Song of the Open Rd.
In my traveling days, I enjoyed most the visits to used bookstores in the towns I was in for a day, a week, or more. Going from my origin in Boston to the Northwest by bus or train, I would visit shops whenever I had
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Some Good News for Independent Bookstores in the New Economy
Indiebound.com mentioned a heartening story from the Boston Globe about an independent brick and mortar bookstore in Coolidge Corner, Massachusetts that is succeeding in the face of direct competition from a major national chain rival. Maybe this is an isolated case, but I tend to
Of Spam and the River
Going through some emails today, it seems I came upon some vague traces of a lost Hemingway novel. The epistolary, straight from the gun style, humbly disguised under this heading: cause that would make me happy. me, 1982. I can’t think of a character named
WSJ calls Google book scanning settlement a “rip-off for authors”
The Wall Street Journal is running a well-written and persuasive editorial strongly against the Google book scanning settlement, calling it a “rip-off” for authors. The author warns that we are all on track to become “Google’s data-entry slaves” and that it turns authors “into fully
Amazon sued over Kindle
The Discovery Channel is suing Amazon over the Kindle for patent infringement, claiming they invented the concept of encrypting a book to be sold digitally over the internet. If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you know I’m usually the dorky uncle wearing the
The Scanning Age; or, a primer on the Corporate State
A recent article in the New York Times talks about Google’s so-called “pursuit” of copyholders on the books they are digitizing. This is part of the settlement announce last October that effectively legalizes Google’s blatant trademark infringement. As part of the settlement, Google is given
Rest In Peace Mr. Farmer
Philip Jose Farmer passed away in his sleep this morning at the age of 91. Farmer was one of the first authors I found when delving into science fiction for the first time. I remember reading Dayworld during summer break in middle school, leaning against
The Great Google Book Search Settlement
I found an interesting bit of news linking the book world to the geek work recently in Timothy Lee’s report over at Ars Technica on remarks by Richard Sarnoff, the chairman of the Association of American Publishers, at Princeton’s Center for Information Technology Policy. Mr.
Biblio.com gets a new skin for a new year
For those who haven’t noticed yet, we’ve quietly rolled out a little 2009 polish on Biblio.com. That image on the side, by the way, is taken from a very cool WPA library poster. The main changes, of course, are cosmetic, but we’ve also made the
Rare Book of the Day – Yoshida Hiroshi
Yoshida Hiroshi: Print Maker by Ben Bruce Blakeney I have a thing for Japanese art, and especially print-making and wood-block prints, because of the precision and complexity involved. Hiroshi was a talented artist and this particular item won’t burn a hole in my pocket if