Polyfoils FIRE UP Reading & Writing “What comes after books? What comes after Kindle, MOOCs, etc.?” – from the O’Reilly Media's Learning Group “About Us” page. “Among the several advances of the 20 th century, nonlinear science is exceptional for its generality.” – first sentence is the Encyclopedia of Nonlinear Science. Reading one page after the other is "the missionary position of reading." – Sven Birkerts, The Gutenberg Elegies. Polyfoil positions: They encircle They egress to the side They connect They parallel They embed on objects They juxtapose they relate to the 21 st century ... Introduction 1 Introduction 1
Transcript
Polyfoils FIRE UPReading & Writing
“What comes after books? What comes after Kindle, MOOCs, etc.?” – from the O’Reilly Media's Learning Group “About Us” page.
“Among the several advances of the 20th century, nonlinear science is exceptional for its generality.” – first sentence is the Encyclopedia of Nonlinear Science.
Reading one page after the other is "the missionary position of reading." – Sven Birkerts, The Gutenberg Elegies.
Polyfoil positions:
They encircleThey egress to the sideThey connectThey parallelThey embed on objectsThey juxtaposethey relate to the 21st century ...
Introduction 1Introduction 1
a PolyfoilIntroduction 2
1. Scroll Down through document.
2. Polyfoil to the side.
3. Scroll Sidewise to Polyfoil panel.
4. Polyfoil panel view.
Polyfoil Ecosystem
“
Introduction 3
One Way Traffic Jam
The Book is dead!Newspapers are doomed!Children don't read!
Maybe they're onto something.
Scrolls to wax tablets, codices to manuscripts, Dickens to the Saturday Evening Post, textbooks to news toromance to biography
…
All must fit linear sequences of words, sections, and ideas.
Introduction 4
The Long DureéHumans tell stories.It's their thing.
Real stories are rarely linear. They bubble up, wrap around, zig-zag to connect dots
Novels begat readers in long lines who wanted a straight ride. Publishers eyed fast presses and saw pulp fiction's tight lines.
Linear sequence is an economy of scale started by Virgil, spread by Gutenberg, inculcated at school. Like representational painting, a knee-jerk norm.
Many suspect it.Scientists know it.The world isn't linear.
Between Homer's cyclic tales& 20th century art & science,documents were linear.
Then came images, film, comics, which made print stultifying. Proust & Joyce broke the linear mold, but left the masses cold.
Children who groan over Shakespeare grow intoparents who grumble that Johnny can't read!
Introduction 5
Polyfoils Bust Linearity
Volumes packaged many ways, to best fit content and the user. The myth of linear writing, reading, thinking, can finally be overcome.
The 1st killer app debuted. MacWrite. It let users move text anywhere, liberated from linearity.INPUT: NONLINEAR. But output linear. Not anymore. POLYFOIL OUTPUT: NONLINEAR
The same length as other text, Polyfoils have more volume, potentially muchmore. Enticing, useful, intuitive volumes.
Introduction 6
More Fit to E-print
Text and Images fought pitched battles in 20th century. Text lost.
The 21st will be different.
Hyperlink surfing fosters bikini knowledge,with too much uncovered.
Polyfoils advance full-bodied texts, not skinny ones.
Polyfoils let readers construct versions they can get the most out of, unrestrained.
1950
1975
2000
2025
2050
Introduction 7
The Polyfoil's the Thing
Polyfoils do the heavy lifting of electronic display design.
Polyfoils are electronic writing and reading systems
They offer unlimited expansion of content.
One user's alternative,auxiliary, additional content
