The Re-Invented Newspaper

This weeks blogging question had me thinking for quite some time. I am not a big fan of the e-book world, I do not own a kindle or any e-book apps, nor do I plan to. Maybe I'm just an old soul, but I cannot get over the sentimental bond that is created between myself and the literature I'm reading whether it be a book, magazine, or newspaper. I believe that a part of the act of reading is enhanced by holding the physical book, appreciating its scent, feeling the page under my finger, writing in the margins, and slowly turning the page over and monitoring my progress (an idea that appears in Taylor's article). I value the bookmark and the act of placing it between pages to mark where I have decided to break for a while, and from where I will later continue. Most importantly, I appreciate the history of book making, printing and typography. Elements such as typography and layout are critical to the page and decisions are made about fonts, size, color, borders and illustrations. 

For the purpose of this post I am choosing to concentrate on newspapers because I see how news apps and websites have significantly changed the way people read and encounter the news, especially me. I am a newspaper enthusiast. My family receives print copies of 2 different newspapers at home, a local and an international. I look forward to visiting on holiday so I can finally sit and enjoy some quality time reading the backlog of papers, something I don't have the luxury or time to do while I live the chaotic student life on campus.

Over the reading week break, I traveled to Washington DC and for the first time, visited the Newseum. It was here that I realized how much the publication and popularity of print newspapers has dissolved over time (at least in NA). On one of the upper floors, there are two highly engaging exhibits dedicated to the history of the printed newspaper - its formation and growth, and another exhibit that showcases print newspapers from around the world. 

World Newspaper Sizes

I could not help but appreciate the various sizes and fonts featured in these newspapers and how amazing it would be to read them in their native language typefaces! The reality is (as much as I hate to admit it) that I read my news online in the form of articles and  e-links to the newspaper websites. I have become so accustomed to reading the news online that I don't even realize that I'm engaging with an e-version of the newspaper page! For example, I regularly visit the New York Times website:

New York Times E-Home Page (Page 1)

The New York Times Print Page 1

Now, as you can see, the e-page is created to mimic the print page however there are some major differences. In the print version, you can flip through to the acquired section. In the e-version, you get this fancy drop down menu on the left hand side (as seen below):



Instead of page breaks and page headings determining the various sections, there is a drop down menu assuming the position of a "page" allowing the reader to click and jump to their desired section. Moreover, the home page provides the reader with snipets of various articles and another click to jump type deal for the rest of it. These short cut jump links to the desired "pages" while quick and easy to use, replace the act of turning the page. The interface is designed to have multiple little pages on the home page that expand to full pages with illustrations if you would like to continue reading (at least that's my interpretation). Moreover, there are ads. Lots of them. Whereas on a print paper, you would have small sections of ads, here you have the small sections with some text that then turn into their own pages. Since there is no limit on the page length or quality of e-pages, there can essentially be an infinite number of jump links to more and more pages. 

Some may see this a good thing, but not me. I feel that I acquire less information because of the lack of obvious cues to articles that I am interested in. Furthermore, the layout of online pages which often insert ads in the middle of the story or force me to click onto additional pages (not to mention scrolling or refreshing for connectivity issues) significantly alter the reading experience. A print story, in all its dusty-cheap paper glory asks me to flip to "A6" or "A2" to finish a long article, however it does not harass me in the process. In other words, it's simple and quick to conclude the article avoiding major distractions such as moving and flashing ads. 

The e-paper re-imagines the idea of a page by allowing it invisible lengths and connections to multiple pages. It does not demand, in my opinion, the same level of respect and engagement as the print version. I'm sure that there are apps and other e-things already available that solve some of the issues I'm addresing, but as someone who has bookmarked www.nytimes.com into my chrome browser, these are my major qualms with the abstract 'page[s]' of the e-paper. 

Pages Unbound

The notion of the page has already been changing for some time due to the way much of the information is available on the web – blogs and most websites, for instance, don’t have pages. We get tabs and other means of orienting ourselves. The scrolling nature of informational hits online are quite like, I would imagine, reading a scroll. There are often headings, but no pages or page numbers. When reading this way I feel a bit adrift in a sea of words. Thinking of Andrew Piper's statement, that our relationship to the “page [is] a fundamental interface of text” (p. 48) I wonder where that leaves me.

I think the page – not just turning a page – fixes the reader in time and space with regard to the book or whatever printed matter is being read. You could say it is a way of measuring “progress”. There are codes or sets of expectations that are embedded in the notion of the page, such as the “seriality” of it, or the “pathways”, to use Andrew Piper’s expression. Will this impact our relationship with time? our relationship to information? Will we lose sense of direction and become disoriented? We have become accustomed to consuming and experiencing books, hence pages, in a certain way; possibly the book has shaped us as much as we have shaped the book.

I like Andrew Piper’s statement that “reflecting on the nature of the page, rather than just the technology” is a good way to anchor the concept and the conversation. Once again, as stated by Piper, it is good to reflect on “what pages have done and what we would do without them” (p. 48). A categorical rejection of “enhancements” would be foolish.

I really liked the image of the “Three Versions of Psalm 118” used by Piper (p. 47) that represents quite poignantly efforts to enhance the page.

I think the power of our own imaginations already enriches texts when experiencing a well written text (I am thinking specifically of literature here) but I think having other integrated information that can contextualise a text could be valuable – not to mention fun. I came across the tool called “Beneath the Ink”. As described on the eBook Architects website, “These enhancements are called Binks. Each Bink gives readers more insight into the characters, places, concepts, and words that pique their curiosity — without ever leaving their page.” That could be very interesting. 

If it truly enhances (I would prefer the word “enrich”) the experience of “the book”, then I’m all for it. And I suppose that is ultimately a very individual thing.

It was hard to find an example of an enhanced page since I don't have an e-book reader. I came across a narrated version of The Mud Puddle by Robert Munsch. Not only is it narrated, but the words on the page, when being read out loud, turn red. This helps the child learn to recognise the words and

sounds... hence learn how to read. I would have loved that as a kid! 

The title of this blog entry comes from the Pages Unbound Festival:

http://www.pages-unbound.com/

Books, websites, blogs consulted:

Piper, Andrew. "Turning the Page (Roaming, Zooming, Streaming)." In Book Was There: Reading in Electronic Times. University of Chicago Press, 2012. 

https://beneaththeink.com/

http://ebookarchitects.com/learn-about-ebooks/partner-beneath-the-ink/

http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2014/enhancing-ebooks-an-author-perspective/

Week 7 - The novelty of an e-reader

I used to be an avid. traditional  book reader. I was one of those people who  either had a tattered, well-loved, dog-eared book in hand or was eagerly digging into a new-just-released-novel (isn’t the initial cracking of the spine so deliciously satisfying?). I read everywhere, all the time, during 15 minute breaks at work, the precious time between classes, on the bus - until I realized I got car sick, before bed, if I had time when I woke up … there was always a book.

Then I discovered the world of e-readers.

I purchased one for my Aunt who had expressed interest in the Kindle Paper White back in 2013. And even as I was checking out on my virtual Amazon cart, I turned my nose up at the very idea of reading on a piece of fancy plastic. Wasn’t that taking away from the reading experience? The long, languid hours of hearing the pages rustle as you travelled on a literary adventure, the weight of the book in your hands, the bittersweet stab of pain when it inevitably slipped and smacked you in the face … no, e-readers were most certainly NOT my cup of tea.

Until … I saw my Aunt upload over 150 books on her Kindle. 150 books all in a 6x6” tablet.

It was absolutely magical.

I purchased a Kindle Paperwhite for myself the next day and donated 80 books to my local library the following week. Books that I absolutely love and hold dear to me have coveted space on my bookshelf, books that I’ve collected over the years, however that traditional book collection has remained quite stagnant over the past two years.

I’m completely drawn to the ease of purchasing/downloading/borrowing e-books and I truly think its an avenue worth exploring.

Reading time for me is right before bed, with my Kindle. The adjustable settings allow me to decrease the brightness of the screen, but I’m sure it still thwarts my circadian rhythms. The pure luxurious convenience that an e-reader boasts makes up for the terrible sleep pattern.

With our academic readings online and available to download as .pdf files, it is even more convenient to read on an e-reader. It is also environmentally friendly. Though I do recognize the indescribable comfort in having a tangible bound book to hold versus the cold plastic of an e-reader, the convenience of a Kindle overshadows the novelty of a book every time.

~ Fareh

Games by the Page

Page Source

Not what jumps to mind when one says “texts” though certainly full of text, web forums (and their layouts and attributes) present interesting platforms where we can encounter reading. 

The traditional, largely unchanged format of the web forum (take the simple machines engine for instance) is composed of a series of topic sections, in which users can post messages of texts, pictures, links etc... Further posts comment or build on the initial post, and comments string along until there are frequently numerous pages of posts. The “page” mechanic is particularly interesting, because the digital medium does not necessitate it. Indeed, services like Facebook and many other more recent information aggregation displays feature functionally infinite scrolling, the list forever being repopulated.

And so the classic web forum format has a particularly static quality, and harks back the corporeal limitations of the printed page. Yet the ‘page’ of the forum means something very different then a printed page, it is more of an archive of activity organized in a naked succession, rather then anything like an indexible list of page numbers or chapter heads. There is a degree to which older posts get lost from consciousness or fade in context the farther back they are. Indeed, this is because the forum is a kind of strangely extruded record of conversation between forum members, instant but non-instant messaging as it were.

Countless web forums exist for plumbing various tech-support problems, or composing lists or long strung out debates, and in this they serve as a knowledge base that can be read and easily participated in. However, I am particularly interested in the context of forum games.

Forum games and Forum Rpgs employ all the above mentioned mechanics and quarks of the interface, but attempt to produce out of them the resolution of games. The sample taken for the screenshot here is from a Web RPG where one member is serving as the game-master and posting the results of actions, other members playing various factions in the game post how they react to circumstances and outcomes from the actions in previous turns. The result is a text that can be read, not merely as history of a conversation, but a quasi-coherent play-through of a game universe.

Many more fast and loose forum games have to particularly contend with the modal curiosities of the Forum as a medium. The most obvious handicap is that posts made at the end of a page (right before the forum algorithms automatically start a new page of posts) tend to get ignored or read less, while posts at the top of the page or the first post of a given topic, tend to garner eye-balls longer and hold more impact. Members will also quote older pages, link to other pages on the forum etc… Sometimes games will have multiple topic threads simultaneously running, and these threads are expected to be read and cross-referenced by the all players and any serious onlookers.

----

I realize in the process of writing this, how quaint and primitive the mechanics of web-forums are (especially small forums) Yet they seem to continue to thrive, and as a medium I find them superior to the more constantly churning eye-ball ingratiating mechanics of the newer social-media. Perhaps the not-so-hidden truth here is that rarely does a web forum arise under the auspicious or drive of naked profit generation. Forums are perhaps comparatively more innocently social documents and texts.

-Ben

Jackson Ossea on Hyperlinks and David Foster Wallace

                                                                Picture Source

     Though commonplace now, the idea of using hyperlinks in the digitized versions of newspaper and magazine articles was a radical idea when it was first implemented. They created a level of trustworthiness between the writer and reader which did not exist before; allowing the reader to check the validity of the author’s sources more immediately than they previously could. Most journalist’s articles are not required to cite their sources, so hyperlinks allowed the reader to confront the article and the research which led to the final composition efficiently.
   
     The difficulty with hyperlinks being used this way is also the most interesting thing about them. Just like any digital text which does not use hyperlinks, they expand the page from the limitations of its dimensions to something which is unlimited. The reader is meant to experience the page through the contents contained with them, but now that space includes the many different webpages which use the article as a springboard to direct the reader towards them.

     Challenging the notion even further is when hyperlinks are used as a digital replacement for when footnotes were used in the printed form. So such usage is the only kind where hyperlinks are used to represent what already exists in the print form of the article in question, and can even be represented in the same space on the page.

     When David Foster Wallace’s now notorious article “Host” was first published in The Atlantic in 2005, the writer’s numerous footnotes – and footnotes within footnotes – were printed in different coloured texts so as not to confuse the reader but also as a creative solution for presenting the entirety of Wallace’s essay while maintaining the experience that he had intended for his reader. The links are still coloured in the same way which the footnotes were in the original print to retain the authenticity of the original artefact in its digital form.

     But because the links, in this case, are footnotes and not quick ways for the author to validate their claims, the new window that the link opens containing the footnotes is still visible on the page which contains the footnotes. In a way, using the hyperlinks in this fashion much more closely resembles the footnotes in the original article. The reader still experiences their content the way they would in the print form without ever having to alter their page placement – but very few online texts actively point out the page breaks because the infinite nature digital space may make the practice redundant for many readers.

    In digital articles, hyperlinks have become another banality of the page alongside the page number and the footer. Still, they have dramatically altered the way the page of a newspaper or magazine had been defined for decades.

Week 6 Response: Shakespeare through Text Messaging

In light of this week’s class trip to the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library and viewing the exhibition of Shakespeare’s plays from its earliest printings to recently published material; had me thinking of other ways in which his life’s work has been reinterpreted and transformed, according to how we communicate as a society in the 21^st century. Brett Wright's book, YOLO Juliet – also available in eBook format – is an innovative and perhaps even radical example of experimenting with page design and in reading Shakespeare’s plays. Whether in print or eBook, the purpose and design of the classic tale of Romeo and Juliet in YOLO Juliet is meant to be read in text messaging format.

Screenshot of YOLO Juliet, from the Toronto Public Library.

Containing a combination of shorthand, emoticons, long sentences and more, Wright’s book is a modern day interpretation of Romeo and Juliet played out in text messages. The screenshot of the eBook from the Toronto Public Library, shows how Shakespeare’s work has been modernized to reach a younger demographic of readers. Viewing YOLO Juliet as an eBook, gives the feeling as though you are actually scrolling through text messages, thus breaking the barrier of the experience in “turning” the pages of a digital book.

Although it’s meant to be fun and interesting, people might raise questions on whether it depreciates the old text, while others might think it’s another way of paying homage to this classic star-crossed tale. But regardless, it cannot be denied that YOLO Juliet is a perfect example that takes today’s societal obsessions and usage of social media, and is embodied within a book; physically and digitally.

YOLO Juliet is part of the OMG Shakespeare Series under Penguin Random House, where it has also published the following plays as text messages: Macbeth #killingit, A Midsummer Night #nofilter and srsly Hamlet (Penguin Random House, 2016). 

(Also if interested, The Digital Reader had discussed about YOLO Juliet here.)

- Raquel

Sources & Image:

Hoffelder, N. (2015, June 14). YOLO Juliet Improves on Shakespeare By Adding TextSpeak [Blog post]. Retrieved from http://the-digital-reader.com/2015/06/14/yolo-juliet-improves-on-shakespeare-by-adding-textspeak/

OverDrive. (2016). Sample. YOLO Juliet. Retrieved from 

https://sample-e57f458a250f293e85ebdf5e54406f9f.read.overdrive.com/?p=yolo-juliet 

Penguin Random House. (2016). OMG Shakespeare Series. Retrieved from http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/series/OGS/omg-shakespeare

Toronto Public Library. (2016). YOLO Juliet. Retrieved from http://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?Entt=RDM3318681&R=3318681

The Door of Pages: Monumenta Germaniae Historica

In medieval architecture, a category which comprises primarily churches, doors were inscribed with biblical texts which thrust users into metaphorical worlds. Indeed, medieval authorities considered art to be the books of the people, using every surface -- lintel, column, window and floor -- for the presentation of image and text. The phenomenon of inscribed doors was well studied by Bede scholar Calvin Kendall. So having spent most of my life reading medieval texts and studying medieval art, perhaps it is not surprising that when someone compares the pages of a book to windows, as Andrew Piper did in his study investigating the shift to digital reading, I would also visualize doors.

Thinking more about my misconstruing of the original metaphor, I am certain that someone ought to seriously consider the concept of book or page as door. When reading, especially in digital format, it is true that we peer through a screen as if through a window into an outside world, while our bodies remain stationary. However, digital resources can be doors. At a time in my life when I had little access to research materials and happened upon a useful online resource, my computer very much became a door to a different place, a portal to a library filled with volumes of all kinds. 

One such resource that I discovered was the digital Monumenta Germaniae Historica, the online version of this series of critically edited Latin primary sources that is a monolithic resource in the research of almost any medieval topic.

The series began in the nineteenth century and many of the texts were chosen with a nationalistic bias. The books themselves are works of printing art, so that I was thrilled to see that the site, sponsored by the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, presents scanned pages from the original editions with all their critical apparatus. Volumes can be searched by keyword and texts can be freely downloaded in pdf format.

The beauty of these pages is their minimalism. The generous white borders funnel one's attention in a liquid manner to the sediment of the text. One can read without straining the eyes, without the distraction of odd structures or flashy layout. As Piper said, "the crowdedness of the digital page" is a hindrance to reading. Yet, here, one can also read with the affordances of digital text, zooming in, turning pages and flipping to different sections with the click of a mouse. In no way is this a reinvention of the page, but it certainly is a monumental one. Best, Laura

Week 6 - Flipbooks!

The research involved for this blogpost was both enjoyable and eye-opening, especially since the 'page' as we know it has undergone radical transformations in the digital world.

I found a particularly interesting website called Flipbook which allows guest users (you can create an account if you like) to create their own digital flip book. Flip books have been around since roughly the 1800s, encouraging imagination and creativity, it also helped that they required inexpensive materials and all classes of folk could enjoy making their own flip book stories.

The general idea of a flip book is to draw a sequence of images on consecutive pieces of paper in order to tell a story or show a particular action. When the pages were quickly turned it looked as though the images were moving like a live cartoon.

As a child I used to love making flip books with scraps of coloured paper, crayons and a particularly strong stapler. It was highly entertaining for a kid in the early 90s when there were no high tech apps to crush multi-coloured candy.

To have the option of making flip books online is strange and wonderful at the same time. With a variety of colours to choose from and an adjustable brush size together with the rapid turning of electronic pages it is an unnerving yet familiar digital experience that can be enjoyed by a new generation of  children and nostalgic adults.

~ Fareh

Cooking up some XML

During one of our classes I wrote in my notes “we discover what print was (is) as we discover what digital can be”. I find that fascinating. That each of these mediums can continue to be explored by different disciplines, and that each discipline (and individual) might find different perspectives, emphasize different aspects, and represent different elements is very interesting. I find it fascinating that encoding decisions impact the experience of the text, thus compelling the encoder/s to be thoughtful about both the audience and purpose of the encoding.  Also interesting is how to encode ambiguity, how to represent form and content and how they interrelate.

Our group has chosen to encode a letter written by Mary Queen of Scots; however, each group member had considered other ideas. For example, I love reading recipes for pleasure, and it’s hard to find someone more passionate about cooking and food. I did a Google search for Julia Child’s archives, which are held by Harvard's Schlesinger Library's culinary collection.  

Below are two documents that I thought would have been an interesting encoding challenge.  

Child's sketch for the set of "The French Chef" is very interesting to me for many reasons. Has she ripped a piece of paper out of a notebook? Was she making this in collaboration with other people?  Where was she was she was making these notes? How do you capture the momentum and energy and passion of these documents? What kind of dining scenario was she thinking of when she prepared this document? 

The recipe is for the omelette noted at the bottom of the page. The typewritten page is annotated in Child's handwriting, and gives the reader insight into her process and ideas as they evolve. These two documents are certainly linked.

I look forward to the group encoding experience. 

See the collection here:

http://www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/schlesinger-library/collection/julia-child