR's ability to track viewing habits.

Globe and Mail article

2007-06-29T05:35:00.000-07:00

MySpace is now playing catch up. You have to love disruption!

Read more.

2007-06-29T05:13:00.000-07:00

Steven Pinker's new book coming soon to a bookstore near you.

2007-06-08T20:49:00.000-07:00

Really enjoying myself at BookExpo right now. The Devices and Desires conference was excellent. It is more fun for me than I had anticipated.

2007-05-10T21:13:00.000-07:00

Just came back from a conference in New York that BISG organized It was sponsored by codeMantra and Vista.
It turned out to be a pretty interesting conference. However, the big thing for me was being in New York, downtown Manhattan, for my first time. I have been all around Manhattan but never there. Publishers Row, McGraw Hill, Simon and Schuster, Random House, all located in these huge beautiful buildings in Times Square.

Oatmeal for breakfast, thoughtful discussion about the digital revolution that is happening in publishing till lunch, and then a stroll to Greenwich village and back.

2007-05-07T14:25:00.000-07:00

John Seed was in Guelph town on Friday and had some interesting observations to make about climate change. John is a student of Joanna Macy who has a book out called Coming Back to Life.

A couple of the big insights I took away were:

1. If the US reduces the speed on their highways from 70 to 50 mph then there would be a savings of a billion barrels of oil a year. That, said Seed would keep things like the Iraq war from happening. That is a phenomenal idea!

2. Ruminate animals cause more greenhouse gases than all the cars on the planet. We need to eat less of that kind of meat. It isn't surprising that our agri business is as bad for the environment as our industrial practices.

One of the attendees of the conference said that he had just been at an environmental trade show and that there was a vendor there with a label for products that indicated the ecological footprint that was involved in manufacturing that product. There is a cool idea, let people decide how they spend their dollars based on that kind of information.

And finally, I don't have the article but a bunch of people were talking about a great article by Paul Hawken. I've read a Ecology of Commerce by Paul and it was great so want to track down this article that everyone was talking about. Fortunately I can just go talk to Stan Kozak down the street from me and ask him what it was. He sent it around.

2007-05-03T06:36:00.000-07:00

Maude Barlow in Guelph:

Went to a talk given by Maude Barlow last night organized by Guelph Water Watchers. It was a great talk if not a little of a downer.

Here are the keypoints:
Humanity (that is us) is affecting the hydrologic cycle so that the planet is losing usable water. We are polluting the surface water, sucking out the ground water and creating polluted water. It is the ground level equivalent of global warming.

Our investment in nanotechnologies means we stop putting our efforts into conservation and thereby create bigger impacts on the eco-system. Not only that but water becomes a commodity under corporate control. The plants are nuclear powered, dirty and then we have to buy back the water for exorbitant amounts. The rich are the only ones who can afford water, not the ones who really need it.

Maude talked about NAFTA, North American Security and Prosperity and the efforts being put forward by short sighted business leaders to deregulate everything under the sun, which is nothing new.

Check out Council of Canadians, raise your voice, protect a precious resource, join the fight against Nestle who is basically stealing the future. Also think about joining this group on facebook if you are using facebook.

2007-04-30T08:18:00.000-07:00

Spent the weekend puttzing around with Facebook and attending the first year of Suzuki Strings concert. Also started watching Deadwood. I knew I would like it and sure enough I do. I started with the first episode of season two. I was on the train and it was rainy out. I just needed to tune out and wanted to watch some t.v. so I did. It was perfect! When I got home I raced to Thomas Video and rented the first season.

2007-04-20T21:08:00.000-07:00

So I just had to say I was wrong for slamming the readers for not having The Road available because they do here at The Road

2007-04-19T18:08:00.000-07:00

It may be telling that I have yet to pick up the Iliad and start trying to use it as a reader. It may be telling that I turned on the Sony reader almost as soon as it was in my hands and started to load things onto it...only a few burps with the install of their updates. I had to uninstall the software and start over and not apply the update. There is nothing I hate more than an update that makes the thing it is updating stop working altogether.

I have heard people say that the Iliad is hard to approach as a non-technically minded user. Even the somewhat technically are intimidated by it and say things like there isn't anything to load onto it.

Nevertheless, the Iliad sits on my desk for one reason or another. A $1000.00 experiment waiting to be tested.

Our blog has started on the BookNet site. Michael started it off with a bang. Now we're all too intimidated by the audience and the quality, never mind that we are all busily reading all that stuff you can't get easily with an electronic reader. For instance, is one of the highest selling fiction books, Cormac McCarthy's The Road, available on the Sony reader, or the Iliad?

So anyway, I am the perfect candidate for using one of these pocket electronic libraries. I commute an hour and a half to work and lug a lot of reading material - not to mention a laptop - back and forth 3 hrs every day. My pack probably weighs close to 30lbs. I love to read! My tastes are varied, I go through cycles. I will read business books, math books, poetry, fiction, science, science fiction, cookbooks, gardening books, spiritual stuff, political, books like Fast Food Nation, Botany of Desire, Pattern Language, How Buildingd Learn, The Ingenuity Gap, Envisioning Information, The Sparrow, The Road, and I am a follower of Earthseed. I love the confused persons dummie guides to Statistics! (oh yeah and don't forget all of those amazing computer books from Pearsons). So how do I fulfill my reading desires with one of these devices?

This weekend I swear I will start looking at the Iliad. But I can't do what Michael did and swear off the printed page for an extended stay in London. Just can't do it.

2007-04-04T18:04:00.000-07:00

E-readers: preliminary report
We received our ereaders this week and just a couple of early observations. First off it cost a lot of money for the Iliad reader from irex. The total cost Cdn. was almost 1000 dollars! That is 3x the cost of the Sony reader. $120.00 of that was for shipping. O.K. that is too much. The sad part is that the handling fee was only $8 and gst and pst made up the rest. Ouch. It remains to be seen if the extra cost is actually worth it.

The Sony reader came with excerpts of books which is about as useful as reading the back of a book. I mean why bother. Include the whole text or nothing. I got a public domain copy of Vanity Fair and loaded that on and also loaded some word documents which so far has been the best use of the reader. Technical documents make a lot of sense on the readers.

I'm not crazy about the usability of the form factor for the Sony reader. There are things I want to do like scroll the page that you just can't do and it is frustrating.

More on the software and form factor later.

2007-03-29T06:36:00.000-07:00

The conference happened and was a big success. It was fascinating to see so many people who are involved in Canadian culture gathered together thinking about the state of affairs. If only we could have had a social network mapping of the event so everyone could see how the nodes on the tree fit together... Want to keep working on that aspect of organization, the book trade social network map.

One of the things coming out of this conference is the purchase of an Iliad and Sony ereader. We are waiting on these devices so we can blog about usability and content etc. I will get to use it on my commute to Toronto and see if I can drop some weight from my backpack. I can't imagine I will have the same content that I currently have though. I use the library a lot and if I could get the library loan onto the reader that would be awesome. Automated checking in and checking out....

The blogging is going to happen over on the BookNet site so stay tuned.

2007-02-27T10:44:00.000-08:00

Harper Collins and Random House have made their own search inside widgets. Pretty cool little things that let you read the inside of the book ala Amazon. So now the problem is obvious. Publishers blow their brains out on developing this stuff but Amazon and Google offer much more content from a single source. Anyway, I think I prefer the random house widget over the harper collins but it will come down to content.

2007-02-13T08:19:00.000-08:00

Help protect our water supply!

GCL member Mark Goldberg and James Gordon are the signators on an official
application made last week to the Environmental Commissioner Of Ontario
to object to the renewal of Nestle's water bottling license.

THEY NEED OUR HELP to help convince the province to deny this renewal.

At the Nestle bottling plant in Aberfoyle, they are basically taking our
water for free.

They can now draw 3.6 million litres per day from the same aquifer as
the City of Guelph and they pay nothing for it! water! (That is about 7
percent of our city's daily intake) This is the commercialization of a
public resource. The world’s largest food and beverage corporation is
bottling our water and selling it back to us for more than the price of
gasoline! Their permit is up for renewal in June. When they apply for a
renewal, their application will be posted on the Ministry of the
Environment’s Electronic Bulletin Board and people will be asked to
comment during the following 30 day period. They are hoping to organize
a campaign to get thousands of people to say they are opposed to the
renewal, and are asking us to help them.

There is an organizational meeting scheduled for:

7 pm on Tuesday February 13th in the Canada Room, ground Floor, the
Co-operators Building on Macdonnell Street.

Review the text of the application

2007-02-09T07:10:00.000-08:00

Better late then never:

So I have been a bit late on the trends that are happening in the publishing world but I pledge to make amends:
Here is a link to the penguin wiki novel, a novel idea or a marketing ploy? You decide, and have some fun while deciding. Mitch Joel has some reservations about it. You also might like this idea for receiving your novel reading, I am getting Cory Doctorow's novel delivered every second day.

2007-02-08T11:47:00.000-08:00

Digital Times:

Thought I should post something about the Conference that we have been putting together at BookNet Canada. Can check it out Here

This has been a fascinating project for me to sink my teeth into. I have learned quickly that the publishing landscape has changed drastically and that convergence is king. Convergence in devices and other technologies. Will post more later.

2007-01-10T12:58:00.000-08:00

Well season 5 of 24 is behind me, and I have to say I wasn't disappointed. I'm not sure how they do it but the tension is never eased up. I have a whole new appreciation of Kiefer Sutherland based on this series, so much so that I even purchased this month's Men's Vogue that has him on the cover.

2006-12-22T11:41:00.000-08:00

Happy Holidays Everyone:

2006-12-11T10:11:00.000-08:00

Noah and Tim two fish working!

2006-12-11T10:05:00.000-08:00

The ubiquitous umbrella.
Toronto a town like any other town where people dress in black and carry black umbrellas. Foggy rainy days bring out the device where ever you are. If you don't look black and ready to attack then you are a fish out of water.

2006-11-16T06:19:00.000-08:00

Here is a story from my last days of working in Guelph.
I was biking to work and decided to take a side trail that wasn't part of the main road traffic. The trail follows the edge of a forest out in the Hanlon Creek watershed. It is well back from the road and you only see people out walking their dogs.
I was very surprised when I rode past a dead deer. It was lying just off of the trail and at the edge of the forest. My inclination was to keep going because I was running a bit late, but then I thought no this is not an accident.
I went to look at the deer and it was sort of horrific the state it was in. The hind quarter had been basically ripped off, one leg was missing and all of the fur. I was somewhat confused as to what happened. The road was a good ways away but obviously this deer had been hit by one and then somehow dragged itself through the business park across the trail and died right at the edge of the forest. I found this pretty amazing. The will involved to get back home was inspiring.

2006-11-15T06:42:00.000-08:00

Life in the big smoke:

I recently started a new job in Toronto which is about an hour and a bit on the train form my fair city. It has been a great change for me and has offered all sorts of little obstacles to overcome, not least of which is adjusting to the new rules of home life.
We told our girls what the new rules were last weekend and I think they apply to life in a general sense:
rule one Pay attention
rule two listen
rule three what did I just say? pay attention.

So I am paying attention. So far I have made a good network on the train and have been listening to what people are saying and doing in their lives. It is fun.

Observe the observer

How To Run A News Site And Newspaper Using WordPress And Google Docs - 10,000 Words

Randomness at play

You are a dog ....

ebooks format and perception

If you want loyalty don't piss me off ...

The real story behind Stieg Larsson and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - Times Online

Top 10 Viral Stop Motion Videos

Clay Shirky

http://www.nycgraphicnovelists.com/2010/03/talking-comics-with-scott-mccloud.html

Dan Brown Ebook Sales May not be the tipping point.

Tim is now following you on Twitter! hahahahaha(evil laugh)hahaha

Interview: Peter Collingridge - Read my inovel - Scotsman.com News

VIA Rail Services Cut in Preparation for Strike

Bits of Destruction Hit the Book Publishing Business: Part 2

‘Tis Better to Lose a Sale Than Sell an eBook? | Booksquare

Seth's Blog: Malcolm is wrong

Book Glutton and Random House team up | TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home

Malcolm Gladwell reviews Free by Chris Anderson: Books: The New Yorker

"Coraline: Knitting Little Itty Bitty Outfits"

Mary Roach on 10 things you didn't know about orgasm

The Digital Economy

Frank Lloyd Wright Lego Sets | Gadget Lab

Elizabeth May's New Book

Elizabeth May

#TOC notes toward more notes

#TOC Challenging notions of free

#TOC Tim O'Reilly

#TOC lexcycle lessons learned

#TOC Scott Berkun

some social insight?

The Composer is Dead

Daniel Handler

Post your snowman stories: Snowman Project

Dear Snowman

Snowmen

Liz Noble Invitation - Group Sale & Show - Saturday, December 13th!

The party carries on without you

May you be delighted with light

Well under way

Still going strong: minus 3 hours and counting

Michelle, Maria and Killer Miller meets Phyllis Diller

Getting ready for the show: kukucaju setup

Digital Ghetto

Bring back the real Christmas (batteries not included)

15% off at Pistachio opening this weekend, November 21-23

Loving Kindness

New Business Model for Publishing?

Over at www.concordfreepress.com a free-conomy model with a twist. Here is what they have to say about it:

Liz Noble's paintings

Future of the Book

Have a happy bat day

Ah summertime

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