Alice for the iPad

[Nate the great]

I just came across this demo video for iPad only edition of Alice in Wonderland by Atomic Antelope. It’s a little intense, and looks like it’s lot of fun.

But, it’s not an ebook. It’s a game based on a novel. With that in mind, this demo helped me understand what some people were saying at O’Reilly TOC about the future of publishing. If this is the future, then book publishing is going to die out.


via The Digital Reader

[simond]

Not bad at all, I must admit, I'm already planning to get an iPad when it's out in the UK

[WillAdams]

History repeats itself. Two early programs for the original Macintosh were:

- Alice:
http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?pro...tory=Alice.txt

available for the iPhone / iPod Touch:
http://onedoto.com/iPhone/Alice/

- The Manhole:
http://www.amazon.com/Manhole-CD-ROM.../dp/B00093IJEW
(originally it was in black and white, w/ an option to load the game, a Hypercard stack, in colour)

William

[scottjl]

Speaking of Hypercard, it would be a killer application for the iPad. Too bad it is dead and buried. But imagine running all your stacks on the iPad, or designing new stacks right on the iPad.

[mr ploppy]

I really hope that idea doesn't spread to adult books.

[iReaderReview]

you hit the nail on the head.

If this is the direction *people* start pushing books in then book publishing is going to die out.

Carr at Techcrunch wrote a very good post talking about how the iPad is going to end up killing reading if it manages to kill ereaders and there is a lot of truth in it.

I really hope there are kids who can enjoy books without needing animated cartoon characters running through them.

[WillAdams]

Actually, AppleScript Studio has much of the feel of HyperCard and I'd dearly love to see it on the iPad --- if one wants stacks though, there are (for Mac OS X and / or Windows):

- Runtime Revolution ---- http://www.runrev.com
- SuperCard --- http://www.supercard.us/
- HyperNext --- http://www.tigabyte.com/index.html
- PythonCard --- http://pythoncard.sourceforge.net/

Runrev has announced a mobile version which will be available on the iPad:

http://www.runrev.com/products/revmobile/overview/

I actually did a graphic design utility using Runtime Revolution:

Windows - http://mysite.verizon.net/william_fr...portionbar.zip

Mac OS X - http://mysite.verizon.net/william_fr...ionbar.app.sit


William

[mores]

OOoooh, animated books.
Don't we have those already? They're called CHILDREND'S BOOKS.
Some you can even scratch and sniff.

I can't immagine reading a book like that. Too distracting. Plus, I'm older than 5

[WillAdams]

Yeah, this is an awful lot like the Living Books series by Broderbund --- which has apparently, sadly been discontinued.

William

[Over]

It's a children's book. They have a right to it. Why would this kill book publishing?

[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.

[scottjl]

actually i wouldn't mind some "adult" books that had interactive content. imagine reading a "who-dunn-it" mystery and being able to look at the scene of the crime, look around the room, size up the suspects. let you draw your own conclusions before the author finishes the story and see how well your detective skills measure up. or how about an extra "layer" of text you can overlay on the pages of a book that have notes from the author, explaining their development process in the story? video content embedded into a historical novel. an interactive map in a book on a war. possibilities are endless.

no. most adults don't want to see a white rabbit running around their pages. but don't think adult books can't be enhanced by interactive content.

dvd's aren't just movies, they contain lots of extra content, and people buy it all up.

i think books that are just plain text might be given a run for their money by text with more interaction for the reader. the death of the book as we know it. hell, we don't read things on scrolls or clay tablets any more either, do we?

[Exer]

Originally Posted by scottjl

actually i wouldn't mind some "adult" books that had interactive content. imagine reading a "who-dunn-it" mystery and being able to look at the scene of the crime, look around the room, size up the suspects. let you draw your own conclusions before the author finishes the story and see how well your detective skills measure up. or how about an extra "layer" of text you can overlay on the pages of a book that have notes from the author, explaining their development process in the story? video content embedded into a historical novel. an interactive map in a book on a war. possibilities are endless.

no. most adults don't want to see a white rabbit running around their pages. but don't think adult books can't be enhanced by interactive content.

dvd's aren't just movies, they contain lots of extra content, and people buy it all up.

i think books that are just plain text might be given a run for their money by text with more interaction for the reader. the death of the book as we know it. hell, we don't read things on scrolls or clay tablets any more either, do we?

I agree 100%, and funny you mention the DVD "features" point, because there was a post not too long ago about about the Vook "video book" genre on the iPod / iPhone, and I brought up the very same point as to why extra content can be a beneficial thing.

It seems for some folks though, no matter which way they happen to be consuming their written media, be it paper books, ebooks or even a standalone app, they want NOTHING but words. The main objection for some seemed to be that they didn't appreciate anyone (including the author) "forcing" content on them that they might not otherwise want to view.

Valid point, if that is what they want. I say that you should simply get what you expect. If I buy an ebook, I don't expect a paper edition to arrive at my house in a week. If I buy a paper book, I don't expect to be able to load it on my kindle. And if I get an interactive digital app on an iPad, I expect it to be a little more than simple words on a screen.

My own opinion is: can't there be room for us all? Having extra options can't be a bad thing. This sort of flashy interactive book might even have the added benefit of getting kids to want to read "real" books down the line. I mean I know most of us didn't start out as a toddler reading Moby Dick. It was a progression of different formats until we reached that golden "real book" zone.

[scottjl]

if the original author of the book designed/coded/implemented the additional functionality, how would it be any more "forcing content" than, say, putting chapter two after chapter one?

you're right. some people are on here only to sit and argue that the sky is blue. me. i'm looking forward to all the additional content.

[dmaul1114]

Yeah I could see it being great in some adult books. Especially something like Dan Brown's books where you could have interactive displays of the artwork and other clues they're examining in the book etc.

I wouldn't want every book like that, but I'd enjoy some.

But then again, I'm relatively young and was raised on tv, movies, video games, computers etc. so I'm not a diehard bookworm like many on here!