Chris Meade gave us a talk about his move to the Institute for the Future of the Book (IF Book) and the different psychological reactions of different groups within the industry towards the whole idea of digital fiction – readers, publishers, writers, creators.  He introduced us to the type of background of Bob Stein has been involved in, his meeting with Stein which lead to his new job within IF Book, his move from the very traditional book world and the types of project the Institute is involved in – including Sophie and Comment Press. 

 

Chris gave us a brief background of the evolution of the technologies of publishing, including the introduction of paperbacks, which we heard about last year during campus week.  He also talked about the serendipity and physical space of a library – particularly how this can be retained as libraries can be increasingly stored digitally.  He was in New York last week to discuss these issues, so his description of this event and the ideas that were involved were very interesting.

 

Chris now has the challenge of working for IF Book in the UK, including considering how to monetize digital fiction and conducting experiments in publishing.  The background of the Institute seems to be more academic, so he is bringing a more fiction-orientated approach to this, based on his own work and experience on the MA.  Monetizing our work is a major issue to us as digital writers so ideas about how to achieve produced quite a lot of discussion.  The various commercial models for doing this – with reference to the music industry and Radiohead’s recent ploy, which Janine was able to give interesting insight from her experiences in that industry.  My own dissertation idea about linking a creative piece into a real world commercial project is one example of how this could be achieved – using the online writing as a loss leader in a project that makes its profit in other ways.

 

The issue that technological developments are viewed as “the death of the book” and that there is some how an either/or result to this process is one that we agreed was simply not the case – and that the development will not be just focused on the physical device people use (such as an e-reader).  Actually there are already examples of paperbacks and the internet being used in partnership – either on a marketing or creative level. 

 

Chris showed us a visual piece created by an artist – Orson Whales – who painted on the pages of Moby Dick to create like a flick-book animation with sound, which was another way of reusing the traditional technology of the book in digital way.  This reminded me a lot of Mark Leahy’s work that he discussed yesterday.  This is the type of work that Chris is exploring as part of his work for IF Book.