digital futures of literature, theory, criticism, and the arts

materiality

Ebooks, Libraries, and Feelies

Countering the persistent popular notion that electronic literature is just reading the classics under glass, Daniel Punday advocates for greater innovation, and more authorial autonomy, at the level of book design. Insisting on "authors' rights to design the interface through which readers encounter their books," Punday argues that digital book publishing should strive to emulate the medial status of games, "which remain messy individuals."

Computers, Cut-ups, and Combinatory Volvelles

“With each project I find myself reimagining what cinema might be”: An Interview with Zoe Beloff

Jussi Parikka interviews artist Zoe Beloff about her relationship to the emerging set of interdisciplinary theories and methodologies known as media archaeology. In way of response, Beloff discusses some past works, including: Lost (1995), Shadow Land (2000), Claire and Don in Slumberland (2002), Charming Augustine (2005), The Somnambulists (2008), and The Dream Films (2009).

The Cybernetic Turn: Literary into Cultural Criticism

Joseph Tabbi reviews the essay collection Simulacrum America.

Printed Privileges

Carsten Schinko on Niklas Luhmann's Analogue Loyalty.

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However, on the other hand, the fact that readers depend on multiple interfaces for reading the same text points, I think, to the ways in which the reading interface is actually of utmost importance.

‐ Lori Emerson

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Of the three examples of library objects mentioned here, only functions really qualify. Commands and types of data objects are not part of the library of a programming language, they are constitutive of the language itself. (Except for commands like “read” and “write”, which do call procedures that belong to the library). As for functions, some are original to the program, others are part of the library.

‐ Marie-Laure Ryan

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While the distinction between accumulative and modular library became clear to me as I read the text, I think its characterization here is rather confusing. “Accumulative” is defined as “emphasizing the interdependence of component elements.” This suggest the idea of a system. But it becomes clear later that accumulative libraries are more like unstructured lists than like systems. As for modular libraries, they can be added to, so they do have an accumulative capability. It seems to me that the distinction boils down to encoding: in accumulative libraries objects are collected as they are; in modular libraries they are encoded in a uniform way. If this is the case, only digital libraries can be modular. But in a library of physical books the cataloging system creates an internal organization: does it mean that the library is modular?

‐ Marie-Laure Ryan

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What would the “general data file” contain? Would it be something like an ASCII file that contains just the words and that can be searched? What about texts with images: would they need two types of data files ? But since images cannot be searched, the image file would not be very useful.

‐ Marie-Laure Ryan

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I once had a few of my books in Softbook, the first (and now abandoned) e-reader. No reader has yet arrived that has completely satisfied my desire for the book experience. At the same time, as a designer of electronic literature, the ability to link, with sound, color and motion, would be a necessary part of the delivery. The forthcoming Apple iPad might be the platform to do for reading what iTunes did for music (and books on tape, for that matter). If the New York Times can format for it, and all user control (font size, for instance, or orientation), this could be the breakthrough. If not the iPad, then something very like it, I would guess.

‐ Rob Swigart