I personally think that crowdsourcing is overblown; it’s the latest trick pony, and I’m not convinced it’ll solve nearly as many problems as the research (and technical) community occasionally seems to think it will (particularly when the economy picks up again and we don’t have as many un- or under-employed people). But there are so cases where crowdsourcing seems like a clear opportunity to add value with minimal additional cost.
A case in point: why on earth don’t e-book publishers work with Amazon, Google, and Apple (and other e-book reader providers) to enable crowd-sourced identification of typos in e-books? You’ve got a large (and growing) audience already engaged in reading the books, and they’re finding the typos anyway. I’m pretty sure that if you made it easy for people to flag typos while reading that they’d gladly do it (provided the publishers then fixed the identified typos and provided the improved versions to people who’d purchased the books). You could get tons of data very cheaply, and actual typos and reader mistakes (reports of non-typos) should be clearly distinguishable by the volume of reports.
In fact, I can only think of two reasons this hasn’t already been done. One, no one’s thought of it yet. Which I doubt. But even if they have, here’s the idea! Now please, pick it up and use it! Two, publishers aren’t sufficiently interested in providing quality e-books. Which frankly I could see; in some cases it seems like they can’t even be bothered to spell check the e-books they produce (which should be trivial). I wonder if one of the reader providers could then fill the gap themselves, or whether they’d be risking copyright infringement for providing modified copies of published (but flawed) works. Probably.
Anybody got contacts in either the publishing or e-book reader/store worlds that can provide insight into why we don’t already have such functionality?
I’d been thinking about writing a blog post discussing how I really like applications like Instapaper and Reeder that leverage technologies like Readability to provide clean, restful, quiet reading interfaces to content drawn from the web. You get all the content, none of the annoying ads that frequently surround it, in an interface optimized to the device you’re reading on. I actually prefer reading a lot of sites through Reeder now rather than visiting the actual sites because the actual sites are starting to actively make it hard to read.
But then Brent Simmons made the point for me with posts on The Pummeling Pages and The Readable Future (Rian van der Merwe makes a similar point with nice example images in his post Please let this not be the future of reading on the web). Allowing me to say: yeah, what they said!
I can’t resist taking on one last point, though. Silicon Valley currently seems to be in love with making money on applications and services through advertising. That isn’t exactly a new observation:
“The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads,” he says. “That sucks.” (Bloomberg BusinessWeek)
But the growth of embedded functionality in popular applications to strip out ads and other noise suggests that we’re starting to cross a threshold for what users find acceptable. If so, the question is whether we’ll see an arms race between those trying to use and those trying to block advertising or innovation from content providers exploring new revenue models. I’m hoping for the latter, but I’m not exactly holding my breath.
I’m still enjoying the Kindle Fire after almost 2 weeks with it. I’ve still really only used it for reading; I don’t watch nearly as many videos (TV or movies) as I used to. And while I’ve set up Amazon’s Cloud Player and downloaded a few songs onto the Fire, I haven’t really used it to listen to music much yet either. But I have gone through three books on it, and both the reading experience and the easy access to Amazon’s Kindle store is quite nice.
However, the Fire does definitely still have some rough edges. Some are software-related, and could easily be fixed in the next software update. For example, notifications don’t seem to work reliably. I’ll see email notifications flash up at the top of the screen, but they won’t remain as persistent notifications to allow me to see the details of what messages the Fire actually downloaded. But it’s inconsistent; sometimes (although it’s the less common case) the notifications will actually remain.
As another example, the Fire apparently does not want to mute. If I tap on the sound icon in the settings it appears to deselect, which I would assume would mute the Fire. However, pulling open the settings again shows sound once again selected. It’s a rough edge but not a showstopper; you can still just turn the sound all the way down. Still, hopefully the next update will fix it.
Software updates won’t help, of course, with hardware rough edges. I haven’t had the lack of volume buttons bother me (possibly because I don’t listen to music or video much), but I frankly don’t understand why Amazon stuck the power button on the bottom of the device. It’s too easy to accidentally brush it with the grip I use while reading. I’ve taken to holding the Fire upside down; since the display reorients and the power button is then at the top and out of the way. I’m frankly not sure why Amazon didn’t make that orientation the default; arguably it would also make sense to have the speakers toward the user at the bottom rather than away from the user at the top (the speakers are on the opposite side from the power button). Again, not a huge deal. And it might actually be possible for a software update to also change the default display orientation, in which case the next software update could also address this issue.
So overall I’m still happy with the Kindle Fire, but I’m hoping that the next software update addresses some of the rough edges.
I’ve now had my Kindle Fire that I ordered back in September for 2 full days now. And while I’ll confess that I haven’t had tons of time to play with it (I’m finishing a library book before shifting over to read a full book on it), I’ve now played with it enough to form a few initial opinions.
First, I think the Kindle Fire is a subtly different type of tablet than the iPad or current Android tablets. Those tablets are designed first and foremost to run applications, some of which happen to allow you to access content. You can buy content from those devices as well, but the buying experience isn’t tightly integrated with the experience of reading / watching / listening to the content, so it feels slightly awkward. I would say the Kindle Fire, by contrast, is first and foremost a content device that also happens to run some applications. You can see this from the high-level structure of the experience: it’s around moving between content types (Books, Video, Newsstand), and Apps are just another type of content. I think that’s going to make a big difference in how people use the Kindle Fire vs. other tablets as well as the types of people that are attracted to it. Personally I’m happy with the emphasis, since I primarily got it to read books and to watch movies when traveling (when I’d sometimes prefer something a bit lighter than my iPad to tote around when I’m already carrying my laptop).
Second, the Kindle Fire makes it very easy to purchase additional content. Of course, that has upsides and downsides. On the upside, it’s easy to purchase content. On the downside, it’s easy to purchase content. I have to see the tight integration to Amazon’s stores (Kindle books, Amazon MP3 / Cloud Player, Amazon Instant Video, Amazon App Marketplace) as a big win for Amazon’s ecosystem: I suspect people will be buying content early and often. I can also see the Kindle Fire driving Amazon Prime memberships, since you get free streaming videos with your membership (in addition to all the other usual benefits).
Third, the Kindle Fire actually does a better job of other tablets of making it easy to determine what content you have available on the device and what data you have in Amazon’s cloud (and to move content on and off the device). Apple’s iCloud integration and Google’s cloud integration aren’t nearly so smooth.
Fourth, I have to confess that I find Amazon’s choices around the physical buttons for the Kindle Fire a little strange. There aren’t any physical volume up or down buttons; you need to access the Volume settings in the interface to change the volume. That’s a little awkward. The one physical button the Fire has is the power button, which is slightly awkwardly placed: it’s on the bottom, so I have a slight tendency to brush it when holding the Fire to read (I tend to brace my pinky along the bottom to avoid the need to squeeze the frame particularly hard to avoid the tablet slipping). Of course, since tablet’s don’t actually have a canonical up direction I could just rotate the tablet 180 degrees… (but then the “Kindle on the back would be upside down!)
Last, I’m still not sure about the design of the default home screen. The carousel is fun to zip through, but because it includes everything you do sorted from most recent to oldest, I tend to have things showing up in the carousel (web pages, songs, apps) that I’m not likely to want to access through the carousel again. My opinion might change as I shift from exploration to more focused use, but so far I’m not really feeling it.
I’ll note that these are impressions after just a couple of days of use. Further opinions will no doubt follow with further use.
Dear mobile web zealots advocates:
I feel like we need to talk. I know that you mean well, but lately you’ve rather been driving me around the bend. But luckily with a few small changes on your part I’m sure we can all get along. Specifically:
- Please stop saying that the mobile web will catch up to native applications Real Soon NowTM. You’re assuming that native applications are going to stay where they are, and, let’s face it, that’s just not happening. Last I checked Apple and Google are going all-out adding new functionality for native apps to leverage. Yes, mobile web apps will get access to new functionality over time. But “mobile web apps will improve” != “mobile web apps will catch up to native”.
- Please stop claiming that mobile web applications provide user experiences as good as native apps. Yes, mobile web applications can provide good user experiences. Google’s Gmail mobile web app isn’t half-bad, and I rather like what Amazon did with their Kindle Cloud Reader. But as good as native? Ummm, not really. If your goals are to provide a good-enough user experience while leveraging existing developer skills and minimizing cross-platform developments costs that’s totally cool; that’s an understandable goal. But please don’t pretend your mobile web app will provide an equivalent (or better) user experience to a native app.
- On a related note, please stop pretending that “looks like” is equivalent to “feels like”. Yes, it’s great that with CSS styling you can make a mobile web app look like a native app. But just because your slide deck of captured, still images looks like a native app does not mean that it will feel like a native app. Native apps are fluid and responsive and minimize latency. Mobile web apps? Yeah, not so much.
If you’ll make those small, simple changes to your behavior I’m sure we can all get along. After all, mobile web apps do bring a number of advantages to the table. If you’ll just focus on highlighting them instead of pretending to equivalence (or near-term equivalence) to native apps I think we’ll all be happier.
Thanks!
Bret Victor’s fun rant about the future of interaction design has been making it’s way around Twitter, Google+, email, and other communication tools. While the rant is quite enjoyable, I have to confess that I find that the glee some people seem to take in forwarding it a little strange. Particularly since they all seem to pull out this quote:
Are we really going to accept an Interface Of The Future that is less expressive than a sandwich?
Oooh, snap! Take that Pictures Under Glass! You’ve been served, smartphones and tablets! You’re thoroughly mediocre devices! Never mind the millions sold and billions earned!
Bret’s point, that we shouldn’t limit our visions of the future to what we have now, is entirely valid. And yes, we should absolutely consider the capabilities of humans when designing future interfaces. But there are problems with some of the interfaces that Bret poses as alternatives. That hammer? Great at hammering stuff. Need to cut something in two? Ummm…
A key issue is whether a device (or tool) is specific to a particular task or general-purpose. Tablets and smartphones (and desktop and laptop PCs) are general-purpose devices: they’re good at a very large variety of tasks, but not necessarily great at any of them. Many research projects on tangible interaction (one of the alternate research streams Bret points to) may be better for a specific task (or a small set of tasks), but they’re usually worse than the general-purpose devices for anything else.
In the end whether general-purpose or special-purpose devices succeed depends a lot on the economics involved. Sometimes special-purpose devices succeed over general-purpose devices because they’re so much better at the task than general-purpose devices and because people really want to perform the relevant tasks. So cameras, media players, and e-book readers all succeeded as special-purpose hardware devices with non-Pictures Under Glass interfaces. But sometimes the general-purpose devices catch up: look at what’s happened with Apple’s iPods now that the iPhone is in the picture. And I suspect that sales of low-to-medium-end cameras are nose-diving as smartphones increasingly offer better integrated cameras.
So yes, we should consider a broad spectrum of possible technology futures and not focus just on Pictures Under Glass. But be careful about knocking Pictures Under Glass just because they only support a subset of possible interactions.
Oh, and I should note that I’m not terribly impressed by Microsoft’s “Productivity Future Vision” video either. But for a different reason: I don’t think they thought through whether the interactions they show would actually work in practice.
And a further note: I’m actually a big fan of Bret’s work. Some of his Kill Math projects are super awesome. I particularly like his recent essay Up and Down the Ladder of Abstraction. I wish conference papers were as interactive and compelling!
The conference committee for UIST 2011 decided to once again offer the proceedings on USB flash drives instead of providing a printed proceedings. Because, y’know, print is dead. One minor oversight: people are starting to move on from USB drives as they move to tablets. We had multiple people ask for a way to access the proceedings from their iPads (since ACM had not yet posted the papers in the Digital Library.
While a simple solution to allowing tablet users to read the conference papers would be to make them available on a local download site (a solution adopted by MobileHCI 2011 this year), thinking about the shift from reading papers on laptops to reading them on tablets got me thinking. Conferences (and journals) overwhelming rely on PDF. While PDF is a standard format these days, it’s a static format designed primarily for printing. In an age of dynamic publishing on the web, preparing “camera ready” PDF files is starting to look like a bit of an anachronism.
We could instead allow authors to submit “papers” as HTML5/CSS3 sites, but that might be a little too bleeding edge. But what about allowing authors to submit their research “papers” in e-book formats? Both EPUB 3 and Amazon’s new Kindle 8 Format are incorporating HTML5 and CSS3 elements, which means that researchers could create publications that support rich content and interaction. And they’d work great on tablets. We could still support “classic” PDF formatting for legacy purposes, but EPUB and K8F would allow explorations into new ways to share research.
Of course, we’d need a guinea pig conference willing to test the waters. Surely there’s an existing conference on digital publishing that would be willing to explore new systems for academic digital publishing. Anyone have pointers?
I chaired UIST 2011 this week. A fair bit of work, a fair bit of stress. Thankfully everything went pretty smoothly and many folks expressed that they’d had a great time. To reward myself I’d arranged to take Amtrak’s Coast Starlight back from Santa Barbara to San Jose rather than flying. While significantly slower (roughly 7.5 hours instead of 2), after a busy week I was looking forward to the more leisurely pace. Plus the Coast Starlight is reputed to pass through extremely pretty countryside.
After my ride yesterday, I have to say that it was hands down the best train ride I’ve ever been on (although the ride from Zurich to Montreux in Switzerland might be a close second). The ride was just so much more relaxed and civilized than plane travel these days. Instead of a long wait and hassle at airport security, people just sat around the train station and ambled onto the platform when the train arrived. The conductors assigned seats on the fly, and folks boarding were extremely polite as they found their seats and stowed their luggage.
And then we were off. After noisy (due to both the engines and the passengers) flights, the train ride (both the train and the passengers) were surprisingly quiet. I think everyone was absorbed in watching the scenery, reading books, or watching movies.
Shall we start with the scenery? For the first hour and a half or so out of Santa Barbara the train hugged the coast. There were beautiful views of both the ocean on the left and rolling hills and mountains on the right.
Once we headed away from the coast, we got into golden grasslands and mountains.
After San Luis Obispo and Pasa Robles, we headed into the Salinas Valley (the “salad bowl of America”), where farm after farm filled the valley. It was at the start of the valley that I discovered the Lounge car, which I really wish I had found earlier. Floor to ceiling windows on both sides, with seats facing the windows to make it even easier to enjoy the views. I spent the rest of the ride in that car until the sun set, at which point I headed back to my seat.
And shall we talk about the seats? Leg room. Lots of it. And plugs for power right at your seat. Plenty of overhead luggage space. So much better than being crammed into a cramped airplane seat and having the person in front of you recline into your lap.
And the Lounge car also had a cafe on the lower level where you could buy snacks and drinks. And the Dining car served real food and took dinner reservations. And the price of this nearly 8 hour excursion through the picturesque California countryside? I paid $42 for my reserved coach seat, roughly 15% of what a plane ticket would have cost me. And the ride was much more leisurely and pleasant. It was downright civilized.
I realized that in our society we prize speed and efficiency. But after my train ride back from Santa Barbara I wonder whether those benefits are really worth what we give up in exchange. Sometimes I’m sure they are. But I personally am looking forward to another opportunity to ride the Coast Starlight.
I pre-ordered Amazon’s new Kindle Fire today. While I have no intention of ditching my iPad (I expect it’ll continue to see the same level of use it does today, or perhaps more as my team at work explores business applications of tablets), after playing with a Samsung Galaxy Tab from work for months I’m convinced that 7-inch form factor tablets do fill a niche.
The biggest advantage of 7-inch tablets is that you can comfortably hold them in one hand. While you can sit down and read on an iPad (or 10-inch Android tablet), they’re big and heavy enough that you really need to either use two hands or rest them on your lap. I personally find the iPad too big to comfortably read books. The 7-inch tablet, by contrast, is just about right (I find 4-inch smartphones too small for reading comfortably.
While I have a first generation Kindle that I still use for reading (and I do really like the e-ink display and battery that lasts and lasts), using a 7-inch tablet for reading has a big advantage: it has its own light source. I often read in bed next to my wife, who falls asleep before I do. With I use my Kindle I need to use a reading light, which even though it’s better than a bedside lamp still lights up the room a bit. A 7-inch tablet, by contrast, is easy to read in the dark but (with the brightness turned down) puts out little extraneous light.
I’d been keeping my eye on 7-inch tablets for awhile, intending to eventually pick up one for my own personal. While I like the original Galaxy Tab’s form factor, it’s underpowered and expensive. I’d been keeping my eye on Samsung’s announced Galaxy Tab 7.7 because it’s supposed to run Android 3.2 and from the specs looks like it’ll be more capable, but it’s unclear when it’ll ship or how much it’ll cost.
And then Amazon announced the Kindle Fire. While the early adopter in me would prefer something running a more current version of Android, at the end of the day I’m more interested in a good media consumption experience than pushing the boundaries on Android (I’ll still have my iPad for more cutting edge tablet experiences). I want to be able to read books (all my Kindle books will carry over seamlessly). Watch movies while traveling (I’ve occasionally wished I could bring the Galaxy Tab instead of my iPad when traveling for work, but I like to rent movies when traveling. Problematic with regular Android, easy with the Kindle Fire). And listen to music. Check, check, and check.
The price tag obviously helped too. At $199, I spent more on my first generation Kindle than the I will on the Kindle Fire. Even when the Galaxy Tab 7.7 ships, I don’t expect it’ll be anywhere near the Kindle price point. I admit I hesitated slightly at the 8 GB storage limit (I regularly fill up my iPad when traveling), but since Amazon is backing the Kindle Fire with their cloud storage it may work ok; time will tell.
So I placed my order, and I’m looking forward to playing with it. Too bad I have to wait almost two months. Although if by some miracle Apple announces a 7-inch iPad at their event next week all bets are off and I’ll likely be cancelling that order right quick…
I’m curious how libraries decide how many copies to buy of a particular book. While I presume for standalone books they estimate based on buzz, reviews, and an author’s track record, I’m particularly curious how they decide for the volumes in a series.
Case in point: I’m currently in the midst of a six book series. The library has two copies of each of the first three volumes, but only one copy of each of the last three books. So I got sucked into the series with the easy availability of the first three, but upon finishing them and checking on the fourth I discovered that there’s a backlog: three holds on the fourth book, and two holds on the fifth (I didn’t even check the sixth).
A cynical interpretation of this phenomenon would posit that it’s a way to drive readers to pay authors, since if you’re midway into a series and don’t want to wait and see what happens next you’re more likely to buy a copy than wait for one at the library. Sure enough, rather than wait I bought and immediately downloaded the Kindle version of the fourth book and resumed reading. I should note that if this is a partial explanation for the fewer copies of books later in series, I actually don’t mind. I often try out new series by reading the first book or two from the library, and then buy later volumes because I feel like I should be paying the author to reward them for their work.
I suspect that the real reason for more copies of books earlier in a series and fewer copies for later books, however, is simply that fewer people finish a series than start it. Given attrition of readers for any given series, at a certain point the library probably just needs fewer copies.
If that’s true, an interesting follow-up question would be whether that’s a planned behavior (e.g., whether libraries expect to have to purchase fewer copies of books later in a series), or whether it’s an emergent behavior (e.g., they buy based on demand, starting out with one copy of each book and only adding more if sufficient demand arises).
So those are the questions. Anybody got data (or a dataset suitable for analysis)?
jeff pierce 