The Reading Room

"One of the interesting trends of 2009 has been the gradual decline of RSS Readers as a way for people to keep up with news and niche topics. Many of us still use them, but less than we used to. I for one still maintain a Google Reader account, however I don't check it on a daily basis. I check Twitter for news and information multiple times a day, I monitor Twitter lists, and I read a number of blogs across a set of topics of most interest to me. Frankly, I'm more likely to use Google Reader to search for specific information nowadays, than to scan my subscribed feeds for their latest posts. So what's happened to RSS Readers. Do people still use them and is there still a viable market for them? In February 2007 we reported on the state of the RSS Reader market, based on statistics from Feedburner and Pheedo. At that point Google had 59% market share amongst web-based RSS Readers, followed by Bloglines with 33%, then Newsgator and Netvibes with 3% (note: this didn't count Newsgator's... more... - sofarsoShawn from Bookmarklet

!!! @sofarsoShawn Good to know that I'm not the only person who has that kind of problem... #foodnottoeatonadate - See-ming Lee 李思明 SML

K, for obvious reasons. - Kendra <3 Three Lions

V for Vengeance, & VictorGodot. Years ago I was in love with B for Beckett, Burroughs, Bukowski.... ;-) - diego morelli

"After much mulling and culling, we've come up with our list of the twenty best books of the decade. The list is weighted towards science fiction, but does have healthy doses of fantasy and horror. And a few surprises." - Kol Tregaskes from Bookmarklet

Up for WWZ :) - diego morelli

"“The most important thing you need to know about Saudi Arabia is this: it is full of bizarre contradictions and stark contrasts, it basically lives on paradox.” This is something that I frequently tell to foreigners who come to our country and find it difficult to understand." - Itachi from Bookmarklet

"Dan Brown's follow-up to The Da Vinci Code has sold more copies in its first 36 hours of UK release than any other adult hardback novel, say publishers." - Kol Tregaskes from Bookmarklet

Dan Brown writes the epitome of beach reading: mediocre writing, fun plots that keep you turning the pages. That said, if the paperback is out by next summer, I'll read it on the beach then. - Shannon Jiménez

Google Editions! Me Likey the Sound of this! - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick from Bookmarklet

"Google a déjà numérisé dix millions d'ouvrages dans le monde. En France, les éditions du Seuil ont engagé des poursuites contre le groupe de Mountain View pour contrefaçon. La chancelière allemande Angela Merkel s'y met elle aussi. Elle critique le projet de bibliothèque universelle numérique de Google, qui bafoue selon elle les droits d'auteur. Google a déjà numérisé dix millions d'ouvrages dans le monde. En France, les éditions du Seuil ont engagé des poursuites contre le groupe de Mountain View pour contrefaçon. Samedi, dans son podcast vidéo hebdomadaire, à trois jours de l'ouverture de la 61e Foire du livre de Francfort, qui s'ouvre mercredi, elle a souhaité une meilleure coopération internationale pour protéger les droits des créateurs et des auteurs. "Le gouvernement allemand a une position claire : les droits d'auteur doivent être protégés sur internet", a-t-elle dit. "C'est pourquoi nous rejetons la numérisation [des ouvrages de bibliothèques] si on ne tient pas compte de cette protection, comme le fait Google. Le gouvernement pèse de tout son poids pour défendre les écrivains en Allemagne". - sofarsoShawn from Bookmarklet

Difficult for Google given Germany's political and economic clout within the EU and her cultural contribution to literature. Page, Brin & Schmidt have some thinking to do. - winckel

"L'Allemande d'origine roumaine Herta Müller s'est vue attribuer, jeudi 8 octobre, le prix Nobel de littérature 2009. Elle succède à JMG Le Clezio. Elle est récompensée pour avoir "avec la densité de la poésie et la franchise de la prose, dépeint l'univers des déshérités", a précisé l'Académie Nobel. C'est le troisième auteur de langue allemande en dix ans à être récompensé, après l'Allemand Günter Grass, en 1999 et l'autrichienne Elfried Jelinek, en 2004. Née le 17 août 1953 à Nitchidorf, dans la province de Banat en Roumanie, au sein de la minorité allemande des Souabes, Herta Müller a étudié la littérature allemande et roumaine entre 1973 et 1976 à Timisoara. Après quoi, elle devient traductrice dans une usine de machines industrielles. Proche dans sa jeunesse d'un groupe d'écrivains germanophones perçu par le régime de Nicolae Ceaucescu comme un "ferment d'opposition", elle est licenciée parce qu'elle avait refusé de collaborer pour la Securitate (les services secrets roumains)... more... - sofarsoShawn from Bookmarklet

//The Romanian-born German Herta Müller was awarded, Thursday, October 8, the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2009. Elle succède à JMG Le Clezio. She succeeds JMG Le Clezio. Elle est récompensée pour avoir "avec la densité de la poésie et la franchise de la prose, dépeint l'univers des déshérités", a précisé l' Académie Nobel . She was honored for having "with the density of poetry and... more... - sofarsoShawn

I found my first journo to follow: Charlie Brooker: http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile... writes abut tech and entertainment for the Guardian and was great on last's week's BBC Radio 1 Review Show: http://ff.im/8U14q. An example of one of his articles I enjoyed is here: http://ff.im/8TPA4 - Kol Tregaskes

For TV criticism, I like Alan Sepinwall. Politics, non-blogger columnists: Krugman, Taibbi. - Andrew C

Thanks to Sean McBride - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick from Bookmarklet

Amazing images. - Sean McBride

Painful, and makes you sweaty? - Mark H

Fo' shizzle - Mitch

Usually I sleep dreamlessly, but tonight I had a dream! And when I awoke I thought of this article. - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick

waiting for the Red book. - darwin|1q84

Two of my favorites were: Then: Declaration of Independence Now: The Pursuit of Happiness: How to get control of your continent and have fun doing it! And this: Then: Quotations from Chairman Mao (or "the Little Red Book") Now: You're Telling Me Comrade! Hilarious but helpful sayings from China's Best Selling Author - Gladstone from Bookmarklet

What books would you bring if you were going to be stuck on a tropical island? Did I mention you were going to have to wear a flourescent orange jumpsuit and have water poured into your nose every day? - Gladstone from Bookmarklet

It's a rare occasion when I find a good article via Twitter's trending topics. - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick

Great post. I wonder what this means for the future of book borrowing/sharing. I get a lot of pleasure from sharing books with friends (not to mention a lot of knowledge)... would be disappointed if DRM prevented this =\ - LivingSocial

Explain why you found it useful. - today's Plinky question: http://www.plinky.com/prompts... - Kol Tregaskes

"What Anne Heller recognizes, that few others have, is that Rand was a nineteenth century romantic novelist living in a twentieth century, post-war world; a world fixated on existentialism, abstract expressionism, anti-heroes, atonal music, psychoanalysis, relativism, pragmatism, protest and dogma. Rand provided compelling explanations for all of these phenomena, which stood opposite the world she spoke for and that originated the language in which she spoke." - Gladstone from Bookmarklet

Books books books! Me Likey! - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick from Bookmarklet

Might not be as professional as all those actors etc. at http://etgarkeret.com/audio... but since it's Etgar himself, it lets you feel how he relates to his own text. - ĎÚβĨŐÚŚ Dod from Bookmarklet

"An early review of part of the Eoin Colfer-penned sequel to Douglas Adams’ Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Galaxy series has panned the book as not being very funny." - Jason Huebel from Bookmarklet

"E-book readers, emails and other such digital facilities are making paper redundant to an extent. But the one area that I’m not ready to compromise is the Newspaper. My morning ritual of fixing my coffee and curling up with the papers is under threat from the In Newspaper. Yeah, yeah, it does have the perks of an inbuilt alarm clock and fresh content from a choice of global papers, but imagine carrying the flexible display to the loo, where many of us read it while we take a crap!" - Kol Tregaskes from Bookmarklet

"If you consider yourself a book reviewer or an “influential readers” then I have review copies of my second novel available. What’s an influential reader? If you publish your views in any publication such as a blog, podcast or other media, have a book club or buy books for a library, then I’d be happy to send you a copy. If you’d like to help out in some way so you can get a copy, but you don’t see any of those being you, I’d still like to hear from you." - Mark H from Bookmarklet