I met several really cool people this weekend at Portus 2008 who are involved in various Harry Potter fan sites. Here’s a few you might like:
Azkatraz, Harry Potter conference next year in San Francisco. July 18-21, 2008. There will be a Wizard Rock show at Alcatraz.
Infinitus 2010 is the next Harry Potter conference AND it’s in Orlando, Florida, which will be the home of the “World of Harry Potter” theme park. I am incredibly excited about this conference.
My loot bag photo includes the links to lots of fun stuff that I discovered at Portus. Click on the photo to view it in Flickr and mouse over areas to see the info.
Zoomii bookstore shelves are pulled from Amazon data and you can zoom in, scan the shelves and click for book details. This is a cool idea: browse 22,060 books, search 156,580 books.
Quillpill is a micro-blogging site, which is currently in private beta. The service lets users write and read content on mobile devices. Yes, it’s another version of Twitter, but Techcrunch had an interesting article about how Quillpill takes a totally different approach by wanting to know what stories you would like to tell. The site is primarily aimed at aspiring authors and readers of fiction.
E-books still unnerving publishers. “Jeffrey P. Bezos, the founder and chief executive of Amazon, spent much of a packed session on Friday evangelizing about the Kindle, which he said already accounts for 6 percent of his company’s unit sales of books that are available in both paper and electronic formats.”
Carolyn K. Reidy, the chief executive of Simon & Schuster, said “electronic book sales last year totaled about $1 million, a sliver of its annual sales of roughly $1 billion.”
And here’s something ironic. Despite the fears of e-books, “Electronic readers have nevertheless gained many fans in the publishing industry. Random House and Penguin, among others, have equipped their entire sales force with electronic-book readers, allowing them to avoid having to lug around as many preview editions of books. Editors at many of the larger publishing houses also use the devices to read manuscripts submitted by agents and authors.”
I was speaking to Nicola Furlong the other day about her new mystery novel which is newly published as a Quillr. A Quillr is a multimedia version of a book that uses actors to portray certain scenes, audio effects, text and images.
This book is a study in what what world would look like without humans. The book is one of James’ favorites. It stimulates a lot of thoughts and questions about the world. The website is a multimedia experience that extends your ability to explore the ideas in the book. There are podcasts, interactive google maps (which are pretty cool--and my favourite part of the site), flash-based book trailer, an interactive slideshow, and audio clips.
Zio calls his work an iNovel. The physical book references the website and you can move back and forth between the two to listen to the music referenced in the book or other elements.
Einstein’s Dreams by Alan Lightman, produced by DNA Media
This is the closest I’ve seen to what Nicola is doing and unfortunately DNA has gone bankrupt and you can no longer access the site. There was a website, DVD and book. The website moved you through the novel in a fascinating way, it was all done in Flash I believe and it was a really integrated story experience. You were able to “choose your own adventure” which was part of reading and understanding the work. I loved the music in it and am very sad that it’s lost.
Now about Nicola ...
Here Ends the Beginning by Nicola Furlong HereEndsTheBeginning.com
Nicola’s latest novel, a supernatural thriller entitled Here Ends the Beginning, is available online in a multi-media storytelling format that she calls a Quillr.
Nicola says:
Much more than a conventional e-book, a Quillr is an innovative and interactive fusion of book, movie and soundtrack. The text of Here Ends the Beginning is punctuated throughout with video clips and photographs of actors recreating the characters and scenes. Music and sound effects further enhance this novel experience ...
Here Ends the Beginning is a dramatic, compelling story about the devastating consequences of manipulating science and desecrating the laws of God and nature.
The first five sensory-enhanced chapters are offered for free online at http://www.hereendsthebeginning.com, with the full 43-chapter entertainment package available for $12.95 Canadian.
What do you think of the site? Feedback for Nicola?
This Sunday was the 2008 AGM for the Association of Canadian Publishers. I moderated the first professional development session of the day, which was a panel discussion on online marketing.
Rick Wilks, co-founder and director of Annick Press
There were several interesting sites mentioned in the session that I’ll post here for audience members interested in following-up on those discussions. I plan to post some notes about our session too.
Annick Press Livebrary Blog: A great resources for publishers, educators, librarians and anyone interested in what’s happening online in children’s publishing.
Emarketing101.ca: A fantastic source of information on search marketing, pay-per-click campaigns, search engine optimization and anything related to search--the most cost effective online marketing spend.
SeenReading.com: Julie Wilson, also of House of Anansi, keeps a blog that is a perfect example of how to play with books and the web. Simple. Engaging. One of my favourite web sites.
MyNameIsKate.ca: Marketing and Technology Consultant Kate Trgovac’s personal blog, which is a hotbed of links and brilliant posts on marketing and technology.
W8NC is a Canadian marketing and communications company specializing in emerging technology.President is Wayne MacPhail.
OneDegree.ca: The best and most interesting source of marketing news, case studies and interviews related to marketing in Canada.
HorsePigCow.com: A marketing blog for those who see the online world as a place for creativity, community, conversation and collaboration. This girl has it together. Another of my daily blog reads.
I haven’t written about tap dancing for a while so let me tell you about figure skating.
My friend Julie, who I visited in Malta last year, is back in town and actively promoting her figure skating blog, called Boot and Blade.
It’s an interesting look into the figure skating world from the perspective of someone who spent an awful lot of time on the rink skating and coaching. I have a passing interest in figure skating but Julie definitely knows how to hook me. I think I even watched part of the World’s with her last year just so I could get the inside scoop on who should or shouldn’t win and what moves were tough vs. crowd pleasers.
Julie Wilson adds audio to Seen Reading,
