A.D. Wissner-Gross & T.M. Sullivan say printing advances enable entire books on posters Codex Poste r advantages of archiving large texts in an- Imagine a b o o k on one poster, an entire volume reproduced alog form (e.g., considering the upcom- and readable on a single poster-sized piece of paper. High-resolution ing black hole of digital data). Electronic printing technology enables the unexpected condensation of vast texts ink enables a single page to display en- in this way. For properly displayed fonts, "books on poster" can also be tire books, but it remains expensive. Norsam Technologies' High Defi- legible at a reading distance of a few inches. This novel medium may nition Rosetta technology employs have profound consequences for education and literacy. electron beams to inscribe microscopic English text into nickel plates intended to last for thousands of years. However, The perceived size of a book is propor- Character readability at a fixed reading Rosetta and the more traditional micro- tional to the time taken to read it. This is, in distance is measured by rhe angle stretched film format are not readable by humans. turn, proportional to the time taken to scan beneath character features. Thus, for sufFi- In contrast, texts condensed to a 2' x 3' rapidly each line. Also, line scanning time is ciendy small character widths, the readabil- sheet of paper can be legible to the na- proportional to character width for a com- ity is surprisingly good, based on charaaer ked eye for young adults and with the mon adult scanning speed. width. Since readability scales with charac- aid of a simple magnifying glass for oth- The actual size of books is propor- ter width, it is possible to achieve this sur- ers. Given the compact size, lightweight tional to the area the text takes up. Writing prising result while maintaining legibility character, and affordable production is fundamentally two-dimensional, which at a short reading distance. With 300-dpi cost, the societal impact of this format is has led to a long history of two-dimen- (dots per inch) printing, anti-aliasing (font potentially large. sional information storage media, includ- smoodiing), sans-serif fonts, and heavy- ing hard drives and magnetic tape. Since weight paper that avoids bleed.s, works may For children we live in three spatial dimensions and re- be compressed into a surprisingly compact As children perfect their fine motor quire one for random access, it is unavoid- form factor and remain bl skills, they often take interest in small able that we densely pack information into writing, so this represents an ideal meth- two dimensions. In traditional books, ran- It's regular ink od for promoting literacy. Encouraging dom access begins when a particular page This precise format has received little at- children to read books on posters as if has been selected for reading. tention before, despite the well-known they were completing a contest or puzzle

12 WINTER 2007 netconnect makes reading a pleasurable and chal- ence. For instance, a poster listing the lenging activity, Demonstrating that caloric content of 1000 common foods dauntingiy "long" books are in fact no wotild prove useful in the office of a physi- LINK LIST larger than the size of a single sheet of cian or nutritionist, as well as in the kitch- Adoption of the Codex Book: paper can help overcome the psycho- ens of the diet-conscious. The lists of casu- Parable of a New Reading Mode logical barrier toward reading more dif- alties from international conflicts might be aic.stanford-edu/sg/bpg/ ficult works of literature. kept as personal memorials by those who annual/vl7 have lost loved ones. A SpaJiish-English Books on Poster Developing world dictionary might be posted in classrooms www.booksonposter.com More ambitiously, consider a lightweight or bedrooms for language students, or Third World airdrop, which would give in retail stores for when communication Electrophoretic Ink for All-Printed breaks down owing to a language barrier. Reflective Electronic Displays children and adults alike access to great dx.doi.org/10.1038/28349 works from the Western canon. In areas The religiously observant may use com- that are arduous to access or where educa- plete holy texts such as the Gospels, Torah, , Ergonomics in Computerized tional opportunities are insufficient, whole or Book of Mormon in order to read im- : Offices libraries of information might be made portant passages at a glance. ! www.worldcat.org/oclc/14240032 available to villages and schools tbat would Considering its utility, the single- A History of Reading otherwise never be exposed to this litera- page book may just be situated at the ; www.worldcat.org/oclc/34633305 ture. Libraries and information providers juncture of the scroll, the codex or have begun to address these needs with the bound book, hypertext, and electronic AGORA, HINARI, and TEEAl.. projects. ink. Of the early media for recording parisons among texts on widely separat- In regions where education is suf- and transmitting literature, the scroll ed pages. Moreover, codices and printed was among the most important and books consume significant cubic vol- prestigious. In the West, it was the ac- ume, evidenced by the need for research cepted format for the dissemination of libraries to expand to startling sizes. serious literature and still lives on within certain religious traditions and in the Who needs linking? virtual forms of computer software and Much more recent developments in television, where "scrolling" through the history of the book solve the prob- long documents is common. lems posed by the scroll and the codex Like the book on poster, the scroll but fall short for different reasons. Hy- permits a vast text to be written upon a pertext, developed in the 1960s, over- single surface, if not a single sheet of paper. came the linearity of text by providing However, the similarity goes awry with re- intratext links among related passages spect to random access, which is consid- and documents. Electronic paper also erably impaired in a format that requires seeks to resolve the problem of the skimming and adjusting a long document codex by using a low-power paper- in order to reference an individual pas- like display that allows the viewing of sive. Scrolls were somewhat cumbersome vast texts on single electronic sheets. to use and offered no opportunity to ap- While both hypertext and electronic preciate the relationships among widely ink present interesting solutions, they, separated passages. Julius Caesar recog- too, share similar problems with ear- The Divine Comedy nized this weakness and is said to have lier forms of media. Dante folded his scrolls accordion-style for easy Hypertext needs computer access reference, a sort of proto-codex. and, unless used under exceptional con- Every circle: The entire text of a Western clas- Caesar couid have found a better so- ditions, doesn't permit widely disparate sic printed on a 2' x 3' poster—and it's legible lution in the codex, or handwritten book passages to be compared in context yet consisting of 24 pages stitched together. simultaneously. E-ink remains expensive ficiently advanced and standard books Codices are thought to have developed and has the same problems that we have plentiful, educators and scholars can use in the first century CE. but were not fully cited with regard to hypertext. this new book format to view the over- accepted for works of serious literature for Alternatively, the book on poster all structure of a text and investigate with several centuries. While the scroll as a form can be part of an energy-friendly, low- relative ease both the visual and spatial re- did not entirely die out in the West, the tech environment. Used in conjunction lations between important lines and pas- codex proved the most popular form of with a simple magnifying glass, it also sages. By marking up the text on a single book during the Middle Ages and con- can be enjoyabiy legible. Better yet, this surface witb aids such as highlighters, and tinued in large-scale production into the form of publishing has significant po- connecting these passages, relationships early Renaissance. With the consecutive tential for the dissemination of literature can be better appreciated. Indeed, books developments of movable type, the print- and the promotion of literacy. • may be skimmed so vast works can be ed bound book, and the indexed bound summarily understood in hours. book, random access became a matter of considerably greater ease. A.D. Wissner-Gross is a Ph.D. student in the The new reference book Department of Physics, Harvard University, It still requires effort, however, to Cambridge. MA. T.M. Sullivan is a Ph.D. Posters that contain large lists can be put locate passages among often hundreds student in the Department of the History of to use in numerous ways for easy refer- of sheets of paper and make direct com- Art, Yaie University, New Haven, CT

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