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Hmm. This is British and talks about a primarily British (that I can tell) service marrying itself to Facebook, but it has interesting implications should others decide to adopt the same thing. "'There's been a big barrier to sign-up, we wanted to remove that and make it a seamless experience,' [Daniel Ek, Spotify co-founder] said in one tweet, apparently indifferent to the criticism that Spotify had just erected a barrier where there wasn't one before." "'We want to remove barrier to sign-up and create a more seamless experience...' he confirmed in a follow-up." Yep, it'll be completely seamless for the advertisers who want to target Spotify users, they can get all sorts of other info on them besides just that they downloaded Rebecca Black's "Friday"...Zuckerberg must be laughing all the way to the bank.

Sad. Just very very sad

"Back in October, the startup tech firm Silent Circle ruffled governments' feathers with a "surveillance-proof" smartphone app to allow people to make secure phone calls and send texts easily. Now, the company is pushing things even further-with a groundbreaking encrypted data transfer app that will enable people to send files securely from a smartphone or tablet at the touch of a button. (For now, it's just being released for iPhones and iPads, though Android versions should come soon.) That means photographs, videos, spreadsheets, you name it-sent scrambled from one person to another in a matter of seconds." In an age where we can pretty much assume we're being monitored 24/7, is this a good thing? Or is this another tool for some really terrible people to do some really terrible things, but now with an added layer of privacy?

Uproar over $18 price for the new Rowling book.  E-books just don't get no respect.

It's all just a little bit of history repeating...some of these quotes sounds awfully familiar these days WRT lamenting how no one writes or reads paper anymore because of the frenetic pace of life.

Many new releases have design elements usually reserved for special occasions - deckle edges, colored endpapers, high-quality paper and exquisite jackets that push the creative boundaries of bookmaking. If e-books are about ease and expedience, the publishers reason, then print books need to be about physical beauty and the pleasures of owning, not just reading.

Crowdfunded ebook operation that is just releasing it's first "unglued" edition, that is, not proprietary to any device and free to all who want to download it.  What's cool about Unglue.it is that they're attempting to raise money for specific publishing projects to compensate authors, and get their work out to anyone who can download it.  It's early and success is not guaranteed, but it's a cool idea!

Though e-books are rising in popularity, print remains the foundation of Americans' reading habits. Most people who read e-books also read print books, and just 4% of readers are "e-book only." Audiobook listeners have the most diverse reading habits overall, while fewer print readers consume books in other formats.

The conditions in digital media, essential to just about any future growth for newspapers, are getting worse for papers.

Greedy publishers?

The creation EPUB books just got a lot easier.

Another example of how DRM and ebooks are broken...

Just when people were starting to figure out Web 2.0, here comes Web 3.0!

Just thought I'd post this article since we were talking about it in class last night.

Of course we talked about this in class, but what I find more interesting than Oprah's endorsement is all the comments at the end of the article. Several posters don't even acknowledge Oprah's new-found interest, but are just extolling Kindle's virtues. My guess is that, until the Kindle's price is a little lower, those folks who just like to get what Oprah has might not go for it. But the more "techie" folks might get one -- or already have one -- regardless of what Oprah thinks.

"Why does anyone own a Kindle?" luddites often ask. As early adopters drool in anticipation of Kindle 2's launch on Feb. 24, Technotica asks a literature-loving Kindle owner just that.