futureofthebook.com

board acting splay

analog computer
The Linotype is an analog computer. That big, smooth rotating cam set rolls on a continuum, the casting jaws squeeez and the keystroke brings down each letter along wavy, differently timed, channel. Likewise the codex splay of pages and its reading gymnastic of display is analog, “sensitive to minute changes in parameter values”.

There is a wonderful study of this analog/digital distinction by Greg Shapley who is Director of Don’t Look Experimental New Media Galleryand the Sound of Failure Festival in Sydney. He is a PhD candidate at the University of Technology, Sydney, where he also lectures in Media Arts Production. Shapley has interests in the post-digital, sound and alternative technologies.

Where did I get this leaf link? Where else but the most generative garden on the internet.

retake on double fold
For the first time I find a preservation perspective criticism of Nicholson Baker. His new Kindle item in the New Yorker advances no further his premise from Double Fold that source originals have a continuing role in the context of their surrogate delivery. He actually forgets the premise in the context of newspapers

To begin with his evaluation of Kindle 2 is without aid of comparison to Kindle 1. Aside from all the excellent 2 negative reviews of the comparison, I can tell you as an owner of both, the 2 has a grey screen and grey text. The 1 has a much better contrast; “Where were sharp black letters laid out like lacquered chopsticks on a clean tablecloth?”

But nowhere in Nicholson’s excellent rambles about Kindle, the phenomena, the technology or reactions of a bibliophile, does he take up the banner again for the continuing role of source originals in the context of their surrogate delivery. He slurs the issue even with newspapers. “The Kindle DX ($489) doesn’t save newspapers; it diminishes and undercuts them—it kills their joy. It turns them into earnest but dispensable blogs.” Only the loss of “joy” is left to regret.

He even misses one of the great bibliophile opportunities when we encounter the Amazon promo of Kindle as providing “a lifetime of reading”. Yes, he does mention that the device ” ….will probably take a last boat ride to a Nigerian landfill in five years.” But, how would we like a lifetime of reading as evoked by a little dark screen? Nicholson does discuss the ownership infringements of Kindle reading, but he does on not go on to discuss the bibliophile interests in possession of books, appreciations for ergonomics of comprehension embodied in physical books, or understandings of the reliable transmission of conceptual works.

So it appears that advocacy for the strategic future of print is now left to a few working preservation librarians. As Walter Cybulski has said, from a preservation perspective; “Digitizing is micro-filming all over again.”.

script and print
This excellent book studies site and journal has kindly linked to FotB.

future of the book
If the projection is interplay between paper and screen both transactions should be portrayed; paper as an accessory of the screen and the screen as accessory of paper. These interplays then influence each other creating a single transmission system merging self-authentication (paper) and self-indexing (screen).

Paper is mapped to related works by a screen utility while notes from the screen prompt paper confirmation. Tangential screen searches are returned to the parent topic by paper while a paper footnote is screen up-dated. Skills of page manipulations merge paper and screen navigation techniques. Research based on paper is delivered on screen and screen research is printed for paper delivery. Hand held reading devices, electronic and paper, are conveniently carried and possessed, stored forgotten or suddenly consulted.

early news
The recovery of papyrus manuscripts from the middens of Oxyrhynchus continues. This material is renown for the reconstruction and interpretation of ordinary life of later Antiquity. At the fringe of the new knowledge is evidence of early Christian scriptorium production and an associated transition from papyrus to parchment. Both aspects are gracefully described by in a new book; Greetings in the Lord, Early Christias and the Oxyrhynchus Papyri.

The interpretation continues; “With multi-spectral imaging, many pictures of the illegible papyrus are taken using different filters, finely tuned to capture certain wavelengths of light. Thus, researchers can find the optimum spectral portion for distinguishing ink from paper in order to display otherwise completely illegible papyri.” (Wikipedia) Again the self-authenticating capacity of physical documents is illustrated. This fundamental attribute of self-authentication is also dramatically demonstrated in another artifact.

The Hidden History in the Bayeux Tapestry is a magnificent reinterpretation of the imagery, captioning and gestures depicted in this later 11th century embroidery. What was long considered a narrative of Norman conquest, is actually a complex non-Norman French narrative of pro- English perspective and the tangled adventures of Anglo-Saxons in France and non-Norman French in England around the period of the Norman invasion.

That this subversive history was sequestered for a thousand years in this magnificent artifact is an awesome demonstration of the self-authenticating powers of physical documents.

print alcove
Slowly, slowly momentum is building for a Print Alcove at the UI Library. This will be a haven of comfy reading chairs and mood indigo where undergraduates can look at real books. Brooding in the corner is the Mighty Columbian press. Next to it the renown Zine Machine and all the new print acquisitions. A Special Collections exhibit invites those in line at Food for Thought to adventure up-stairs. “Meet me at the Old Printing Press!”

commemoration
It is approaching the ten year anniversary of the passing of Paul Banks. How he would have enjoyed advocacy for the continuing role of print in the context of digital delivery! In his day print was the establishment, now it is the outsider…just his kind of position.

abstract
“Continuing Role of Print Collections in a Context of their Digital Delivery; Preservation Risks and Preservation Responses”, submitted by Gary Frost, Conservator of Libraries, University of Iowa

A cascade of recent reports and white papers investigate digital preservation prospects and, reasonably and unreasonably, diminish the continuing role of print collections in research libraries. There is growing linkage between certification of digital reprography and discard of print sources.

This presentation reviews these studies and counter proposes interdependence of physical and digital book collections. Functionalities of back-up, mastering and authentication that physical book collections provide for their screen delivered copies are presented. The back-up function comes into play whenever the screen copy is unavailable. The mastering role is engaged whenever a second or subsequent capture is required for reasons different from the initial capture. And the authentication role comes into play as the intent or forensic features of the physical publication are investigated further.

A case study of “leaf master” collections that are sequestered to act as sources for digital copies will be described. A proposal for certification of print masters, modeled on designation of alkaline paper publication, will be presented. (coming soon to Milwaukee soon?)

interplay of print and screen
…This change seems symptomatic of the uncertainties besetting the publication of electronic texts at present and encourages us in the view that the future of the scholarly edition may lie in a combination of stable printed volumes embodying carefully weighted value judgements and an electronic archive that provides both the evidence for those judgements and the opportunity to challenge them. p.136

This is a defining work; Text Editing, Print and the Digital World, providing an exposition of the future interplay of print and screen in scholarly publication.

drive-by typography
Visit this wonderful blog and see the video of calligraphic driving.

vaporizer
Will Google vaporize libraries? Not if they hold onto their books. With the books acting as back-up, masters, and authenticators of all their delivery surrogates, the physical books will actually vaporize Google.

Yes, books can be scanned twice. The books can be scanned three times or more. But even more significantly, the un-scanned books can be scanned. Scanning is just another kind of reading. This is a live linkage persisting and evolving across the paper and screen divide. The libraries still have the originals. Unless, of course an even more conniving Google-like settlement or gratuitous digital depository linkage motivates disposal of physical collections.

Oh, and check this out….Brewster Kahle on the Google settlement. Libraries need to recall the experience of microfilming. That era is fifty years duration and we are still redoing the capture.

bibliopunk
Cyberpunks and Steampunks are sidebars for the emergent Bibliopunks. The enclave will open the Print Alcove at the Book Festival next week end in…Gibson Park south of the Main Library! The PrintAlcove will feature the Mighty Columbian press, the Renown ZineMachine and best of all, New Aquisitions, incoming print books. There will actually be a place in the library for undergraduates to look at real books!

book and paper interest group
The BPIG/ALCTS/PARS at ALA still has mission definition work. The focus is to be a hold-out interest in tangible collections, but the entire meeting was on digitizing special collections. The group needs to clarify that the focus is on the continuing role of tangible collections in a context of their electronic delivery. There is also a need to mention “preservation”.

scan on demand
Production digital imaging from paper sources, long associated with interlibrary loan of general collections, is now increasing with special collections. These materials have long been restricted from physical circulation, but they now face other risks.

The nature of the new risks extend beyond physical damage and faulty imaging. New risks include a liberalization of protective curatorial control; we are going to digitize these materials. The two immediate preservation responses include image capture oversight and ever more strict assignment of the source originals to functions of back-up, mastering and authentication.

surrogate access
An additional explanation for the “drive to serve a broader range of preservation needs” is growth of desire for “surrogate access”. Such screen delivered access now expands via digital networks to supplant traditional physical access to collection items. This surrogate access, once minimally produced by researchers themselves, is now assigned as a comprehensive service of the libraries. In this new service environment there is need for preservation oversight of the imaging process and preservation care of physical source collections as they are more strictly reserved for production of access surrogates.

i-pod of e-books
In a blink the contest is now between e-publishers and their devices. The old contest between paper and screen is so over. About time. Now let’s see who figures into the future of the book, if any.

sayings from incoming links
Physical books are graceful companions; dependable and engaging when needed and otherwise tranquil. Our exchanges with books have a life of their own and the meanings of reading include that attachment. Create change, find meaning, assure transmission; the print book does it all. The print book is also an opportunist quickly assimilating digital technology and connectivity to transact its own future. But do we need print books? There are many other media including the internet and e-books. It really depends on your preference in friends. There are personality differences between a physical artifact and a screen drawn transmission and between a simulation and a graceful companion. (Forgotten sayings from the WordPress Dashboard incoming link referer column.)

new kind of language
What if print and screen are a single transmission mechanism, something like writing and publishing? In that frame there is little use in comparing the two modes, but some interest in understanding the legacy and prospects of the assimilation.

I would call the new transmission mode synthetic language. This grounds the discussion in communication and the advent and diversification of language, but also positions the discussion out-of-body with implications of artifact and non-mortal and artificial quality.