Since my dealings with a certain very large academic press are going nowhere fast (actually, nowhere very slowly), I think that it’s time once again to take my content creation fate into my own hands. It’s what I did with my first Independent America film when we dithered around as finalists with the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. When they finally passed on us as finalists, we just said to ourselves, the technology is there, let’s just do it!
And as that film serves as the foundation for this Storyteller Uprising “book,” it probably behooves me to continue the pursuit of disruptive technologies, platforms and processes. I would love to produced an enhanced, multimedia infused e-book, as explained in this (ironically) PBS primer to enhanced e-books:
Enhanced e-books are also referred to as rich media books, book mashups, enriched, hybrid and amplified books. The media and interactivity is provided by you, the self-publisher, who collects and integrates music, audio, video and color photo slideshows, news feeds, illustrations and background materials. You may also provide searchable text, tilt scrolling, internal and external links and Flash animations into the linear story.
I’m also encouraged by Google’s launch today of an e-book platform, which should work on pretty much any e-book reader (i.e. avoid Amazon Kindle lock-in). This video is worth watching:
With the explosion of e-reader apps on smartphones and tablets, e-books are just going to be come a hotter content platform — and more immediate. I speak publicly often. At the conclusion, I’d like to give participants a take-away from my talk. While I figure out the enhanced e-book route, I’m thinking that in the meantime, I should set up Storyteller Uprising-in-progress on Scribd. That way, folks can download it to any device that they have. I’m going to explore this fully in my upcoming Storytelling class next month (along with some new ideas and chapters with my students).
Certainly, I could pursue other publishers with what I consider a very viable project. But I’m impatient, and this content is timely. And those old filter-then-publish processes are quickly dying, so why bother playing with dinosaurs? Unless, of course, they’d like to come play with me. Jurassic Park looked like fun.
HRH Media 
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