Saturday, July 11, 2009

The Printed Media Revolution

Something's going on in the world of publishing and reading the written word. Maybe not nearly as big as the printing press at the beginning, but a revolution's brewing never less.

For example, check out the discussion about the Amazon Kindle on C|Net's site, and you'll come away with the feeling of a pending "change in the wind".

I believe the shift to digital publication and reading has the potential to turn the whole concept of printed media on its ear. But the jury's still out on how it will unfold, and the price tag is too high to make paper "yesterday".

What strikes me about the overall discussion are the novel ideas voiced by the end users. Being able to scan a UPC or ISBN from your own library for access on a digital reader, or checking out books from a library website for immediate download, or searching your entire on-board library, etc. Now those are really interesting ideas *:-)