Transcript of the live chat session that took place Thursday, June 29, 2000. These sessions are normally scheduled for 12 noon-1 PM US Eastern Daylight Time (GMT -4) every Thursday.
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Richard Seltzer -- Welcome, Bob and jkirvin. We'll be starting in about 5 minutes. Please introduce yourselves and let us know your interests. That will help us get off to a fast start.
jkirvin -- I'm a writer and epublisher (free-epress.com). I've written fiction and nonfiction, but my nonfiction book on the Palm is far and away my best seller.
Richard Seltzer -- jkirvin -- Is your nonfiction book about the Palm available for download to the Palm? (e.g., in Peanut Press format) Or is it only available in paper form?
Jeff Edmunds -- Hello, Richard. Jeff Edmunds here. Ready when you are.
Richard Seltzer -- Welcome Jeff -- Were you able to find a copy of Stop-Time?
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard, found Stop-Time and dipped into it, though I haven't had time to read it. I can see what you mean about some similarities with METRO.
Bob@CottageMicro.Com -- Hello all. I am an independent consultant and software developer. I am interested in eBook delivery because it is a current project of mine. - a program and/or transcription service that creates formatted HTML with marketing, sales and optional naration among it's features.
Jeff Edmunds -- Bob--your project sounds intriguing.
Bob@CottageMicro.Com -- Jeff, I have two books ready for deployment as examples, The Autobiography of Ben Franklin and The New Testament.
Jeff Edmunds -- Bob--are the examples available on the Web?
Bob@CottageMicro.Com -- Jeff - examples will be up this weekend.
Richard Seltzer -- Bob -- Is your project custom consulting work? Or are you intending to package your approach? And what have you done that's out of the ordinary in your presentation of Ben Franklin and the New Testament?
Bob@CottageMicro.Com -- Richard - I intend to pake it and also offer a service to customize the output.
Richard Seltzer -- Bob -- What URL should people check to see what you're doing?
Richard Seltzer -- Welcome Ann Kennedy and Ellen Isenstein -- Please introduce yourselves and let us know your interests.
Ellen Isenstein -- I'm primarily here to observe. I work at the library of the Kennedy School of Government and we're interested in checking out possible applications for chat technology.
Ann Kennedy -- Ellen, my teenage daughter is taking a Web-based course thru the University of South Florida for the Governor's Summer Program on the Holocaust and Ethical Leadership. They do web-based discussions, chats, searches, It's really a neat program they've set up there. You may be itnerested in how they'e done that.
Richard Seltzer --Ann -- do you have a url for that U. of S. Florida program?
Ellen Isenstein-- Ann - Do you know if the library there is involved at all? What are they using for research resources?
Ann Kennedy -- Ellen, I am not sure of all the details, but I could certainly pass along their information to you (website, contacts, etc).
Jeff Edmunds -- Welcome, Ellen. BTW, I work as a cataloger here at the PSU Libraries.
Richard Seltzer -- Welcome, Ellen. How is the KSG distance learning project coming along? Is it now being used for regular courses? Or are you still in pilot mode?
Ellen Isenstein -- It's still pretty much in pilot mode. It's likely to be limited pretty much to executive ed course at the beginning, but there's talk of possibly developing a "hybrid" program where students divide their time between on campus and off campus learning experiences. That's a good way down the road, though.
Ellen Isenstein -- I have a meeting to get to, so I'm signing off now. This has been interesting. Thank you all.
Ann Kennedy -- I am from Buzzcity Press, closely related to Ministry of Whimsy Press, which published Metro. Jeff VanderMeer (of MoW) couldn't be here for the chat, so he asked me to check in.
Jeff Edmunds -- Hi Ann, thanks for stopping by. Please tell Jeff V. I said hello.
Richard Seltzer -- Welcome Robin Lind, please introduce yourself, let us know your interests and dive in.
Jeff Edmunds -- METRO can be found at http://www.mindspring.com/~toones/metro/metro1.htm
Richard Seltzer -- All -- How many of you have read the novel Metro? Jeff -- Could you provide a quick synopsis for those who haven't had a chance to read it yet?
Jeff Edmunds -- METRO might be described as postmodern detective fiction, a kind of deconstruction of the crime novel.
Richard Seltzer -- All -- At first glance Metro is a mystery novel. At second glance there are layers to the mystery -- not just who did it, but what actually happened. Not just who committed the crime, but was a crime actually committed, and was someone murdered? or were there multiple murders? Then you begin to realize that you've "seen" this particular incident before, maybe several times, and that you are seeing a limited set of events through the eyes of several different witnesses, of varying credibility. Then you realize that you are often in doubt as to which character is acting as the narrator/eyes of particular scenes. What had seemed straightforward becomes more and more problematic. But the style and the crystal-clear description make every scene very tactile and real and carrying you along. It's a very unusual novel. Jeff -- have I captured some of the spirit of what you were trying to do?
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard, yes, thanks very much for such a lucid synopsis of the novel.
Richard Seltzer -- On a superficial level, you might think of the movie Sliding Doors, where the title event in fact happens in a subway. Did she make it into that subway before the doors closed or didn't she? With branching alternative reality stories starting from there. But in Metro, there is no alternative reality, because there is no base line to start from. There are multiple views of a very problematic reality. There is no omniscient point of view to resolve the differences. There is no single narrator or single point of view. You see and hear what are very convincingly real events. But the more you see and hear the more you doubt your eyes and ears. The dissonances simply don't resolve, deliberately.
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard--I think I'll create a PDF format for download, and investigate on-demand reproductions for people who what a bona-fide book. I'll also happily send the text as a Word document to anyone who requests it.
Richard Seltzer -- Jeff -- You might want to check the offerings of Ion Systems. They recently made a deal with IBM. I'm trying to better understand how it all works and what it costs. But it appears that from a single electronic file they can allow you to generate an ebook in a variety of formats and also to produce books on demand. My contact there Thomas Thomas thomast@ionsystems.com could probably explain it a lot better than I could.
Jeff Edmunds -- Thanks for the advice Richard. If Thomas would be willing to explain the system to me, I'd appreciate it. Sounds intriguing.
Bob@CottageMicro.Com -- Jeff & Richard, I tried twice to read Metro, but could not get off the first page. My screen will only do 800x600. I couldn't find the hot area to goto the next page.
Jeff Edmunds -- Bob--my apologies. METRO is optimized for a higher resolution and won't work at the lower. Then again, not being able to get past the first page is a problem some readers have complained of even without the technological difficulty! If you'd like a Word version, contact me by e-mail and I'll send one along.
Richard Seltzer -- Jeff -- Have you set aside a discussion space (perhaps on one of the free discussion sites) for readers to share their reactions with one another and with you?
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard, not
yet. There's a commentary feature at the Ministry of Whimsy Press site
where readers can leave messages or respond to other readers' ideas. It
doesn't seem to function well (at all?) with the versions of Netscape I've
tried. IE seems fine. Go to:
http://www.mindspring.com/~toones/metro/metro.html
and click on Commentary.
Bob@CottageMicro.Com -- Jeff - Is Metro a free ePublication or are there sales involved?
Jeff Edmunds -- Bob, METRO is free. The publisher Jeff VanderMeer and I decided to use this project as a test case and see how things went.
Richard Seltzer -- Jeff -- I believe that "technically" Ministry of Whimsy Press is the "publisher" of Metro. But you could have posted the book anywhere on the Web. What was the contribution of Whimsy? What did they do to improve the book or its presentation? And are you still free to do whatever else you might want with it?
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard--the Ministry provided financial backing for development of the online version of the novel, enthusiastic support and feedback during the design process, and ambitious promotion of the book. I retain copyright to METRO, but I would consult with Jeff VanderMeer before doing anything else with the book.
Richard Seltzer -- Jeff -- What did it cost to present the book in this particular format? What kind of work was involved? I'm a great fan of the book itself, but not of the ebook format you have it in now. It would have been much easier to simple convert a Word file to HTML. What would have been lost with that simpler, cheaper approach?
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard, for design, etc., we're talking in the hundreds rather than thousands of dollars. I designed the book myself, and the process was extremely labor intensive, because I essentially had to chop the Word file up into over a hundered separate 'pages'. As to what would have been lost: 1) authorial control over the presentation of the text 2) some of the the ability to control the rhythm of the reading experience (margins, amount of text per page, etc.) 3) control over how easily the entire text could be downloaded.
Richard Seltzer -- Ann -- Have you done any experimenting with electronic book formats? Or do you only do books in printed form?
Ann Kennedy -- Only in book format. I currently have two books in print - Jeff VanderMeer's Dradin, In Love and Michael Cisco's The Divinity Student.
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard, you nearly read my mind. I would love to see METRO filmed, although I'm not a screenwriter and have no experience crafting scripts. If David Lynch would direct...
Richard Seltzer -- Jeff -- Yes, Lynch would be perfect. Especially since the enigmatic woman who may have been murdered is named "Laura." Regarding the "reality" of the book, have you read Richard Power's latest -- Plowing the Dark. There he keeps using a refrain from traditional Middle Eastern stories that something both happened and didn't happen, that it both is and isn't -- almost their version of "once upon a time." Also, echoes of Stanislaw Lem, another favorite of mine.
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard, I haven't yet read Powers's new book, but I'm a big fan of his work. He's one of best American writers now working, in my opinion. Lem I'm less familiar with.
Richard Seltzer -- In Powers, Lem, and also (often jokingly) in Tom Robbins, there's a continuing theme that the world that we take for granted is far more complex and random than we presume; hence that we are far less important in the immensity of the random universe; but then, ironically, there's inexplicable deep order in all that randomness. Hence trying to understand even the most ordinary of events and the other events to which they seem to be connected only by coincidence soon becomes an almost religious quest.
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard, very intriguing scenario, and one I would be willing to seriously explore if I had or could find backing. I have no experience with film...
Bob@CottageMicro.Com -- Richard - that is an interesting idea. I would like to see it on the web as a narrated play, like the old "Mystery Theater Radio shows. Real Audio would be a better bet than RealVideo.
Jeff Edmunds -- Bob--your idea is one I have considered, although not as a play, but merely as an audiobook in RealAudio format. I'd need someone with a better reading voice than mine, I suspect.
Richard Seltzer -- Bob -- You're right that audio without video might actually be more effective, and would probably be far less expensive. Let the story unfold in the theater of the mind. (I'd love to have my own "Lizard of Oz" done that way too).
Bob@CottageMicro.Com -- Richard - do you own the rights to Lizard of Oz so that you can publish it on the web ?
Richard Seltzer -- Bob -- You can read The Lizard at my Web site.
http://www.samizdat.com/readers.html#lizard
Take
a look. Yes, I own the rights. I self-published it in paperback about 25
years ago, and over the years have sold about 7000 copies.
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard, as you know, Nabokov subscribes to a similar metaphysics, except for the part about humans being less important in the universe. I still haven't figured out what I believe, but I would enthusiastically support Eward de Vere's famous line "There are more things than are dreamed of in your philosophy." What we actually know is incredibly limited.
Richard Seltzer -- Jeff -- I love Nabokov's Pale Fire. In that case, it feels like there are two parallel worlds: the world of ordinary experience, and the bizarre world of the paranoid narrator. Pynchon produces similar effects with paranoids in his early (best) books V and Crying of Lot 49. Paranoia is a simple and effective organizing principle, finding order in any random set of events and then creatively presenting the case that the paranoid narrator might possibly be gifted, might actually be perceiving an order that is "real" but hidden to mere ordinary mortals. Power and Lem move a step beyond that. Their narrators are very analytical and creative without being paranoid.
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard, if you like Pale Fire, you might light Charles Kinbote's most recent work, Silvery Light: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/iasweb/nabokov/abvn.htm
Richard Seltzer -- Jeff -- Is Charles Kinbote a pen name of yours?
Jeff Edmunds -- Richard, a few years ago someone was claiming Silvery Light was written by me, but I'm sticking with the story that Kinbote is the author. ;)
Jeff Edmunds -- Robin, what has your experience been with ebooks?
Richard Seltzer -- Robin -- Welcome. What's your URL? And do you do fiction? nonfiction? Both? Do you act as a "publisher"? Or as a host for other people's work? What format do you use for your eBooks?
Bob@CottageMicro.Com -- Welcome Robin, Are your eBooks on the Web? Can you point us to an example of eBooks that you have available?
Robin Lind -- I'm interested in the "e" part of eBooks. Intrigued by earlier discussion of audio and video hyperlinks to your novel. My current thinking is that straight scrolling text is not much of an improvement, actually not an improvement over ink on paper. That's why our eBooks are massively hyperlinked; internally and externally. See samples at www.firstaidyourself.org and at www.webpointers.com
Bob@CottageMicro.Com -- Robin, can you explain what you mean when you say your ebooks are linked externally and why?
Robin Lind -- Yes, Bob. I think that the e part of e books ought to involve (1) connectivity and (2) extensibility of information. These are the greatest strengths that eBooks have to offer. I want to offer the ability to extend a reader's reach beyond the confines of the printed page. So in the case of "First Aid Yourself, Essential Breast cancer Websites" we've assembled the most comprehensive listing of bc websites available. This turns the book, a really compelling narrative, into a useful tool that readers can use to explore further on their own.
Jeff Edmunds -- Folks, I've got to go, but thanks Richard for your time and incisive questions and to everyone else for stopping by. I enjoyed the discussion and am curious to learn more about ebooks. I'll check out the links mentioned by Robin. Ciao.
Richard Seltzer -- All -- thanks very much for joining us today. Before signing off, please post your email address and URL so we can keep in touch. (Don't presume that the software captured that info.)
Bob@CottageMicro.Com -- Thanks everyone. See you next week.
Robin Lind -- Thanks, bye. robin@firstaidyourself.org
The full text of the novel Metro book is available online for free at www.mindspring.com/~toones/ministry.html.
See my review at www.samizdat.com/isyn/metro.html
Previous transcripts and schedule of upcoming chats -- www.samizdat.com/chat.html
To connect to the chat room, go to www.samizdat.com/chat-intro.html
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