Reading is not Dead, says Cody Brown

Joining the debate on the effect the iPad will have on reading and writing, New York University student and Kommons-founder Cody Brown says it won’t kill books but that it could, and probably should, transform the way we think about and create them. He says authors shouldn’t think of the iPad just as a place to publish a traditional book. In a post earlier today in TechCrunch, he says, “If you, as an author, see the iPad as a place to ‘publish’ your next book, you are completely missing the point. What do you think would have happened if George Orwell had the iPad?” Authors should think about their next work as an “app” rather than a book, he says.

“What’s challenging for authors at this point is the iPad enables so many different types of expression that it’s literally overwhelming. Once you start thinking of your book as an app you run into all kinds of bizarre questions. Like, do I need to have all of my book accessible at any given time? Why not make it like a game so that in order to get to the next ‘chapter’ you need to pass a test? Does the content of the book even need to be created entirely by me? Can I leave some parts of it open to edit by those who buy it and read it? … Start thinking about how each and everyone one of the iPad’s features can be a tool for an author to more lucidly express whatever it is they want to express and you’ll see that reading isn’t ‘dead’, it’s just getting more sophisticated.”

To read more, check out his “Dear Authors” post at TechCrunch. To find out more about his Kommons project, you can read this story on nyc30.com or his more detailed thoughts about the future of news.