Why p-books are still better than e-books

Paper books or printed books, p-books for short, are still better than e-books in many and important ways. They are aesthetically better, not only because the current e-ink is mostly black and white, but also because typography tends to become a fine art, and as such it cannot be easily incorporated into the existing electronic text presentation tools. If we are compelled to buy e-books, we certainly do it for reasons other than their visual superiority to p-books.

Not only are the capabilities of the “e-printing” tools very limited, but also certain e-book “publications” are still terribly sloppy, as if no one took care to open the e-book after creating it. Recently I purchased an e-book on the economic crisis. When I opened it on the e-reader, there was a space attached to each “fi” pattern, which converted all occurrences of the word “finance” to “fi nance”.  In a p-book this could have happened once or twice, but in the e-book it was bound to happen hundreds of times.

The future of e-books is in self-publishing. While Gutenberg liberated us from allocating man-years to the process of book copying, the e-book technology will liberate us from the expenses required to publish a book. However, one cannot count on the average writer to be a master of writing style and typography rules. This is where advanced self publishing tools will enter. Perhaps their most important predecessor is LaTeX, but more  still have to appear.

But, beyond self publishing there is another important problem, which will soon require its solution, namely the problem of “reputation”. How will the average reader be able to distinguish good books from the vast amounts of junk, which will be created by ambitious and unqualified authors? Currently, there is a selection process, which allows a publishing house to distinguish between documents worth publishing and those which will never see the light of publicity. If you want to take a glimpse of this process, you can perhaps read the first chapter in Styrion’s “Sophie’s choice”. Reputation management mechanisms will become more and more important in this context.

Professional editing services are also likely to become more and more important and to replace the editing departments of publishing houses. Well known writers will have an additional opportunity to make a living by selling their consulting services to a new market of aspiring authors.

Last, but certainly not least, the book distribution related financial model must be modified. Publishing houses will face a dim future, while distribution channels must also be redefined in order to survive, perhaps by exploiting social networks.

Some of the above emerging trends have already started to materialize. However, there is a long way before we reach maturity.

On new talkative smart assistants

Recently a leading smartphone maker incorporated voice recognition and natural language processing in its latest product.

Somewhere, on the railways of new technologies, there is a train waiting for those who believe that voice based human machine interfaces are a natural unavoidable development. Apparently some smartphone makers believe that they must not miss this train or, perhaps, that they will be the first to really set this train in motion. In the meanwhile there is another train, which has already started moving around. Passengers in this second train have re-trained themselves and accepted the fact that machines seem to feel better with complex sequences of keystrokes rather than words. There is perhaps a strong belief among the so far few passengers in the first train that once they get it moving, they will soon overtake the second train.

Perhaps, and despite the fact that HAL ought to have appeared exactly ten years ago, I will probably live not long enough to see the final outcome of this race. What mainly concerns myself is the change in everyday life that will be brought by the introduction of new technologies in real products.

There is an advertisement showing the new fascinating capabilities of the aforementioned smartphone: A white-collar worker appears running in a park. He reschedules his appointments by using the new voice based human-machine interface. Clearly the advertisement is very carefully designed. He is alone; those who might overhear what he is saying cannot threaten his privacy. He is running; he cannot use a keyboard. He is not driving; he can afford to increase his degree of involvement in the “discussion” without endangering himself or others.

Now imagine yourself in a public space (bus, train, airplane, waiting room). You must whisper for the fear of being overheard. On the other hand, the more extrovert part of the population around you will probably not care, they will speak out their commands to their smartphones, and terrible noise will be created. Not only you will be annoyed by the addition of useless sound decibels, but also by the fact that you will not be able to whisper any more.

As a further example, imagine yourself on the road, driving among cars, whose drivers are prone to new kinds of misdemeanors. They can now violate the law not only by talking to their friends, but also by dictating letters and email messages to their smart-phone talk-bots. In addition, they will become more and more nervous as soon as they find out that they have to correct a talk-bot’s understanding of what they have just said or meant to have said.

Then there is the serious issue of context awareness technology maturity. Context awareness in particular and ambient intelligence in general, are well-researched areas. Ask your smartphone to remind you to collect your keys when you leave home. It will create a location dependent reminder to do that. However, the location is sensed with a certain (feasible or desirable) accuracy, and you will be reminded only once you are some hundreds of meters away from home, i.e. when you are already locked out of. The problem is not purely “technical”, it is also a problem of logic. How does you smart assistant understand that you will be leaving home while you are still there? A proper answer would probably rely on a combination of events, e.g. your calendar, your daily routine, and indications of movement from accelerometers hidden in your smart-briefcase or in your car keys. And still the real truth, i.e. the intention to leave home, lies deep inside your brain.

Perhaps the elderly will find in the currently naïve talk-bot of their smartphone a consoling voice, and kids will rediscover it once more as something between a toy and a friend. Perhaps using the more natural voice interface can eventually save some lives. Perhaps significant experience will be gained and the side effects will eventually be smoothed out. In the meanwhile we shall become part of yet another mass scale field test with or without our consent.

What's in a name, and in a form

Yesterday a smartphone upgrade was announced and publicly presented in a much-awaited marketing event. While the public expected a “new model”, an “elevated version” of the existing model was offered instead. There were disappointed journalists and technology analysts, who were frustrated to see that they had been caught wrong in their predictions and speculations. What was perhaps more serious was the fact that the maker’s stock price took a temporary plunge. The reception of the aforementioned announcement was mainly based on two facts: (a) the “new” device was offered in the same physical container, and (b) the codename of the new product did not reflect enough change (the device was named as a version of an existing model number, i.e. as a third degree differentiation in the hierarchy [product name, model number, version letter] instead of a second degree differentiation). Apparently, shape and name are more or less superficial properties of the product, and a serious evaluation should have been based on functionality improvement. While the public reaction is a complex social, psychological, historical, and economic phenomenon, there is a question central to its heart: How does the average consumer understand quality and innovation in technology?

The reaction could be considered as yet another example to the old “form vs. content” problem of philosophy, assuming that the case (with attributes such as shape, material and color) and the name are expressions of “form”, while functionality is an expression of “content”. It takes a 21st century human a second to feel form, it may take years to taste and appreciate functionality. Also, the diversity of opinions on functionality matters is much wider than the diversity on form. Once more it seems that a content improvement is not enough, if it is not accompanied by a change in form, which in fact implies that the appreciation mechanisms of today’s humans are still tailored to the needs of the prehistoric era. Anyway, is a smart phone anything more than an advanced tool?

The moral of the story (“one must always signal content change with sufficient form change”) has serious repercussions on the future of technology, as we understand it today. Significant investments have been made on pervasive computing (or ambient intelligence) technologies. However, a major objective of pervasive computing is seamless integration with human activities. Unfortunately, humans seem incapable of appreciating seamless functionality, unless they are somehow forced to sense its absence.

There is an interesting exercise, which illustrates this point. After a long period of continuous smartphone usage I feel bored, overly addicted, and perhaps abused by the telecom industry. That is why once in a few months I subject myself to voluntary smartphone deprivation. I usually repent my decision in less than a week, as I miss certain functionality other than making plain phone calls and sending messages. However, appreciation by absence is relatively difficult to achieve, because it requires former presence. The prevalence of form over content in human valuation mechanisms implies an inherent difficulty in making pervasive computing and other “seamless” technologies acceptable by the general public. Inverting the prevalence of form over content is not only a philosophical challenge, but also a major issue in promoting and financing the aforementioned technologies.