Technology is changing the way we read, and therefore, the way we write. Previously, most books were physically printed and read cover-to-cover. Some books were organized as collections of articles or short stories and as an exception, a reader may have elected to go to a particular story or article instead of reading sequentially.
QR Code
Reading and learning have changed drastically in the last several years. Physically printed books are using QR Codes from which a reader may use a smartphone app to snap on the book’s QR Code and bring up a website or a video explaining a particular topic in more detail. And eBooks are embedding hyperlinks to direct you anywhere else as relevant in the current book or to any other article, book or further research with a URL!
As technology and telecoms band-width improves exponentially, more pictures and videos are being imbedded into eBooks to bring them to life. A picture is truly worth a thousand words and a video a million!
And it is not just reading, but training and education more broadly which are seeing vast changes. You can learn anything, anytime, anywhere! New business models such as Lynda.com, Udemy and Skillshare are being built on technology being available 24×7. I have re-invented myself using these services over the last six months. My ‘reading’ to learn has been replaced by videos and screencasting. I hardly ever read or even refer to how-to or reference manuals anymore. I demand a search function, hyperlinks and access to a multitude of resources at my electronic fingertips – a physical book or electronic book which is not highly interactive no longer cuts it.
If you are an author and only writing physical books or eBooks which are an electronic version of the physical book, your are last generation and out of touch with what readers want today. Well-written text using great simile is still important, but if you are not embedding hyperlinks, QR Codes, or photographs and imbedded videos, your readers will go elsewhere. Book writing is changing and your readers with it.
© 2013. Steve Shipley, author of Wine Sense, due out early 2014
Twitter: @inkitpub
Twitter: @shipleyaust
Still Stupid at Sixty (published under my writing pseudonym Blake Stevens)
