Alice for the iPad

[ggareau]

This type of thing isn't going away but it's not going to kill books as a media form. If it were, text-based graphic novels (See: Stardust) would have won out by now. For the most part if people want to read they'll read.

But sometimes people don't want to read. Some of the arguments on here for interactivity in detective novels are, in my opinion, missing the point. Heavy Rain (PS3) is actually a perfect example of that sort of thing - a choose your own adventure book dressed up as a game. There's a market for it, but it's tough to argue that it's a book. Yes, you could have the crime scene explorable without actual interactivity but why?

In On Writing Stephen King talks about what the medium is, exactly. It's not intended to be a fixed story. If you want a fixed story with visuals associated with everything watch a movie. The point of a novel is that it's created by both the reader and the writer -- it's two-way. The author's job is to give you just enough information so that the reader is able to create the image in their heads. That way each person will be reading a unique novel, one personal to them and fluid based on that person's thoughts and ideas at the time of reading. A re-read therefore should be reading a new book that just happens to have all of the same words.

Now that's all specifically tied to fiction, and there's definitely an argument to be made for interactivity in nonfiction books. Most nonfiction books would be greatly aided by such a format. But will it kill the existing novel? There's no way. Some stories work better in the imagination (and on the written page) and some work better on screen. Some work best as an amalgam of the two (Comics/Graphic Novels), and some work best as poetry.

All the iPad does, all any computer can do, is create a new medium between comics and movies (See: Broken Saints) and add animation to children's books. Is it a game changer in nonfiction? Definitely. In fiction? No. Not at all.

[ChrisC333]

Originally Posted by dmaul1114

Yeah, this is the digital version of say pop-up children's books. So I don't see why it's a threat to book publishing, or why anyone would expect it to happen with "adult" books.

But then again this is Mobileread, and people here have to make everything into some controversy to argue over.

+1


During my lifetime books have been killed off by:

Radio - who wanted to be bothered reading once you could just sit and listen?
Movies - they killed reading even quicker.
TV - clearly nobody would need another book once the box came along.
Computers -I think we all know how Bill Gates killed books almost single handed.
Video Games - it's well known that nobody under 40 has read anything since they arrived.
Audio books - why bother turning page when somebody can do it for you.

Books have been dead for so long now - and killed so many times too - that so called booksellers now get prosecuted for necrophilia. Don't they?

[rakulos]

Originally Posted by ggareau

This type of thing isn't going away but it's not going to kill books as a media form. If it were, text-based graphic novels (See: Stardust) would have won out by now. For the most part if people want to read they'll read.

Aaargh - I'm now wishing for a Stardust version like the Alice app - curse you!

Any developers out there, please get this done post haste

[scottjl]

Originally Posted by dadioflex

You're quite correct. An author should write, proof, edit, design the cover and own his own printing presses as well. Investing six months to a year of your life in writing the book isn't enough, they should spend another two years working alone to code and animate all the interactive features for the e-book.

I highly doubt the people who threw together Alice spent 2 years doing the coding. You probably have never taken any time to do any sort of development but there are wonderful tools out there that will automate all sorts of animation and code development for you. Heck, PowerPoint can do some snazzy transitions if nothing else. As for writing and proofing and publishing your own work, isn't that what web sites like SmashWords are doing already?

So, someone can spend a few months writing and editing their own book, throw it into something as simple as PowerPoint with stock clip art and snazzy transitions and sell it themselves on a web site like SmashWords. Didn't take much know-how or a large corporation to accomplish that.

Is it the best way to go about putting together an interactive work? No, probably not. But some well known bands started out in a garage. And, think of the new market opportunity for someone to develop an authoring system for writers that helps them assemble some sort of animated/interactive works. Maybe Adobe should get on this one.

Don't knock it until you've tried it, it's not as hard as it looks...

[ChrisC333]

Originally Posted by scottjl

I highly doubt the people who threw together Alice spent 2 years doing the coding. You probably have never taken any time to do any sort of development but there are wonderful tools out there that will automate all sorts of animation and code development for you.

Absolutely. And such powerful tools aren't new either. I put together a couple of interactive computer books for teaching purposes using a program called Opus. I was able to scan the artwork in for the pages, add lines of multiple choice text that would trigger a range of animated responses depending on which was selected, add sound effects to clickable hotspots, include sound files that provided a voice reading of the story text, and so on. It then compiled it all into a standalone file that could be run independently.

The only training I did was reading the manual. That was over five years ago, so goodness knows what you can do now.

Cheers,

Chris

[dmaul1114]

Originally Posted by dadioflex

You're quite correct. An author should write, proof, edit, design the cover and own his own printing presses as well. Investing six months to a year of your life in writing the book isn't enough, they should spend another two years working alone to code and animate all the interactive features for the e-book.

I never said it was a bad thing for the big companies that pay a team of people to do this - and note they're doing this to a public domain book so they don't even need to employ a writer, and there are a LOT of PD books out there - nor is it a bad thing for people who want to spend money on it, I said it was a bad thing for writers.

Suggesting that a writer, who wants to write, simply acquires, somehow, the skills to produce multimedia content, isn't realistic. Frankly, anyone with that kind of skill set would be working in games or animation, not writing.

Still, great idea. I'm sure Tom Wolfe will be all over it.

That's all silly.

Authors generally get a royalty that's a certain percent of each book sold. An interactive book like this would generally sell for more than the plain text version. So even though other's did the multimedia work, the author would get more out of each copy sold since they're getting the same percentage of a higher list price for the interactive book.

The people who do the multimedia stuff probably don't get royalties, the companies probably just pay them for hours of work, or a flat rate to create the content for them.

That all depends on the author having a decent contract etc. of course, but there's no reason authors have to get screwed by interactive books. They'll still get their royalty at the least, and it will probably be a bit more than for a sold copy of the print version as the interactive book should sell for a higher price most of the time.

[sfernald]

Originally Posted by scottjl

Well I purchased Alice today and I'm quite impressed, the developer put some time and effort into the book, not just the extras. I have read the original story, and seen many movie and TV adaptations (my imagination was never harmed to my knowledge).

Looking at just the "book" alone, it's the complete story of "Alice in Wonderland" and does not include "Through the Looking Glass." It is beautifully illustrated using what I would describe as antique style watercolor drawings on parchment paper. It is not your typical eBook in the sense that you can not alter font size, spacing, or colors. Sorry. But the dark black font is large and easy enough to read against the parchment color behind most of it (some words may fall on some of the drawings, but those drawings are lightened to make the text easier to read). A few pages use a different color scheme, but they are the exception, such as white text on a black background, again, very easy to read. Black and white, or color drawings appear on most pages and illustrate what is happening in the text. There are a few pages that have no text and are just a scene from the book, with some sort of animation. Pages do not rotate when you turn the page, the book is meant to be read in portrait mode, home button on the bottom. At the bottom of the page is a forward arrow, a backward arrow and a Cheshire Cat's head which calls up the table of contents. You can not swipe these pages to turn them and there is no curl animation, the pages slide to the next or previous page. There is a slick spinning graphic if you select a page to jump through through the ToC.

I would describe this as a "digital age pop-up book" as the interactions are very limited, there are no games, video, web pages, etc. Many are simply objects that fall down the page when it is turned to, turning the iPad results in the objects falling to the new "floor". If there is more than one object they will stack up on top of each other. Care was taken so that they do not obscure the text.

There are very limited sound effects, the only one I found was a horn when opening the ToC. This is my only complaint, the beautiful book is strangely silent. A few more sound effects would have been a nice touch. Ruffling of cards, a squak from a flamingo, the dutchess sneezing, anything really.

Is it worth the $9? Well. Maybe more like $4.99 in my opinion. It has limited replay value, and the story itself is available for free. It is only some 52 pages, including the few that are nothing but a graphic. It's not as much of a kid story as the free Toy Story book, which younger children might play with over and over. Most people will read and work through this once, maybe twice, then use it to show off to friends. I can't see anyone reading this nightly to themselves.

It is a very good example of a book that is great to look at, has a good story, and some good interaction for the user without a game. If it were a printed book it still would be a good book to look at and read, the artwork really is very well done. I look forward to seeing what else the developers come up with. Some "easter eggs" might have been interesting too, to see what people can find hidden in the book.

On a scale of 1-5, I'll give this a 3.5. A good story to illustrate in this manner, beautifully done, but with limited replay value (as pretty much any book is going to be) and maybe a few bucks more than what I would have thought for it.

I got this, and I think it's pretty lame. Not a good example of an interactive book at all I think.

The "interactive" aspect of this books consists of having (every third page or so) a random object under the influence of gravity dropping down. All you do is spin the ipad around and the object tumbles about. Worse, in some cases, such as when the rose petals fall, the framerate slows to a crawl, making it an annoyance more than anything.

And as you said, of course it needs sound, and much more interesting interactions, maybe puzzles, animations, etc.

I like the idea of it, but I give it about a 3/10 in execution and I don't recommend it to anyone.

[scottjl]

[deleted post]

[JWLaRue]

I'm guessing that if you have viewed that video (ad?), then you have seen all the good parts...just like a lot of the ads for movies.

-Jeff

[Goshzilla]

I don't see the utility in this as a vital educational tool. The danger with trying to use video demonstrations is the same as analogies, that is it can put students into a form of tunnel vision where they fail to abstract concepts. The risk is that students will latch onto simple demonstrations of said concepts that are in themselves flawed in a general setting.

Example: Try demonstrating to a student what dividing a number by two means in a visual realm. A lot of teachers will use the apple example, where given an apple, dividing something by two would be like chopping an apple in half. That analogy fails in the general realm because it's not applicable to dividing by fractions.

Also, I find sound, and video a distraction from reading. If you are supposed to be reading a math book that talks about certain concepts, having a clickable video on the page will mean more often than not, that the student is going to be paying more attention to the video examples than what is being said in the text. Because we are most likely dealing with byte size limits, videos and audio portions are going to fall short of what text can say.

Not only that, but many novels are either not transformable to an animated story board, or will suffer from having a poorly adapted storyboard. Les Miserables has been adapted to stage, movie, and musical many times and none of them will be as complete as it's original text. To suggest that the unabridged Les Miserables is unnecessary to read and that an adapted storybook is a suitable replacement, is the basic equivalent to vandalism.

[scottjl]

like any tool, it may only be applicable to certain tasks. there may be little use for an a/v component to a math book, but what about history? sciences? art? any sort of vocational training? students being able to watch a re-enactment of a battle can get a visual understanding of what a war is like, not just try text. science books showing experiments that are too dangerous or costly for students to actually perform in the classroom. an art book with a rotatable 3d image of a sculpture, or a/v history of a piece of artwork safely tucked away in a museum in another country. any vocational class could benefit from a video of a task actually being performed so that a student can review it easily as many times as they want learning proper technique and safety before turning on the arc wielder/router/chainsaw. how about a medical student who gets to read about a procedure as well as see an a/v clip of it right on the page.

ok. so interactive books aren't for you. don't discount them from someone else though. i am fortunate to be the type of person who can sit down with a text book, read it cover to cover, and learn what it has to teach. i have a few peers who envy me of that "ability" because they were more the "hands on" type and need to go through something to learn it. to each his own.

[ChrisC333]

Originally Posted by Goshzilla

I don't see the utility in this as a vital educational tool.

The merit lies not in the tool itself but how it's used.

That fact that you could build something poorly with it doesn't take away from the fact that in the right hands it has more options than a plain text book and could also be used to create material of high quality. You can have boring and overly concrete text books or dull uninspiring face-to-face teachers too. Both may utterly fail to fire up the minds of the students. I'm sure we can all recall examples.

Any limitations here are more likely to be with our own imaginations than with any particular failing of the tools.

[dmaul1114]

Agreed Scott.

For some educational purposes interactive books can be great, for others not so much.

But even a math book I can see some possibilities. I.E. for the practice problems have solutions be able to be revealed one step at a time so a student can figure it out if they're stuck at one step and then go back to working it out. Vs having either the whole solution--or worse just the answer and giving up as they can't figure out how to get that answer.

There are a lot of possibilities IMO, if people are open minded rather than just being book worms who feel that reading is the only way to learn etc.

For some things there's not substitute for plain old books--especially literature etc. But in other areas combining media has a ton of potential both for just entertainment and reference purposes, as well as educational purposes.

[scottjl]

And all this talk about what could be done has me really thinking the iPad is just begging for some sort of HyperCard like development studio so people could put together their own simple apps quickly and easily. It's too bad Jobs would probably never go for it as those apps wouldn't be likely to generate a lot of revenue for the App store.

[dmaul1114]

Yep, we'll never see that on the iPad.

Android tablets will have more potential on that front.