Manolis Kelaidis, a lecturer at the Royal College of Art in London, UK has found a way to make the traditonal paper-based books interactive by embedding circuitry and wireless network technology.
Accoring to reports from the O'Reilly's "Tools of Change" conference:
He [Kelaidis] asked the audience if, upon encountering an obscure reference or foreign word on the page of a book, we would appreciate the option of touching the word on the page and being taken (on our PC) to an online resource that would identify or define the unfamiliar word. Then he made it happen. Standing O.
Yes, he had a printed and bound book which communicated with his laptop. He simply touched the page, and the laptop reacted. It brought up pictures of the Mona Lisa. It translated Chinese. It played a piece of music. Kelaidis suggested that a library of such books might cross-refer, i.e. touching a section in one book might change the colors of the spines of related books on your shelves. Imagine.
Ben Vershbow at The Institute for the Future of the Book provides a good analysis on the ergonomics of Kelaidis' book and it implications as a competitor to electronic display-based books.
Concepts like Kelaidis' blueBook reminds me that our attachment with printed physical objects — like the book — is something that is firmly fixed in the human psyche.
Discussion
By David on Jul 03, 2007
Very neat- about time! I always thought it would be cool and handy if articles in newspapers or magazines (books for course as well) could have "highlighted" areas with say a unique marker (barcode). Then, with a scanning device (small, hand-held scanner with a wireless transmitter) you could leap you from the printed page to a specific web page on your computer, all via the hand-held scanner pen, getting more info on that subject, word or reference source.
Even cooler if the circuits are built right in the page.
By Thomas D. Greer on Jul 03, 2007
To David:
Such technology has been on the market for several years. Recall "CatScan"? It was a "free" scanner/wand that was distributed by Radio Shack as well as several periodicals. Dense barcodes were sprinkled liberally through the printed text, and the idea is the reader would read the newspaper while sitting near his internet-connected PC. The magic was really in the barcodes, as they were dense enough to contain entire parameterized URLs. Scan them with your "cat", and you'd be whisked away to a website. It never caught on.
The danger of such technologies is the propensity for usability to be drowned in advertising. Witness what is already happening on the web. Is that hyperlink really a hyperlink? Or is it an advertisement? Who created the hyperlink? The author of the article or comment, or an intrusive advertising script, such as IntelliTXT?
I would love a printed book with real hyperlinks. I would loathe this technology if it got into the hands of advertisers, so that the mere act of touching a page filled my Inbox with spam.
By David on Jul 05, 2007
Thank you Thomas-
If a publisher would have backed it and gives away the "scanner" for free with subscription, I wonder why it never really worked or was actively pushed?
I am with you, advertising can be tricky, but as we all know it is (for better or worse) that which makes the world go around. That is scary though, the thought of a mere touching a page filling your email with "personalized" spam! Yet that is up to the publications themselves to determine how they will fund their products and surely un-warranted spamming would be just as wrong with these integrated hyper-links as with current email, rss, etc.
(I still like the idea of Bill Gates on spam, which goes something like this: charge $0.01 (or $0.03) per un-accepted or deemed spam email. Only those "accepted" would not get charged back to the sender... the problem with this is you need a massive administration in place, registration and near world-wide agreement...)
-David
By Thomas D. Greer on Jul 05, 2007
It was backed by a publisher, several in fact. Many newspapers syndicate the "Parade" insert with their Sunday editions. That was a primary user/pusher of the "Cat" reader. It failed because not that many people wanted to sit at their PC with a fairly bulky wand reader in their hand just to read the paper. Today, with Bluetooth and WiFi, it might stand a chance.