"PRSS"?
Surely they could have come up with something better than that...?
I assume you don't read TRVL. It could, I suppose, be interpreted as PRISS, PRASS or PRUSS etc. but in a publishing situation anyone with an IQ over 120 would assume PRESS.
The basic problem with ebook publishing today is quite simple. Those developing the standards (i.e. ePub) have been looking to webpages for ideas. But that's ridiculous. An ebook shares a lot more with a print book that it does with web pages. They should be looking to print and attempting to duplicate its features.
well, problem is even bigger.
It's all started at Xerox: they made computers to simulate paper (4000 years old invention).
Xerox turned computers into "advanced" typewriters that we, unfortunate, still use today.
Ted Nelson explain this phenomenon very good here:
Print publishers don't feel stupid - they are publishing digital as well. Digital-only publishers leave the still significant print revenue on the table.
Highly leveraging advanced tech in iPad publications has been tried many times without any ROI. Apps which disseminate news simply through intelligent aggregation (like Zite and Flipboard) contain the value users are looking for.
Publishing in the iPad age is a proposition fraught with danger: digital publications must match the dead simple ease of use of their print counterparts, while adding enough additional value — through interactive elements or enhanced accessibility, perhaps — to justify their often slightly higher price."
Who are these people. Digital books are typically quite a bit cheaper than their print counterparts, in my case $2.99 versus $14.95. And I'd be quite happy if the tools would just let me create ebooks as typographically sophisticated as a print book. Forget the interactive stuff. Forget the multimedia that costs a fortune to do right. Just do what print can do and has been able to do for hundreds of years.
Quote: 'Elings's overarching goal with Prss, he said, "was to make print feel stupid. Everything we've built in the last one-and-a-half years or so is completely based on that."'
Remarks like that make me wonder if he's got much sense. Print is a highly refined product and an excellent way to handle word-after-word texts, which is precisely why people read, whether in print or digital. Adding multi-media is far too expensive in all but bestsellers and a complex UI is just a distraction.
The basic problem with ebook publishing today is quite simple. Those developing the standards (i.e. ePub) have been looking to webpages for ideas. But that's ridiculous. An ebook shares a lot more with a print book that it does with web pages. They should be looking to print and attempting to duplicate its features.
For instance:
* Web pages are online and can pull anything from there--such as video. Ebook readers such as the Kindle typically spend their time off line, so storage space for videos is a big problem.
* Web pages typically on run for one or two screens and users scroll down to read. Books run for the equivalent of hundreds of screens and users page though them. A lot of the stupidity of ebooks (i.e. bad page breaks for pictures and orphaned text) is because those creating ePub standards forget the distinction between scrolling and pagination. They build for what works with scrolling and the result looks awful with pagination.
* What makes sense on a short webpage, i.e. lots of pictures and clickable links, makes no sense for a book were the reader intends to read along for a half hour or more. People visit webpages to be distracted. They read books to get away for a time.
If you'd like to see an illustration of how best to do an ebook given current epub standards, check out a book I recently published. I use pictures about as well as they can be used. Both Amazon and Apple offer free samples of the digital version and Amazon offers a look inside for the print version.
--Michael W. Perry, My Nights with Leukemia: Caring for Children with Leukemia
I can see why he said much of what he did but I would say that it depends greatly on what the book is about. I am sure their comment about making 'print feel stupid' is a marketing ploy and a good one judging by the fact we are here discussing it. That said, the comment that we should look at traditional print more than the web as a model might be true of a novel but not true of a science text book for example. So it is truly the content that should determine what model is followed. To be too dogmatic in either approach would be wrong. Early automobiles for lack of thinking outside the box included many features from horse drawn buggies. That's the nature of radical changes. You have to be able to let go of the past to make the next leap in many cases. The very things cited as bad about following the web example are in many cases perfect for science books, for example. Getting the latest data, charts and stats are mind boggling compared to print. Even if you have to wait till you are connected to update. Compare that to a heavy and very expensive Geography text book still showing the Sudan as one country!
The real problem with replacing print is easily and quickly creating digestible content. What they really need is a "chunk size + effect = what graphic gets displayed." Meaning; you can't be sure how much content a user has on a page. PDFs are horrible for offline reading for this very reason. At a given type size * screen resolution -- you have so much content. But when that changes, the page designed for HTML (and larger screens) or the page designed for Print/PDF, doesn't know how to keep what you need to see on the page.
It would be relatively easy to say; "Page 5 has 3 graphics" and so graphics are anchored based on overlapping and arbitrary beginning and end points. Processing a PDF or other document would begin with some automatic settings on how to handle transitions and graphics and assumptions on "chunk size". Then a developer would just flip through pages and adjust -- then save.
As a multimedia developer, I recognize there's a lot of "over development" and attention to detail required to properly create a useful piece. and rarely does anyone have time to do this for a lot of content. And just by default, HTML and PDF are actually pretty bad at handling the formatting of text for someone reading copious amounts while not losing their place.
I assume you don't read TRVL. It could, I suppose, be interpreted as PRISS, PRASS or PRUSS etc. but in a publishing situation anyone with an IQ over 120 would assume PRESS.
It doesn't matter how "wow" the publication is. The point of "print" is that we can still read Egyption papyrus scrolls, an original Gutenberg bible, etc.
Can we still read the "wowest" digital publication in three years? Can we read it on a non-iPad? Can we read a whateverPad publication on the iPad99 in 95 years from now?
In this short-lived time, people forget that culture is something that's created to endure from one generation to another.
If I even tried to read one of the floppies from one of my C-64 days, I'd be hard up. Even if my old C-64 drive still would work, how would I transfer the data and what app could display it properly?
Sure, something like PDF may stick around a bit longer, but all these various proprietary "value added" (read: DRM encumbered) formats like they are common on a variety of e-book readers, Zinio news stand, etc. they are destined for the garbage, while my National Geographic collection from the last 20 years is just as readable as the they it the issues fell through my mail slot.
Until users, legislators, etc. demand and mandate that all digital publications be published only in open document standard file formats, which are easily re-implemented or converted for use in future devices, I'd stay away from any digital publication that's not as disposable as this weeks calendar of happenings in East-Kaboomfuck.
It doesn't matter how "wow" the publication is. The point of "print" is that we can still read Egyption papyrus scrolls, an original Gutenberg bible, etc.
Can we still read the "wowest" digital publication in three years? Can we read it on a non-iPad? Can we read a whateverPad publication on the iPad99 in 95 years from now?
In this short-lived time, people forget that culture is something that's created to endure from one generation to another.
If I even tried to read one of the floppies from one of my C-64 days, I'd be hard up. Even if my old C-64 drive still would work, how would I transfer the data and what app could display it properly?
Sure, something like PDF may stick around a bit longer, but all these various proprietary "value added" (read: DRM encumbered) formats like they are common on a variety of e-book readers, Zinio news stand, etc. they are destined for the garbage, while my National Geographic collection from the last 20 years is just as readable as the they it the issues fell through my mail slot.
Until users, legislators, etc. demand and mandate that all digital publications be published only in open document standard file formats, which are easily re-implemented or converted for use in future devices, I'd stay away from any digital publication that's not as disposable as this weeks calendar of happenings in East-Kaboomfuck.
nice read
and interesting that people only now come to this sad realisation.
Ted Nelson thinks about it long before C64 come to market but nobody listen to him!
but at the end, we eventually will implement his, half century old, ideas ...probably in next half of century
Comments
People say email now. And “Internet” isn’t capitalized anymore.
PSS?
The basic problem with ebook publishing today is quite simple. Those developing the standards (i.e. ePub) have been looking to webpages for ideas. But that's ridiculous. An ebook shares a lot more with a print book that it does with web pages. They should be looking to print and attempting to duplicate its features.
well, problem is even bigger.
It's all started at Xerox: they made computers to simulate paper (4000 years old invention).
Xerox turned computers into "advanced" typewriters that we, unfortunate, still use today.
Ted Nelson explain this phenomenon very good here:
Highly leveraging advanced tech in iPad publications has been tried many times without any ROI. Apps which disseminate news simply through intelligent aggregation (like Zite and Flipboard) contain the value users are looking for.
True, but I was referring to interpreting words with vowels missing as full word, pss is itself an abreaviation. Sorry I wasn't clear enough.
I tried looking it up but didn't find anything, is there a collective name now for words that are used like TRVL?
I can see why he said much of what he did but I would say that it depends greatly on what the book is about. I am sure their comment about making 'print feel stupid' is a marketing ploy and a good one judging by the fact we are here discussing it. That said, the comment that we should look at traditional print more than the web as a model might be true of a novel but not true of a science text book for example. So it is truly the content that should determine what model is followed. To be too dogmatic in either approach would be wrong. Early automobiles for lack of thinking outside the box included many features from horse drawn buggies. That's the nature of radical changes. You have to be able to let go of the past to make the next leap in many cases. The very things cited as bad about following the web example are in many cases perfect for science books, for example. Getting the latest data, charts and stats are mind boggling compared to print. Even if you have to wait till you are connected to update. Compare that to a heavy and very expensive Geography text book still showing the Sudan as one country!
""Six months later, with Prss powering what was at one point Apple's number one Made for iOS 7 iPad app -- TheNextWeb's SHIFT magazine"
"Shane, have you even tried TNW's app or at the very least read the iOS reviews for it? Awful, with most reviewers complaining about the UX...."
Which is why TNW moved to Prss in October, hence this is news...
http://thenextweb.com/voice/2013/10/02/introducing-the-next-web-beautiful-new-ipad-magazine-shift/
The real problem with replacing print is easily and quickly creating digestible content. What they really need is a "chunk size + effect = what graphic gets displayed." Meaning; you can't be sure how much content a user has on a page. PDFs are horrible for offline reading for this very reason. At a given type size * screen resolution -- you have so much content. But when that changes, the page designed for HTML (and larger screens) or the page designed for Print/PDF, doesn't know how to keep what you need to see on the page.
It would be relatively easy to say; "Page 5 has 3 graphics" and so graphics are anchored based on overlapping and arbitrary beginning and end points. Processing a PDF or other document would begin with some automatic settings on how to handle transitions and graphics and assumptions on "chunk size". Then a developer would just flip through pages and adjust -- then save.
As a multimedia developer, I recognize there's a lot of "over development" and attention to detail required to properly create a useful piece. and rarely does anyone have time to do this for a lot of content. And just by default, HTML and PDF are actually pretty bad at handling the formatting of text for someone reading copious amounts while not losing their place.
too bad the average american IQ is only 98.
I assume you don't read TRVL. It could, I suppose, be interpreted as PRISS, PRASS or PRUSS etc. but in a publishing situation anyone with an IQ over 120 would assume PRESS.
Actually, as those with an IQ of over 120 all know, by definition, the average IQ of a sample is 100.
I was kidding
My 2-bit education taught me it was 1,100,100.
Can we still read the "wowest" digital publication in three years? Can we read it on a non-iPad? Can we read a whateverPad publication on the iPad99 in 95 years from now?
In this short-lived time, people forget that culture is something that's created to endure from one generation to another.
If I even tried to read one of the floppies from one of my C-64 days, I'd be hard up. Even if my old C-64 drive still would work, how would I transfer the data and what app could display it properly?
Sure, something like PDF may stick around a bit longer, but all these various proprietary "value added" (read: DRM encumbered) formats like they are common on a variety of e-book readers, Zinio news stand, etc. they are destined for the garbage, while my National Geographic collection from the last 20 years is just as readable as the they it the issues fell through my mail slot.
Until users, legislators, etc. demand and mandate that all digital publications be published only in open document standard file formats, which are easily re-implemented or converted for use in future devices, I'd stay away from any digital publication that's not as disposable as this weeks calendar of happenings in East-Kaboomfuck.
It doesn't matter how "wow" the publication is. The point of "print" is that we can still read Egyption papyrus scrolls, an original Gutenberg bible, etc.
Can we still read the "wowest" digital publication in three years? Can we read it on a non-iPad? Can we read a whateverPad publication on the iPad99 in 95 years from now?
In this short-lived time, people forget that culture is something that's created to endure from one generation to another.
If I even tried to read one of the floppies from one of my C-64 days, I'd be hard up. Even if my old C-64 drive still would work, how would I transfer the data and what app could display it properly?
Sure, something like PDF may stick around a bit longer, but all these various proprietary "value added" (read: DRM encumbered) formats like they are common on a variety of e-book readers, Zinio news stand, etc. they are destined for the garbage, while my National Geographic collection from the last 20 years is just as readable as the they it the issues fell through my mail slot.
Until users, legislators, etc. demand and mandate that all digital publications be published only in open document standard file formats, which are easily re-implemented or converted for use in future devices, I'd stay away from any digital publication that's not as disposable as this weeks calendar of happenings in East-Kaboomfuck.
nice read
and interesting that people only now come to this sad realisation.
Ted Nelson thinks about it long before C64 come to market but nobody listen to him!
but at the end, we eventually will implement his, half century old, ideas ...probably in next half of century
is it supposed to be prss or is it misspelled, supposed to be press?