I am so very much looking forward to my Kindle 2′s arrival. My Bookman and I ordered a Kindle way back in November as a holiday present for ourselves but they were all out of stock and we’ve been waiting ever since. Then, as you have probably heard, the Kindle 2 was announced on February 9th. The next day I got an email from Amazon saying they would be sending me a Kindle 2 after the 24th and that mine would be among the first shipped out. Of course I will share my thoughts about the gadget after I have had a chance to play with it and do some reading on it.
In the mean time, the Kindle is getting buzz of a different sort from the sector of the Author’s Guild. The Kindle 2 has a text-to-speech function on it so it can, in theory, read your book to you. The Author’s Guild is crying foul and suggesting that text-to-speech violates copyrights. It is all much ado about nothing because no copyright is being violated. And really, would you want to listen to an inflectionless computer voice read War and Peace to you? I know I wouldn’t.
Now for something completely different and even more cool than Kindle 2. How about Web 3.0? Just getting used to Web 2.0? Don’t worry, it won’t be all-pervasive for a little while yet so you have time to get used to the idea. Web 3.0 is very likely going to be the semantic web. Scientific American has a fab article about it for all you fellow geeksters out there. The internet won’t necessarily look different, it’s what you will be able to do with it that is so amazing. Pretend, for instance, you are at a conference and you want to get in touch with someone of the last name “Cook” you met there but…
You don’t remember her first name, but you remember that she worked for one of your clients and that her son was a student at your alma mater. An intelligent search program can sift through all the pages of people whose name is “Cook” (sidestepping all the pages relating to cooks, cooking, the Cook Islands and so forth), find the ones that mention working for a company that’s on your list of clients and follow links to Web pages of their children to track down if any are in school at the right place.
The thing about the web right now is that computers can only read links and tags and some other pieces of mark up language. Computers can’t read or understand the content of a webpage. But with the semantic web, they will be able to.
What does this have to do with books? Nothing really. But imagine instead of a person you were trying to find a book with “cook” in the title and it wasn’t a cookbook and the author wasn’t named Cook and you know it was published within the last year and is a spy thriller. You would never be able to find it with Google as it currently works. You would get so many worthless results you’d give up after one or two pages. But with the semantic web you’d be able to set parameters in such a way that you would be able to weed out a good deal of the worthless and be more likely to find what you are looking for. Pretty spiffy, eh?
Update: I goofed up the link to the Scientific American article but it is fixed now. Thanks Philip for letting me know!
Web 3.0? I wrote an article for the school newspaper about Brainify.com, and had to explain Web 2.0, social bookmarking, and a couple other terms to the copy desk, and now we’ve got a new one? My inner geek loves the internet!
P.S. Can’t wait to hear your thoughts on the Kindle!
That example of web 3.0 kind of creeps me out! If they really want to make searching the web better, they should look at deep indexing more sites, especially things like online museum collections, archives, and other sorts of databases. I don’t think they’ll ever replace librarians for truly intelligent search, though.
Stefanie,
The Scientific American article link points to the Wikipedia entry for Web 2.0!!
Can you provide the correct link?
I’m sure you’ll love the Kindle. I own the first version and have been very happy with it for over a year – and, yes, I’m tempted to upgrade…but am trying to hold back…for now
The Kindle 2 looks pretty sweeeet! But I’m not quite so sure about the Semantic Web — seems like a cool idea, but the idea’s been around for 8 years or so (nearly a lifetime in computer science time) and I have yet to see it progress much beyond the idea stage.
I’m still thinking that the whole Kindle thing isn’t really for me, but anyone who wants to order one can click through any of my book links to Amazon and order one that way (so I can get credit-lol). When I heard it could read the text I thought it might be cool for people who were blind, but if it is only a bad computer voice, maybe it wouldn’t be so good. Anyway, have fun with your Kindle!
Kindle sounds neat for travel (although i do love my real books), but Web 3.0 sounds kind of scary (if helpful).
I am looking forward to your Kindle review, though!!
I want a kindle! You’ll have to give us a full update on it.
Pretty spiffy indeed. Although given the difficulty I sometimes have with good old google, I will wait until the miracle occurs. Looking forward to your review of the Kindle. That text-to-speak thing is going to work okay if you could choose a voice to read to you. Pierce Brosnan? Colin Firth? Now that would have even me reaching for an e-book reader!
Oh, my, a Web 3.0?? I can’t handle all this new stuff! It makes my head spin. I’m pretty good with technology in some ways, but mostly I adopt one thing now and then and get a lot of use out of it, but I don’t like searching out new stuff because I find it overwhelming.
I’ve listened to books with a computer-generated voice. You get used to it…
I must say that the idea of Kindle doesn’t appeal to me at all! I’m the same with music, I still don’t have an ipod, although I find the idea quite good. Now, with books, it’s different, books live. I love second-hand books because I love the idea that they have been previously owned. The first thing do when I get a book is to write inside my name, the date of purchase and where I got it. Then, I like to scribble on it while I read it or just after I’ve finished. I like when I’ve made a coffee stain on a certain page. Books have a life!
As you know, I am eagerly awaiting the arrival (and your subsequent critiques) of your Kindle, and I had the same reaction over all the brouhaha from That Author’s Guild when it comes to the audio component (I must say, I like the idea of being able to take the book I’m reading into the car, plug it in, and keep listening to it, but I’m convinced the technology won’t make for a very good listening experience yet. One day, though…) And Web 3.0? Bring it on if it’s going to make my keyword searching so much easier.