Week 8 - Content and Containers within eCookbooks

In the enhanced ebook world, when the video, the audio, or the app freezes, we’re thrust back into the un-enhanced book world and focus quite quickly turns to the container. The same can be said when reading a plain text version of a novel where often errors occur due to the digital transformation of a text.

John W. Maxwell, in "E-Book Logic: We Can Do Better", Quoting Brian O’Leary, says, "We now live in an era of superabundant content, and the value of content for its own sake is an increasingly difficult stance to maintain. In its place, the value of context – connectivity, interconnectedness, currency, association – becomes the driver. If publishers maintain their focus on the “containers,” the packaged objects that help manage how content is distributed, they tragically miss the opportunity in the context" (p. 45). I'm still trying to understand the full meaning of this, but it does seem like in the age of digital possibility, with publishers and technology developers competing for our attention in new ways, it is perhaps too easy to undermine the value of the content and prioritize the experience. I think not only is the concept of the book being challenged, but also the concept of what reading is. 

I found the two examples we looked at this past Monday in class – Our Choice and The Waste Land – fascinating but not surprising. We have come to have very high expectations in the digital world, and at this point high levels of interactivity and layered technology seem almost logical. Our Choice seems like a complete experience where content and container are totally integrated. This kind of book app I think can be very persuasive and mesmerizing, but I’m not sure that an individual would actually learn more that way than, say, watching a documentary which is oftentimes narrated, and visually and informationally very rich. Being able to manipulate the screen activity and the range of media and interactivity is quite impressive. It is definitely ambitious but I’m not sure it’s the book reading option I would often choose.

Personally, I found The Waste Land more captivating and I thought more meaningfully layered. I didn’t get the impression that it was the “definitive” offering of The Waste Land but that it was offering multiple perspectives and possibilities. I found this as a “container and content” experience more impressive because I felt more considered as a user, and I enjoyed the fact that it was perhaps less fluid or integrated than Our Choice.

One type of book that has been late to the digital world is the cookbook. The Internet is a staple for recipes, as well as “how to” videos. Cookbooks are now adding interactive features such as:

·      conversion charts and condiment spinners
·      visual indexes, and ways to explore recipes by regional area, season or type
·      step-by-step guides to techniques and ingredients
·      extra photography and audio clips an author’s Twitter feed and the ability to tweet back.
(This was taken from the Digital Book World website.) 

(from Vietworldkitchen.com)

I found Asian Tofu as an example of an enhanced e-cookbook, published in March 2012 by Ten Speed Press (Random House). Three versions were simultaneously published: hardcover, regular ebook, and enhanced ebook.  On her website, the author of the book explains some of the publishing process to her readers, which is quite interesting. 

(from Vietworldkitchen.com)

The enhancements in this case are mainly audio, video and travelogue, and really connect you in a personal way to the author of the book.  The notion of the printed book has not been entirely abandoned here, given page numbers are still provided and a faint shadow of pages themselves. The container is still quite bookish and deferential to the book. However, the interactivity is a departure from the printed book and certainly stepping away from the printed volume as container.

-Laurel-

Sources cited:

Maxwell, John W. "E-Book Logic: We Can Do Better." Papers of the Bibliographical Society of Canada 51, no. 1 (2013): 29-47

http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2013/random-house-experimenting-with-new-kinds-of-e-cookbooks/

http://www.vietworldkitchen.com/blog/2012/03/asian-tofu-enhanced-ebook.html