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Jeremy Rifkin's New Book: The Coolest Online Reading Experience

The Huffington Post   First Posted: 03/18/10 06:12 AM ET Updated: 05/25/11 04:10 PM ET

'Empathic Civilization' and Jeremy Rifkin are giving HuffPost Books the chance to deliver the coolest online reading experience we've seen yet. Why are we so excited? Click on the book jacket and you'll see. Once you do, run your cursor over the page corners. Click and drag or just click to turn them, and don't forget to read the Introduction and first chapter. It's right here, free.



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'Empathic Civilization' and Jeremy Rifkin are giving HuffPost Books the chance to deliver the coolest online reading experience we've seen yet. Why are we so excited? Click on the book jacket and you'...
'Empathic Civilization' and Jeremy Rifkin are giving HuffPost Books the chance to deliver the coolest online reading experience we've seen yet. Why are we so excited? Click on the book jacket and you'...
 
 
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HUFFPOST BLOGGER
Lowell Thompson
Artist, writer, recovering adman
01:12 PM on 01/12/2010
I'm impressed.

(But then again, I'm easily impressed).

http://buythecover.com

BTW: I may want to use the technology on my "Buy The Cover" blog. Who do I call?
12:13 PM on 01/12/2010
Video games did this 10 years ago.
12:31 PM on 01/12/2010
The Insomnniac..pray do tell how a video game made any person in this world more empathetic to the plight of a doctor in Gaza who had his five daughters blown up by a missile..Seriously.

Empathy is not developed by video game.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Matt Hotz
08:15 AM on 01/12/2010
Design wise. I can get a better more responsible user experience with a PDF document. I don't care about that annoying impatient turning the page sound and question its validity and necessity. This is a different medium. Why ape and carry the baggage of it's descendent? Why should I torture my eyes with a 6 pt or less type face on a 21" monitor? By default, I went to increase the point size through Safari and didn't get a thing. Where are my options for legibility? Where are my keystroke options?
This isn't cool. It's irritating.
12:12 AM on 01/12/2010
This tech is not new. I was seeing this in graphic magazines four years ago.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
charlygardel
My micro-bio is empty. Or dependently-arisen?
09:00 PM on 01/11/2010
Yikes!

Why would you take an electronic book -- with all the possibilities that being digital carries with it -- and simply give it all the bad things about a regular book (page turns, fixed font, shadows, etc.), and then compound that by tying it to a computer screen?

Its like taking an iPhone, connecting it to a cord and phone jack, and removing the screen. Sure, its an iPhone, but what advantage is there over a regular phone?
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Rubyfoo
05:22 PM on 01/11/2010
Sorry, not very cool reading experience. On my Inspiron notebook, the print is too small to decipher without a magnifying glass. Most online readers have a magnifying icon as well as other controls. This one is primitive.
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therblig
Noids do not have sex with doodles.
02:45 PM on 01/11/2010
The talking books in Myst were cooler.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Mannock
Just flew in from Chicago and my arms are tired.
01:42 PM on 01/11/2010
Great! The Dinner Jacket http://www.thedinnerjacket.com has been doing this for over a year.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
RedDogBear
01:28 PM on 01/11/2010
One of the earliest and best works on User Interface design was done by Ben Schneiderman. At the time he was working everyone was into natural language processing and making a computer (this was at the very earliest days of GUI's) try to communicate like a human being. He showed why that was such a terrible idea for most problems. Computers are computers and humans are humans and we have different strengths and weeknesses. The same applies to other metaphors, specifically online bookjs. An online book doesn't have to act like a real book and while its cute and eye catching that this UI does for the first couple of minutes after a while it just gets annoying and I would rather have an Acrobat reader.
12:31 PM on 01/11/2010
This coolest online reading experience is, well, it's sad. Perhaps this is a symptom of another person not being paid to think, but only to do what they are told, but the interactive book still has crop marks and registration marks. I don't think that was what they were talking about when they said it is cool.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Freedom Rush
freedom is the oxygen of the soul
04:53 PM on 01/11/2010
A- my ikea catalogue has been doing this trick for a while now, and B- it looks dandy on my 24 inch monitor, but what will it look like on a netbook? As for the book itself, this was sufficient advertising for me to check it out further. other than that? yawn.
11:29 AM on 01/11/2010
Advertising disguised as news.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Michael Zentz
12:20 PM on 01/11/2010
Umm, when the first sentence lays it out for you like that you're not exactly a genious for noticing the connection between 'Empathic Civilization,'Jeremy Rifkin, and HuffPost Books.
09:26 AM on 01/11/2010
...very interesting e-book.