Amazon is going to begin publishing fanfiction through Kindle Worlds, which is an offshoot of their self-publishing arm. I don’t write fanfiction, though I do appreciate both its authors and the idea of it. So I don’t know if I’m the best one to weigh in on this shit, so I will stae that I like the idea of these talented folk being recognized. Or not recognized. You know, based on the quality of their work.

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Another avenue has opened up for independent funny book mind-makers. (What?) Kindle has rolled out their Comic Creator, which allows people to convert their comic books into Kindle-format electronic somethings. Like all things given to us by The Man, you have to share a bit of the profit. But it’s got to be good for getting your name out there, I assume?

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The most highlighted Kindle book passage of all time is from…Hunger Games. Yup. I’m not even going to be bitter. I’m not.

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Here’s a bit of ingenuity for you. Hacker  Andrew D’Angelo  has hacked the Kindle’s free 3G connection and gotten it to function as a tethering sumbitch. Pretty outstanding.

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I didn’t even know what there was an Amazon Kindle tablet in the works. This marks me as naive, stupid, some combination of the two, and also a silly assholes. Now I know.

And I have details.

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I worry about the death of physical books. I do, because I like beating them to a pulp, carrying them around with me, writing in the marginalia. My worrying today was exacerbated:

via boingboing:

Amazon today released an announcement boasting that sales of the Kindle device have tripled since the unit price dropped from $259 to $189. And with that, a related piece of news. Founder Jeff Bezos: “While our hardcover sales continue to grow, the Kindle format has now overtaken the hardcover format. Amazon.com customers now purchase more Kindle books than hardcover books–astonishing when you consider that we’ve been selling hardcover books for 15 years, and Kindle books for 33 months.”

Sweet Jesus Christ. I simultaneously embrace and fear the forthcoming Intangible Apocalypse. I love the idea of collecting an entire library in a slab of plastic. But I also love physically flipping through books. I love the idea of electronically searching for a term at lightning speed. But I also love the smell of books, and writing in them. Actively engaging the text.

I’m torn.

In the end, I don’t think the decision is going to be left up to me.