How to get young people fired up about books—including the cellphone variety
“The secret to getting young people excited about books isn’t about taking our existing published books and formatting them for cell phones. Instead, we need to figure out how to let readers publish their own books in a way that can reach a mass audience—not just on obscure blogs, but on all media: print, online, audio and, yes, even cell phones.” - Computerworld’s Mike Elgan on mobile phones as possible literacy-promoters.
The TeleRead take: Wise words, especially the “all media” angle. It would be wrong, wrong, wrong to build e-bookdom around, say, the $400 Kindle, even if its owners may buy more books than the typical person. Kindle owners number in the thousands, while cellphone users are in the billions, and more and more of these mobile phones will be e-book-capable. I’m reminded of the newspaper industry. Remember when editors—and I don’t mean the New York Times and Wall Street Journal varieties, exceptions to the rule—thought they would prosper focusing on an elite audience?
By the way, “free” and paid can thrive together. Look at Ficbot, who started out almost entirely focused on public domain and Creative Commons books. She still loves them but is now starting to buy eBookwise books.
Screenshot is of the mobile area of the free Manybooks.net.
(Computerworld clip via MobileRead).
Related: Books as social vectors in if:book and Ursula K. Le Guin in Harpers on“Staying Awake: Notes on the alleged decline of reading (paywalled away from nonsubscribers, ironically).
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