Stumpedgecko on Digital Rights

Stumpedgecko has added an interesting comment about the Kindle

It's worth pointing out a major thorn for Kindle: DRM - have you ever considered the legal ramifications of lending someone a book you just read? No? Well you'll have exactly the same experience with the Kindle with the exception that you won't be able to do the lending bit because of the DRM in the software. 1 nil to print.

Digital Rights is a major problem. Google Video just vanished when the business plan changed. Swizz or what? Gradually it may go away if enough people complain. Music is locked in to the Apple empire for many people but it is possible to buy an MP3 without digital rights coming into it. This is something Amazon is aware of.

If the display technology works ok then other devices will come along. Can Amazon stop you reading material that just turned up over the web? More will become clear later.

Meanwhile I am busy scanning stuff I have already paid for.

Joel Rickett on the Kindle

Photo from Wikipedia

Today the Guardian Saturday Review includes a comment on the Amazon Kindle from Joel Rickett, deputy editor of The Bookseller. He quotes an early reviewer ( no source given, but hey this is a print publication so it must be true...)

it looks "like a shard from the Space Shuttle with a Sinclair Spectrum built in"

Rickett concludes that "An iPod it ain't".

Well, I think the Amazon project should be given more attention by people in the book industry. The Spectrum was the first of a series of devices. After 1982 the computer reached most homes over about a decade. This is an issue the Saturday Review could come back to.

Printweek starts a collective blog

Printweek now has a blog online. There are various views about how print and online will relate.

Matt Whip has a fairly dismissive view about the Amazon Kindle-

I know nothing, OK, so I am in no position to comment, but this is my show, and to me it looks like a Fisher Price version of the scientific calculators I used to get through Maths GCSE in the 1980s. This is a public product, like a phone, a book, a magazine. You use it in public and it makes a statement about you. The Kindle statement reads something like: "I'm with stupid", but it's ironically self-referential.

However there is a different take from Barney Cox on whether an iBook could follow an iTune

Remember the current generation of smart phones are just the beginning. The screens will get better and bigger as flexible e-papers get incorporated as a display technology. What is currently the height of geek chic, that only the diehard are willing to pay a premium and queue through the night to own, will become standard within a couple generations of technology. Once it’s there can you confidently assert that even the most ardent print lover won’t use their phone to read some things on the move over the option of seeking out and lugging around a pile of paper?

As far as I can see the Kindle is more or less a smart phone. No wifi as the coverage is patchy.

Maybe people around prepress are influenced by "geek chic". They do love their Macs in most cases. However I do remember the Apple II was very well thought of at one time and not much later many people bought a very boring box in large quantities.

Quality ideas as a basis for communication

Now back in Exeter after a couple of weeks in Lancaster. Visit the university campus was interesting. The Institute for Advanced Studies had several posters around the Safety research project. Also other posters about Flickr and languages ; experimental ways of presenting research other than just a journal article. The Safety project is including several films during the year. So I am encouraged to develop a script.

Photos follow soon. Also video for a journey from the Info21 to the Spicy Hut.

But I think I may be getting too carried away with oblique and creative ways to present a case for quality. Meanwhile there is significant progress from the Work Foundation project to look at leadership in the context of organisation changes required by technology. So far quality ideas seem to be well accepted here. So I might start again on the learn9 site.

Technology is certainly moving. Adobe have launched a website on web video and TV via Flash. Found this through a promoted video on YouTube. Nothing new, the media player is still not officially released, but the emphasis on video is very strong. Text and print are not very interesting it seems. Who knows, maybe Adobe managers are not crazy.