(2009-04-30) Oreilly Twitter Book Power Point

Tim OReilly co-wrote a Twitter book using MsPowerpoint. The web has changed the nature of how we read and learn. Most books still use the old model of a sustained narrative as their organizational principle. Here, we've used a web-like model of standalone pages, each of which can be read alone (or at most in a group of two or three), to impart key points, highlight interesting techniques or the best applications for a given task. Because the basics are so easy, there's no need to repeat them, as so many technical books do... The idea to write the book in powerpoint came to me while I was thinking about how quickly I write a new talk: I generally use pictures as visual bullets, to remind me about the order of my main points; I know what I want to talk about when I see each picture. And pictures are a memorable, entertaining way to tell a story. All I needed to do, I realized, was to write down some notes equivalent to what I'd be saying if I were giving this as a talk. EBook into Printed Book.

Commenters:

• one wonders what the price will be, and how the Printed Book distribution undercuts the rapid-rewrite possibilities.

• Tony Bove notes I also took an unusual approach with e-book publishing, with my IPhone app (Tony's Tips for iPhone Users). I wanted to make something that is better than a manual in your iPhone - a reference that is always up-to-date, easy to search, and organized for quick reading. I used a Wiki on the back end, and a wiki reader for the iPhone based on Wiki Panion. I can update this content at any time, even every day, without the reader having to update the app itself, or update a formatted e-book.