Two companies are making technological leaps forward (and backward), effective today.
Quirk Books is launching hBooks for the JEM reader, a device that allows readers to experience an author or their favorite character reading to them via a holograph. The size of the holograph can be customized to anywhere between five inches and five feet tall; wireless headphones are included; and there's an updated speaker system for classroom use.
The company notes that hBooks fans should also like some other Quirk products introduced in recent years: homer, the world's first book club digital assistant; litbit, the book reading tracker; and binder, the online book and reader match app.
And today Libro.fm is launching its Books on Tape program, "the bodacious way to read a book," as the company put it. The program includes "Radical Recommendations" from "super fly" booksellers and a selection of 20 introductory titles.
"Listening to books on tape is the bodacious way to read a book," said Nick Johnson, creative director of Libro.fm. "Books on tape, or 'audiobooks' as the cool kids call them, are the fastest growing category in publishing and are reaching entirely new markets like: BMX riders, jazzercise enthusiasts, and video store clerks. Even better, they are portable and can be played on your Walkman or boombox so you can listen anytime, anywhere. Soon, we'll even be able to put books on LazerDiscs."