Eons ago, when the institute was just starting out, Ben and I attended a web design conference in Amsterdam where we had the good fortune to chat with Steven Pemberton about the future of the book. Pemberton’s prediction, that “the book is doomed,” was based on the assumption that screen technologies would develop as printer technologies had. When the clunky dot-matrix gave way to the high-quality laser printer, desk top publishing was born and an entire industry changed form almost overnight.
“The book, Pemberton contends, will experience a similar sea-change the moment screen technology improves enough to compete with the printed page.”
This seemed like a logical conclusion. It seemed like the screen technology innovations we were waiting for had to do with resolution and legibility. Over the last two years if:book has reported on digital ink and other innovations that seemed promising. But the fact that we were looking out for a screen technology that could “compete with the printed page,” made it difficult for us to see that the real contender was not page-like at all.
It’s interesting that we made the same assumptions about the structure of the ebook itself. Early ebook systems tried to compete with the book by duplicating conventions like the Table of Contents navigational strategy, and discreet “pages,” that have to be “turned” with the click of a mouse. (And, I’m sorry to report, most contemporary ebooks continue to cling to print book structure). We now understand that networked technologies can interface with book content to create entirely new and revolutionary delivery systems. The experiments the institute has conducted: “Gam3r Th30ry” and the “Iraq Quagmire Project” prove beyond question that the book is evolving and adapting to networked culture.
What kind of screen technology will support this new kind of book? It appears that touch-screen hardware paired with zooming interface software will be the tipping point Pemberton was anticipating. There are many examples of this emerging technology. In particular, I like Jeff Han’s experimental work (his TED presentation is below): Jeff demonstrates an “interface free” touch screen that responds to gesture and lets users navigate through a simulated 3D environment. This technology might allow very small surfaces (like the touchpads on hand-held devices) to act as portals into limitless deep space.
And that brings me around to the real reason the touchscreen zooming interface is the key to the next generation of “books.” It allows users to move into 3D networked space easily and fluently and it gets us beyond the linearity that is the hallmark and the limitation of the paper book. To come into its own, the networked book is going to require three-dimensional visualizations for both content and navigation. Here’s an example of how it might work, imagine the institute’s Iraq Study Group Report in 3D. Main authors would have nodes or “homesites” close to the book with threads connecting them to sections they authored. Co-authors/commentors might have thinner threads that extend out to their, more remotely located, sites. The 3D depiction would allow readers to see “threads” that extend out from each author to everything they have created in digital space. In other words, their entire network would be made visible. Readers could know an author’s body of work in a new way and they could begin to see how collaborative works have been understood and shaped by each contributor. It would be ultimate transparency. It would be absolutely fascinating to see a 3D visualization of other works and deeds by the Iraq Study Groups’ authors, and to “see” the interwoven network spun by Washington’s policy authors. Readers could zoom out to get a sense of each author’s connections. Imagine being able to follow various threads into territories you never would have found via other, more conventional routes. This makes me really curious about what the institute will do in Second Life. I wonder if you can make avatars that act as the nodes for all their threads? Perhaps they could go about like spiders, connecting strands to everything they touch? Hmmm.
But anyway, in my humble opinion the sea change is coming. It’s going to be three-pronged: screen technology, networked content, and 3D visualization. And it’s going to be very, very cool.
A few games on the Nintendo DS already incorporate a kind of zooming interface very well – for instance, the suduku application in Brain Age has a zoom in, zoom out feature. I also find that using a gesture plugin for Firefox (Drag de Go: https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/2918/) on a tablet PC makes for an excellent reading and browsing experience. I agree that the mainstream application of these technologies, along with ever thinner, lighter, and brighter screen technologies will change the way we read- and probably the way we see.
> and it gets us beyond the linearity that is
> the hallmark and the limitation of the paper book.
without negating possible benefits of nonlinearity,
i believe it is inaccurate to consider linearity to be
“the limitation of the paper book”. on the contrary,
i would rather think of it as “a design characteristic”
that, once accepted by an author who turns it to an
advantage, becomes a major strength of p-books…
in comparison, authors haven’t been able to leverage
nonlinearity to the extent that we might have hoped…
and even when they do, i still don’t think it’s going to
negate the value of those who are utilizing linearity…
it’s gonna take much better tools (over and above the
screens that jeff han is building, amazing as they are)
for us to leapfrog our brains full-scale into nonlinearity.
-bowerbird
kim, thanks so much for writing this. as you know from several of my recent posts, i think the future of the book (taken broadly as we do) is almost certainly in at least three, if not four dimensions. however, i think there will indeed be a mini-sea change in terms of people’s willingness to read on electronic screens — once the displays are good enough. and bowerbird, i think your comment about seeing linearity as a creative constraint is completely right-on. relating this “back to kim’s comment — conversations aren’t linear, which is why when we talk about a book “including the conversation it engenders” it seems that we’re going to need more than two dimensions to represent and encourage a complex asynchronous conversation among many people.
I’m fascinated with your recent posts, Bob, and am looking forward to your experiments in Second Life. This point about linearity is so interesting, I work on textbooks that teach the writing process and there is a constant emphasis on the “recursive” aspect of writing–that process of circling back to where you started and then venturing out in another direction in order to build an idea. It’s similar to the kind of feedback loop we experience in conversation, except that in conversation there are different personalities and different brains that take us in even more divergent directions.
To bowerbird’s comment: I’m a huge fan of p-books and of the incredible art that has been wrought from the classic, linear narrative. I don’t mean to negate any of that, but I am excited about what we are going to do with this new form. I think our brains already operate in a non-linear way, skipping from thought to thought and letting one idea elide into the next. In fact, I think the unstable nature of our thoughts (you really have to meditate to stay focused entirely on one thread for more than a few minutes) is what makes the classic narrative so satisfying. It reorders the world in a logical way. The print book is a hedge against the chaos, while the networked book allows the chaos. Or maybe the networked book proliferates the “network” and then orders it in a more complex, organic way. I’m not sure yet. Maybe it’s a kind of literary version of chaos theory–on the surface it looks like there is no order, but if you know how to look at it, you find patterns.
Advocates for a one way transition from print to screen reading are displaying a stilled, linear thinking. The needed realization is that the print book can easily exceed the legibility (immediacy of communication), haptic assimilation and persistence of screen based book and the print book will advance into a much wider influence based on digital production and the bibliographic utility function of screen based searching. The future of the print book continues to out perform the future of the screen book because digital discovery and delivery technologies are greatly enhancing the role of print.
(I happen to be at the American Library Association meetings in Seattle where just such interplay is being evaluated.)
To open the future of the screen book it should be visualized as a blank book, not a print book; a format for streaming, composite presentation crossing visual, oral, written, print and hybrid modes of reading. But remember, the print book has a fair start on these presentational arts as well.
To Bob’s earlier comment that “we’re going to need more than two dimensions to represent and encourage a complex asynchronous conversation among many people”: While I don’t doubt that these artifacts are high-dimensional, I’m not sure that a 3D representation rather than a 2D one will solve the problem.
(By “3D” I mean not only simulations of three dimensional reality by projected onto a screen, but also embedding representations into a physical space, e.g. by putting material on the wall displays or using Hiroshi Ishii-like tangible bits.)
I have seen too many attempts at 3D user interfaces fail over the years to be sanguine. I can’t think of a single 3D data visualization method that’s made it into the mainstream despite decades of work. (I don’t count games because their representations are literal, not metaphorical.) 3D data visualization is clearly harder than it seems. It’s a lot like cooperation, and consciousness: it seems simple because we’re wired to do it effortlessly, but understanding the phenomenon and externalizing it in technological systems is very hard.
3D visualization is seductive because it builds on one of the primary cognitive metaphors a la George Lakoff: Understanding is Seeing. (Some examples: I see what you mean; it’s a clear argument; she gets the picture; that clouds the issue; he’s in the dark about their motives.) However, just because we model understanding as a visual process doesn’t necessarily mean that visualizing something will make it understandable. To take the case in point: mathematicians use formalism rather than diagrams to do high-dimensional mathematics.
It’s also not at all clear that the volume of digital artifacts we collect could be represented in 3D without significant abstraction – which amounts to moving from pure visualization to formalism, and which undermines the very reasons for a move to three dimensions. There are currently 6,532 files in the My Documents folder on my machine; that’s more than a hundred decks of playing cards. Try arranging them around your office, and then finding the one you’re looking for…
Finally, I suspect that complex topology may be just as fruitful a model for these media as high dimensionality. I’ve jotted down some thoughts inspired by a conversation with Bob here.
It would be fun to paint/animate using this interface… just pulling screen shots from it. It could also make a great prop for visual storytelling performance… manipulating the sreen like a puppet.
Jeff Han’s demo of the multitouch screen illustrates a wonderfully immersive interface that could change the way networked “books” will be experienced.
I agree with your comment that “This technology might allow very small surfaces (like the touchpads on hand-held devices) to act as portals into limitless deep space.
It allows users to move into 3D networked space easily and fluently and it gets us beyond the linearity that is the hallmark and the limitation of the paper book. To come into its own, the networked book is going to require three-dimensional visualizations for both content and navigation.”
apple’s iPhone clearly demonstrates that the multitouch technology can be made small – and I expect there will be versions from wall size to handheld that will revolutionize the future of the book.
My friend Doug Englebart turned 80 today, and it might be seen as something of an ironic birthday present for Doug to see this exciting interface and display techology present a disruptive challenge for the mouse, GUI’s and hypertexdt which he innovated almost 40 years ago.
I can’t wait to get my hands(literally) on the technology to join with others in bringing the “networked book” into thrilling and productive virtual reality.