Will social media and aggregated preferences sweep away book reviewing and literary culture? There’s nothing new about the death of literatureThe writer Caleb Crain is unhappy about “the intrusion of counting into the life of literature”. He believes that big data and predictive-taste algorithms are cutting humans “out of the loop”, and that social media are undermining our faith in “the mental states of other people” when those inner states aren’t acknowledged in tweets and likes. It seems we are mired in “a new kind of disenchantment”, he says, which is devolving our sense of literary merit. As big data blurs personal opinion into preference aggregates, and as Twitter-propelled article-surfing destroys reviewing communities and the authority of critics alike, Crain contends, we have no choice but to “declare war on counting”. So that, you know, “literature will survive”. Related: Computer says no: Amazon uses AI to combat fake reviews Bad criticism in public is a nuisance. Does it spell the end of days? Hardly [S]uddenly the cosmos seems like one vast plan after all, patterned in such a way that the novel you’re reading at bedtime connects to your astronomy lecture, connects to what you heard on NPR, connects to what your friend discusses in the cafeteria at lunch – and then briefly it’s as if the lid has come off the world, as if the world were a dollhouse, and you can glimpse what it would be like to see it whole, from above – a vertiginous magnificence. Continue... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2015-08-06 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Written By: Charlotte Williams The Publishers Association [PA] has attacked the culture secretary's decision to allow communications watchdog Ofcom to "delay" the Digital Economy Act. Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt announced yesterday [1st February] that Ofcom is to assess whether the Act's... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-02-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Written By: Charlotte Williams John Blake has acquired world rights in the "candid, harrowing and often hilarious" autobiography of "Benidorm" actress Crissy Rock. Editor-in-chief Michelle Signore bought the rights through Ken Douglas at MCLA, with John Blake to publish on 12th March. This... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-01-31 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Sanchia Berg reports on the publishing company Pearson who have bought a majority stake in an Indian online tutoring company Tutorvista Continue reading at BBC News
[ BBC News | 2011-01-21 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Simon & Schuster requested that journalists and other writers not comment if asked whether they were responsible for the novel O, about a fictional 2012 presidential campaign. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2011-01-19 00:00:00 UTC ]
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