Generating worlds, exploring them, losing the thread.
The future of the book
“Meet Nelson, Coupland, and Alice — the faces of tomorrow’s book. Watch global design and innovation consultancy IDEO’s vision for the future of the book. What new experiences might be created by linking diverse discussions, what additional value could be created by connected readers to one another, and what innovative ways we might use to tell our favorite stories and build community around books?”
1. Alice. To say I resemble a Ludditic old fart is … Read more
I sit in my office sweating.
The 27-inch iMac gazes blankly at me from inside its raincoat, the pair of us waiting for the air-conditioner repairmen to arrive. It all started when my old PC laptop clapped out, exposing me to attack by the consumerist virus waiting in ambush. Next thing I knew, I was the proudish owner of a nearly-new iMac super doodah. And now look. The world is disintegrating.
Long-slumbering volcano erupts in Sumatra. Floods in Pakistan, India … Read more
“Sky gravid with precipitate disaster.” My, my. Our man Collin certainly has a way with words, hasn’t he? Nevertheless, he’s still starving right along with the rest of us wordsmiths, though not as successfully as some.
But he does understand the kind of lifestyle where the sky is always falling and so what? That’s just the way things are.
We have a buddy, a felllow scrivener, who shall remain nameless, who fled Bangkok’s gravid skies to earn actual money … Read more
Chicken Little epidemic
Our streets appear increasingly aswarm with Chicken Little financial savants.
All around the world, it seems, a hard rain is about to fall. The sky is gravid with precipitate disaster, and quite a few people are reviewing plans to build financial arks, many of these latter-day Noahs figuring they’ll build their boats of gold.
And good luck to them. One advantage of being a starving writer in a state of perennial penury—blessed with a principled resistance to … Read more
Leary here… Darn it, these last few days we’ve gone from spinning in our pre-graves to pre-obits to being pre-dead.
Whatever. Like some wise man once said, not me: Getting old is the only way there is of living a long time. And I want to live a long time. Gosh. The things that go on in this life, you just don’t want to miss what’s gonna happen next.
And here I am, coming to you from some time after … Read more