Today, two things caught my eye. Slightly amusing that whilst both seem clearly rooted in technology, they represent a new take on concepts practically as old as our ability to communicate.
The first which the blogosphere seems full of over the last few days is the ‘Amazon Kindle‘ – “the future of book reading”.
It’s not like me to be so negative about a new bit of technology, but there are a whole host of great reasons why there has never been ‘an iPod of the book world’. The success of the iPod beyond its design (etc etc), was how simple it was for me to put my exisiting music library from CD onto it. I look forward to scanning my present book library to get it onto a digital device (actually, scratch that – I don’t). I’m quite happy taking out my book on the train, content in the fact that I don’t need a contract, wireless network access or indeed power to use it. I love the fact that I can lend it to a friend when we get talking about it, and I love picking up second hand books with carefully taken notes scribbled in the margins. Whilst technology could help us share our scribbled notes, there are some areas where technology really isn’t progress.
This brings me neatly on to the second find of the day, ‘Paper Replay’ – a combination of paper, pen and all that’s cool about digital technology. Check out the video here.
What a day of opposites!
