- Local Bookstores, Social Hubs, and Mutualization « Clay Shirky
Clary Shirky on the future of the bookstore. I think that the local bookstore probably has a longer future that the local record store did – I think it'll take a generational shift or two, until we've got people who are more used to reading on the screen than they are on paper, but I think he's right that they're going to need to make massive practical changes in the way they do business – perhaps becoming hubs for local POD services…
Tag: books
Bookmarks for November 11, 2009
- Chose Your Own Adventure
Some absolutely beutiful stuff here – visualisations of the books, and the paths through them, and a on-line playable book. I am simultaneously regressing to childhood, and getting my adult design/informatics brain stimulated. Brilliant.
- Typekit
Oooh. Proper, attractive fonts for your website. OK, it'll set you back 25-50 dollars a year, and I bet most people will still set their font sizes far too small, but at least I can use it to make prettier things now.
Bookmarks for June 30, 2009
- potlatch: what's going on with the music formerly known as 'indie'?
"I can tell you which Suede record accompanied my GCSEs and A-Levels; today's teenagers would tell you which band."
- Michael Moorcock, Alan Moore, Iain Sinclair
Never mind kicking myself – I am scourging myself with rusty barbed wire, and rubbing salt in the wounds for missing this. Couple of key quotes from this write up: "Is the current be-scaffolded state of London perpetual remythologising?" Iain Sinclair says “Before we can move forward, we have to absorb everything that has come before, and rip it off.”
- SoFoBoMo – The Solo Photo Book Month
Dammit, why was I not told about this? Next year, gadget, next year!
- Glastonbury 2009 – The Big Picture
It *almost* makes me want to got there next year, and take a camera. Obviously, I'm not mad, and won't be going, but there are some absolutely gorgeous shots in here.
Bookmarks for April 28, 2009
- The Art of Penguin Science Fiction
An archive and commentary on some very very striking SF cover design. Well worth a look.
- BBC NEWS | Technology | Home Office 'colluded with Phorm'
My goodness, do you think I might be very, very angry about this? Why yes, I am. Someone please find me someone to vote for at the next election who actually possesses a principle or two.
- Font Squirrel | Handpicked free fonts for graphic designers with commercial-use licenses.
Some of these are very lovely.
- Revolutionary Espresso Book Machine launches in London | Books | guardian.co.uk
This is brilliant, and I live near it, and that makes me happy. I shall have to go and find an excuse to purchase something from it.
Bookmarks for April 23, 2009
- One & Other
Sign up now for your chance stand around on a plinth in Trafalgar Square for an hour at some point over the summer. I have. Fingers crossed…
- Bacon sandwich really does cure a hangover – Telegraph
Well, *duh*.
- Media packaging mashups
Jason Kottke's round up of well, exactly what is says – media packing redone in various distinctive styles that are more usually associated with some other form of media. Some gems in here.
Bookmarks for April 10, 2009
- 3-D Printing Hits Rock-bottom Prices With Homemade Ceramics Mix
I have no personal use at the moment for a 3d printer, but I'm sure the day will come when I will, and I'd really rather not have to pay through the nose for raw materials.
- Cover versions – a set on Flickr
Someone has taken classic record covers, and re-imagined them as Pelican book covers. This is absolutely beautiful stuff.
- Daring Fireball: How to Block the DiggBar
Jon Gruber has implemented an anti-DiggBar tool for his pages. I will probably do the same for mine. Read about why and how he's done it, because while this may sound a bit like a crank thing to do, rejecting potential traffic from a popular source like Digg, the important principle here is that what Digg is doing is subverting on of the basic premises of how the web works, and it should be discouraged.
- Behold the GIGAFLAKE!
Truly, the confectionery of gods and titans.
Bookmarks for February 12, 2009
- apiphile: zen and the art of hurtling towards the ground at a million miles an hour; a manifesto
With Valenties Day about to heave into view for another year, my friend Del writes about falling in love, and produces one of the finest, most impassioned and general beautiful pieces of writing I've seen in a while. Go and read it.
- Hacking the Earth by Jamais Cascio
Jamais Cascio is too clever by half. And he has written a book, for to expand your brains on the subject of climate engineering, and the ways in which we might survive these here end times what are upon us. Read it, unless you want to wind up a slave to the hideous race of lizard overlords that will doubtless come to dominate the planet once the ice caps melt and the atmosphere fills up with noxious fumes.
Bane
Bright spot of the week: I finally own a copy of the finest horror novel I have ever read: BANE, by Joe Donnelly. You have no idea how happy I am to have finally acquired a copy – I’ve been looking for one for half a decade, ever since I first read a friend’s in 1996, by which time, it was already out of print.
BANE is one of only two books to disturb me sufficiently that I had to put it down and find some human company for a while, just because I was so unsettled. You can probably find a copy for yourself through the same place I did.