Ebooks with soundtracks...you knew it was coming.

[Nancy Fulda]

Originally Posted by emellaich

Can't figure out how this works -- eye tracking?-- but according to one reporter it adjusts to your reading speed. It is usually within a few lines of where you are reading. And in the example they gave it included sound effects (a door slam) as well as music.

http://www.businessinsider.com/booktracks-2011-8

Yup, eye tracking software is getting pretty good. I wouldn't be surprised if within a few years, they could trigger a music change with impressive precision.

I don't imagine that I would like it very much, though (with the exception of the Mercedes Lackey example). I tend to hyperfocus, and music distracts me when reading.

[bibahbuzemann]

Originally Posted by kjk

eye-tracking!!

No need! The social networking(YOUR brain bit by bit picking/) reading functions are up and running already!

People have actually been using them. Turns out their publishers have known for quite a while now exactly what, when and at which speed they're reading.

Look at the Kobo forum and see how they love those intrusive s/n "features".

It's actually pretty hilarious, because it's like: OOOOOh please! I want all my "friends" to KNOW when I've won the 'Mark Twain Reading Book Award'

That's something you get from Kobo for reading(having the device display every page of) a whole book, or something.

I don't know, never had a Kobo. Not for a want of trying to get one here, but they're just stringing me along with their promises to finally implement a searching function into their reader and to, ehm, even make it available in Europe.

Man, but did they make one mistake with that new Kobo. They neglected the audio jack! Just imagine all the books they could have sold to millions of people just by sending them sound clips.

THIS IS WHAT YOUR "FRIEND" HEARD WHEN SHE REACHED THE CLIMAX OF CHAPTER 4 IN THE BOOK "X".
Special final facebook offer, ends tonight: just $14,99, only for friends.

[emellaich]

But for most of my reading, I really don't want anything but the words. Maybe a foot massager, but nobody's offering a combination ereader/foot massager yet.

File a patent!

I wonder what that would do to battery life? I guess you could reverse it and shake your feet like crazy when your battery is dying.

[Asawi]

The only timse I would appreciate included sound would be for example if a ceratin piece of music is mentioned a lot in the book I might want to hear it. But it would have to be user triggered.

[Lizzie in Ma]

Originally Posted by 6charlong

There were two versions of the PBS series The Civil War on Barnes and Noble, one was plain text and the second was enhanced. The enhanced one only works on the Nook Color which is an Android tablet. It cost $2 more.

I thought it was useful and interesting to hear the Civil War era music, hear the voices of authorities like Shelby Foote and watch short video clips but for me, the new enhancement came to life with the maps. General Sherman once said that war was all about troop movements. The animated battle maps made those movements clear like no text-only book I've ever seen.

I'd love to see this technique used to explain important moments in military history from Hannibal to Napoleon. I've never been able to follow naval warfare but with animated maps to show how the fleets and individual ships moved relative to each other, perhaps I can grasp what happened. The movement of the lines of forces coming up and turning into little dots for individual units as they redeploy caught my eye. The text described who was moving and which day it happened.

It's probably worth noting that it took a color 7-inch Android tablet running ePub to pull this off.

I don't know how I feel about a soundtrack in a book, rarely do I listen to music while I read. There are, however, valid and extremely helpful areas in which to have the enhanced content and you just gave a perfect example. I read a large amount of history and things like animated maps would be hugely welcome. Of course, then I would need something other than my K3 to read them, but I don't hate the idea of that either.

[Vic333]

The Residents did something like this on their album Eskimo. The music itself was constructed as a soundtrack for short stories contained in the liner notes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eskimo_(album)