So, that's pretty funny. And I only had to see four strangers masturbating before I met this helpful (and clothed) fellow!

He gives a nice summary of what the optimists out there think (hope) is going to happen, and this is certainly the future I see as being most likely:

Amid the literary chaos of the digital future, readers will be guided by the imprints of reputable publishers, distinguishable within a worldwide, multilingual directory, a function that Google seems poised to dominate—one hopes with the cooperation of great national and university libraries and their skilled bibliographers, under revised world copyright standards in keeping with the reach of the World Wide Web. Titles will also be posted on authors' and publishers' own Web sites and on reliable Web sites of special interest where biographies of Napoleon or manuals of dog training will be evaluated by competent critics and downloaded directly from author or publisher to end user while software distributes the purchase price appropriately, bypassing traditional formulas. With inventory expense, shipping, and returns eliminated, readers will pay less, authors will earn more, and book publishers, rid of their otiose infrastructure, will survive and may prosper.

That said, he also raises some good points about all the down sides of this, including the problems of piracy, the transience of digital data, and the challenges for monetizing content. On the plus side, he points out how good e-books will be for back and mid-list titles. The whole thing is well worth a read.

One big question looms above all: will authors be able to live off writing novels and books. Maybe yes, but very much maybe no. It may well come to pass that fewer and fewer writers can live by novel alone, but I would submit that the number of people who do so is already vanishingly small. I can see the field of fiction becoming ever more semi-pro, or pro-am maybe, with just a few break out bestsellers out there living the literary high life. I can also show you math for a lot of people with just a few thousand dedicated readers who could make a fine living selling direct to their customers. Wherever it goes, it won't look like it does today.

As a "third device" aside from computer and phone (and other computer, and gaming consoles) I see a potential big place in my life for the iPad, mostly as a reader. I read a ton on my Kindle as-is, and if the book reader on Apple's device provides a good reading experience, that will be awesome. Actually, it's a requirement. In addition, I'm excited about the idea of getting magazines on the thing. Magazines on Kindle aren't great, but this video Wired produced (which clearly has the iPad in mind) made me want one right now:

I hope they're going for some open format that can appear on numerous different platforms, not just the iPad. Since they don't mention Apple, I imagine that's their plan.

Add to that the Web surfing, video watching, and other media stuff, and I'm sold on this tablet device. Plus there are the Apps.

Let me say, the thing better damn well support the current Kindle App that's on my Ipod Touch. It synchs to all my Kindle books, and while the screen isn't what I want to read long term on, it's a cool, useful app. Keeping this App on the iPad makes it MUCH more appealing as an e-book reader, since it means you have the whole Kindle library available from day one. I'm worried though that since Amazon and Apple are seemingly feuding over e-books and pricing that one or the other of them will pull it. Given Apple's penchant for being assholes about apps, I think it will be them.

Which brings me to my big issue of the day: Apple's prudish, high-handed censoring of its App store. Check out these to stories about Apple's recent removal of TONS of apps from the store based on standards that only a puritan could approve of:

Violet Blue

Tech Crunch

I really despise the idea that Apple is being so egregious in their censorship of content in their store. Yes, it's certainly their right to do so, but it sucks. It sucks so much that I might not buy their damned thing.

It's a short little piece that talks to a few different authors and teachers about how playing D&D in their youth helped develip not only their imaginations and empathy, but also their writing skills. The money quote comes from author Jay Lake, who says:

"Those three years playing D&D at boarding school did more to ground me in storytelling, plot construction, and sheer, raw imaginative throughput than any other single activity of my life. Today I'm a successful fantasy and science fiction novelist with ten novels and over two hundred short stories in print or on the way. I might have gotten to this point by a different path, but it would not have been the same journey,"

That's the same quote IO9 pulled (which is where I saw it first), because it's a great one. For me obviously the line from middle-school gamer to writer is even more direct, since I got my start in writing with pen and paper RPGs. Coming to the fiction side of things after spending close to a decade on the game-writing side of thing presented its own interesting challenges. With game writing, there's always a pressure to keep the plot open and free so that there's plenty of room for the players to create their own stories. In that respect, fiction is quite freeing - you're not only allowed to have a "linear" plot that "railroads" the reader along, it is (in most cases) kind of the point. Writing a novel is like being a game master and a player at the same time! Of course, the extra challenge is that the end result should probably be entertaining for more than just you and your gaming group.

I'd not read the book and so all I had to go on were the trailers. When I saw them, I thought they might be giving too much away, but I can now assure you that's not the case. This movie goes places and then other places still that aren't hinted at in the promotions. That said, I think (like most movies) it would be better seen if you knew nothing about it going in. There are a few moments in the trailer from scenes late in the movie, and while you don't have the context to understand them (and they do some tricky editing to mix images from one scene with dialogue from another, sort of) I ended up waiting for them to happen on screen.

I won't hint at the movie's plot twists and turns, but I will say, this movie almost lost me. Moreover, I can see it losing a lot of people. The teenagers sitting near me certainly seemed more befuddled than thrilled by the end, and that's not a comment on their intelligence. Shutter Islands asks you to come along for a wild and strange ride, and not everyone will be willing to do so. There is a long chunk of the movie - too long by far - where I was sure it was utter crap. I felt disappointed and a little bored. Weirdly, all that stuff turns out to be to the film's advantage when all is said and done, and I'm glad I endured it for the finale. Other viewers might easily decide the pay off isn't worth the price, and I wouldn't argue with them.

I think people should see it. Let's talk about it afterwards. But Shutter Island just might be too true to itself for its own good.

But it's been a productive week and the paper I've been slaving away it is basically done, save for an enthralling conclusion and some polishing. I think it turned out pretty interesting.

Next week I plan to start ramping up the blogging, both here and elsewhere. I have an idea for a weekly advice column of sorts here. Sort of. It's weird. You'll see. Now granted, my record of weekly anything on this blog ain't great, and I cop to that, but I'm trying to prioritize blog writing, so I'm hopeful for my own diligence.

My review of Dante's Inferno should be going up at PopMatters sometime soon, so you've got that to look forward to, right?