Slashdot: Book Reviews

Slashdot: Book Reviews

Slashdot: Book Reviews

24338014 story Posted by Soulskill on Friday September 30, @05:47PM
from the rated-R-for-you-know-what dept. Game development studio Cyanide launched their real-time strategy interpretation of George R. R. Martin's acclaimed fantasy series A Game of Thrones yesterday. You can see a trailer and a few screenshots if you're so inclined. Cyanide also confirmed one of their other offices is working on a completely different RPG based on the series as well. It's still a ways out, but they say it will be "Mass Effect-style," and will pick up at the start of the first book. "True to the style of Martin's books, it will tell the story of two different characters, switching back and forth between them as their tales move alongside the events of the first book (and occasionally intersect with one another). None of the characters from the book will be playable, though the game's protagonists will cross paths with plenty of familiar faces over the course of the game."

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24282392 story Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday September 28, @06:45PM
from the read-all-about-it dept. eldavojohn writes "As a web developer in the 'Agile' era, I find myself making (or recognizing) more and more important decisions being made in developing for the web. Scalability Rules cemented and codified a lot of things I had suspected or picked up from blogs but failed to give much more thought to and had difficulty defending as a member of a team. A simple example is that I knew state is bad if unneeded but I couldn't quite define why. Scalability Rules provided this confidence as each of the fifty rules is broken down in a chapter that is divided into what, when, how, why and key takeaways. A strength of the book is that these rules cover all aspects of web development; but that became a double edged sword as I struggled through some rules meant for managers or technical operators." Read below for the rest of eldavojohn's review.

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24282078 story Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday September 28, @06:00PM
from the give-it-a-number dept. First time accepted submitter MastaBaba writes "I want to move my personal reviews (of books, games, music and films) from my website to an online product review website. However, I would like to be able to bulk upload my existing reviews and I would require my reviews to be downloadable by me in CSV, at any time in the future. Goodreads allows for import/export of book reviews, and IMDB allows you to export your ratings, but what about game and music reviews? What website aggregates consumer reviews of (all) products, while allowing for each individual user to easily import and export his own reviews?"

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24258190 story Posted by Soulskill on Wednesday September 28, @02:09AM
from the words-are-dangerous dept. destinyland writes "The American Library Association released this year's list of the most-frequently censored books. (Included in the top 10 are two best-selling novels — Twilight and The Hunger Games — as well as Aldous Huxley's Brave New World.) The annual list celebrates 'the freedom to read and the importance of the First Amendment,' according to the library association, highlighting 'the benefits of free and open access to information while drawing attention to the harms of censorship.' Interestingly, seven of the ten most-censored books are now available on Amazon's Kindle — more than twice as many as last year."

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24200846 story Posted by samzenpus on Sunday September 25, @03:56PM
from the getting-in-on-the-game dept. Rumors abound that Amazon wants a taste of the tablet market and will unveil a Kindle Tablet later this week. The prevailing thought is Amazon will offer a device that will cost under $300 and will tether closely to its music, movie and digital book content. From the article: "Amazon has brand recognition, a bevy of existing loyal Kindle e-reader owners, and a Web-based e-commerce platform that includes one-click access to buying e-books, movies, digital music downloads, its own Android app store, and streaming media catalog. That adds up to Amazon being uniquely suited to go head-to-head with Apple in the tablet market and become a formidable competitor across the industry."

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24111294 story Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday September 21, @06:15PM
from the read-all-about-it dept. brothke writes "When it comes to a physical crime scene and the resulting forensics, investigators can ascertain that a crime took place and gather the necessary evidence. When it comes to digital crime, the evidence is often at the byte level, deep in the magnetics of digital media, initially invisible from the human eye. That is just one of the challenges of digital forensics, where it is easy to destroy crucial evidence, and often difficult to preserve correctly." Read on for the rest of Ben's review.

bookreview

24109758 story Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday September 21, @04:02PM
from the unleash-the-biography dept. macwhizkid writes "After signing a major book deal for his autobiography, Julian Assange backed out (allegedly worrying about self-incrimination) but failed to return his £500,000 advance payment. The publisher is understandably unhappy with this outcome, and intends to publish the 'world's first unauthorized autobiography' from an early draft Assange submitted. The book will be in stores tomorrow, but I'm still hoping it'll be published early on WikiLeaks..."

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24109544 story Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday September 21, @03:20PM
from the adapt-or-die dept. destinyland writes "Amazon announced this morning that they're making Kindle ebooks available for free in America through 11,000 local public libraries. 'We're thrilled that Amazon is offering such a new approach to library ebook...' said one Seattle librarian, and one Kindle blog listed out the top advantages to having them available in libraries."

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24079386 story Posted by timothy on Tuesday September 20, @12:30PM
from the wish-those-games-didn't-bore-me-so-quickly dept. An anonymous reader writes "In an interview with Forbes Magazine, Neal Stephenson says the 'Metaverse' he created in his seminal novel Snow Crash missed the point — and that video games like World of Warcraft are the true future of cyberspace." Forbes writer David Ewalt seems taken with Stephenson's new book, REAMDE, which I'm looking forward to getting my hands on.

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23879350 story Posted by Soulskill on Monday September 12, @08:05PM
from the at-least-they're-consistent dept. An anonymous reader sends this excerpt from Ars Technica: "With the planned settlement between Google and book publishers still on indefinite hold, a legal battle by proxy has started. Google partnered with many libraries at US universities in order to gain access to the works it wants to digitize. Now, several groups that represent book authors have filed suit against those universities, attempting to block both digital lending and an orphaned works project. The suit is being brought by the Authors' Guild, its equivalents in Australia, Quebec, and the UK, and a large group of individual authors. Its target: some major US universities, including Michigan, the University of California system, and Cornell. These libraries partnered with Google to get their book digitization efforts off the ground and, in return, Google has provided them with digital copies of the works. These and many other universities have also become involved with the HathiTrust, an organization set up to help them archive and distribute digital works; the HathiTrust is also named as a defendant."

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23863798 story Posted by timothy on Monday September 12, @11:08AM
from the buy-one-mitnick-get-one-free dept. Last week, you asked Kevin Mitnick questions about his past, his thoughts on ethics and disclosure, and his computer set-up. He's graciously responded; read on for his answers. (No dice on the computer set-up, though.) Thanks, Kevin.

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23864436 story Posted by samzenpus on Monday September 12, @10:25AM
from the this-book-will-self-destruct dept. First time accepted submitter ni5dotcom writes "Amazon is soon going to launch an e-book rental service soon for US customers, according to The Wall Street Journal. Publishers, however, have shown mixed reaction to this decision so far. From the article: 'Amazon is believed to have offered book publishers a large fee for joining the service. However, the negotiations are said to still be in their early stages. The Seattle-based technology company, which is expected to imminently launch a tablet device to rival Apple’s iPad, has also said that the digital ebook library would feature older titles and be accessible to those who pay for $79 a year for Amazon Prime, the service which allows people unlimited two-day shipping and films and TV shows on demand.'"

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23741408 story Posted by samzenpus on Thursday September 08, @09:54PM
from the would-you-like-some-noise-with-those-words? dept. Zothecula writes "There's no doubt that a soundtrack can significantly enhance the immersiveness and emotional impact of films and TV programs. But can some audio accompaniment do the same thing for books? New York City-based startup Booktrack thinks so and has released an iOS app — with an Android app also on the way — that adds soundtracks to eBooks. As the user reads they can listen to ambient background noise relevant to the book's current setting, specific sound effects synchronized to the text as it is read, and music. But does a soundtrack 'boost the reader's imagination and engagement' as the company states, or does it just create another distraction to be overcome when delving into a book on the bus on the way home?"

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23727524 story Posted by timothy on Thursday September 08, @01:14PM
from the mussolini-would-be-proud dept. theodp writes "In a deal indicating all sides appear ready to call a truce, the San Jose Mercury News reports that Amazon.com is offering to back down from its referendum drive to repeal an online sales tax in exchange for a one-year moratorium on collecting the tax. Under the deal, Amazon would agree to begin collecting the tax from California residents in September 2012, unless Congress takes action on Internet sales taxes before then. The development comes a day after a NY Times editorial ripped Amazon over its sales 'tax dodge.'"

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23643270 story Posted by timothy on Monday September 05, @02:22PM
from the not-yet-for-the-daily-commuter dept. cylonlover writes "On August 12, electrical/aerospace engineer and helicopter pilot Pascal Chretien took to the sky in the world's first untethered, fully electric manned helicopter flight in a prototype machine that he designed and built almost entirely by himself within a 12-month development period. In his 2-minute, 10-second test flight, Chretien beat aviation giant Sikorsky into the record books — but it was not without significant risk. As the man himself puts it: 'in case of crash I stand good chances to end up in kebab form.'"

technology transportation electric

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