BookCamp is an informal unconference. This means participation and conversation is what we will strive for, rather than a more static event with formal presentations. So if there is something you want to talk about, now's the time to let us know. Here's how the day will work, more or less:

 

1. There are roughly 20 session spots, 50 minutes each, with 4 simultaneous tracks

2. recommended format: 15 minutes or so of context, intro, then opening the discussion with the group

3. The Organizing Team has filled in 10 great sessions (see Fixed Sessions)

4. The remaining 10 spots will be decided by you, here's how: 

a. if you would like to lead a session, please post below by May 18 (questions? please send an email to: hugh@bookoven.com)

b. make sure that you include the session name, a brief description, and your name (as session moderator)

c. on May 19, we will collect feedback on which sessions people would like to see

d. we'll announce the final schedule on May 25

 

FIXED SESSIONS:

These sessions are fixed. For your suggested sessions, see below.

1. When every book is connected to everyone (Moderator: Peter Brantley, Internet Archive) [info & discussion]
2. The quagmire of international copyright in the digital age (Moderator: Lisa Charters, Random House) [info & discussion]
3. How to be a digital marketing rockstar (Moderator: Mitch Joel, Twist Image) [info & discussion]
4. At the intersection of video game & narrative (Moderator: Erin Robinson, Wadjet Eye Games) [info & discussion]
5. Books and podcasting (Moderator: Miette Elms, miettecast.com) [info & discussion]
6. Stories from the trenches of online bookish communities (Moderator: Hugh McGuire, Book Oven/LibriVox) [info & discussion]
7. Where are the reviews if there's no review section?  (Moderartor: Claire Cameron, writer & Steven Beattie, Quill&Quire) [info & discussion]
8. Design and digital (Moderator: Mark Bertils or TBA) [info & discussion]
9. What's a publisher for? (Moderator: Hugh McGuire or TBA) [info & discussion]
10. Listening to readers (Moderator: Connie Crosby, CrosbyGroup & Malle Vallik, Harelquin) [info & discussion]

 

SESSIONS YOU WOULD LIKE TO LEAD:

Below is a list of sessions you would like to present at BookCamp. Please add sessions until May 18. On May 19, we'll send an email for feedback to select the best set of sessions for the day... if space/time allows, we may be able to accomodate all sessions. For some ideas, scroll down.

Please write below:

a. session name

b. your name as moderator

c. a brief description of the session, issues etc.

 

Please edit this list!

• Relating Better, Ghazaleh Etezal (InternetOfLife.com) Description: Experiences are what matter, so how can we touch each other's hearts better in this age of connectivity? How can we link our streams of thought and match our identities by relating better? How can a book become a personal bible, a book of memory and experience? And how can relating better transform our way of understanding our purpose as individuals and a human family? 

 

• The Evolving Ecology of the Book, Carlos A. Scolari (University of Vic, Spain), Stephanie Troeth. Description: The objective of this session is to analyse the transformations of the book in the context of reading/writing interface evolution. To see what happened in the past could be important to think what's happening today and how this interface may evolve in the future.

   

• Toward the sBook: simple, searchable, smart, social, sustainable, scalable, Greg Van Alstyne, Bob Logan (Strategic Innovation Lab, OCAD) Peter Jones (Redesign Research) Ramon Sanguesa (Citilab, Barcelona). We live our lives split between page and screen. How can we reintegrate and enhance the experience and interconnections between networked forms and printed forms of publication? This interactive session engages ideas, solutions and critical questions regarding the coming convergence of social media, recommender systems, Internet of things, and print on demand, toward a future of publishing that may be simple, searchable, smart, social, sustainable and scalable.

 

• Death to DRM, Sean Cranbury, (Books on the Radio, Vancouver), What is the purpose of the digital book?  Is there a possible standard universal (open source) way to deliver a book to all existing/potential digital readers without limitations? who is the audience, are they willing to pay for it, if so, what's the breaking point?  Can the digital file enhance, support, inform the physical book?  Are publishers willing to go to war with their customers over digital rights management?  Is there anything to learn from Big Media vs Pirate Bay?  Here's my latest blog posting on the subject:  http://bit.ly/RzgSI

 

• Curators - Who are They, Where are They and What the Hell are They Doing?  Sean Cranbury (Book on the Radio, Vancouver)  It used to be the local independent booksellers and the weekend reviewers that held the torch to light the way but who are the contemporary arbiters of what's good, what's challenging, what's worthwhile?  What do they do?  How do they do it?  Is it blogs, libraries, big box stores, Facebook communities?  Where do we turn when we need recommendations, when we need direction, context, someone to tell us we're not crazy for loving that book.

 

• The Carrot Seed: A new model for book, author and publisher promotion Mark Blevis (Just One More Book!!) uses the groundbreaking children's book by Ruth Krauss and Crockett Johnson as a metaphor to demonstrate how the book publishing industry (authors, illustrators/photographers/artists, publishers, publicists, etc...) can use text, audio and video content as onramps to promote books, engage book readers and buyers and demonstrate thought leadership.  The session will highlight some of the many creative campaigns that can be found on the Internet including those by Neil Gaiman, Terry Fallis and the KidLit Community.

 

• Death by Bullets: Pitching Projects without Powerpoint Poisoning Michael Tamblyn (BookNet Canada, Toronto) If you want to change things, you need to find resources, gather support and turn skeptics into believers. That means you're going to have to stand up in front of people and pitch your idea. We'll talk about what audiences want, finding the right style for you (and them), the value of stories, the importance of passion, and the evil of the five-bullet slide.

 

• Kindle, Shmindle: future directions for E-books Evan Leibovitch (York University) Now that the ePub standard is (mostly) complete, it offers an open, multi-vendor, publisher-supported, DRM-optional approach to e-books that is an alternative to that offered by Amazon and the Kindle. Given that the Kindle isn't even sold in Canada (yet), is epub mature enough to stimulate ebook production in Canada?

 

• Open Source Publishing Evan Leibovitch (York University) What can the book world learn from the growing popularity of open source as a model for creative development? The meritocracy and peer-review models used to develop Linux, Firefox and other projects can be applied to book production, especially in the field of textbooks at both K-12 and post-secondary. Can these models have the same disruptive effect on publishing that they have had on computing?

 

• XML Production Workflows John Maxwell (Simon Fraser University) How StartWithWWW might make more sense than StartWithXML. This is a report on some recent R&D work at SFU's Master of Publishing program, wherein we prototyped a web-first XML production workflow with paths to both ePub and to high-quality print via InDesign CS4. It doesn't suck!

 

• Puting Print in its Place: The Importance of the Local in a World of Globalized Words Moderator: Amy Lavender Harris (Imagining Toronto)

  Description: Is there still a place for the local in a globalized literary landscape? Whither small presses, independent booksellers, local reading series, community book fairs and books engaging imaginatively with local places? In a world dominated increasingly by Amazon, big box bookstores, multinational publishers and digital print, how do we maintain a place for local literature? What happens to local stories, situated cultures, narrative traditions and oral histories? This session will explore how Toronto functions as a hub of literary innovation whose continued success will depend on how well it makes room for the local.

   

• Artefatica: An Open Publishing Experiment. Christine Prefontaine, Artefatica. Everything Artefatica produces — from original works to remixes to new versions of the classics — is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike license. The vision: Projects that bring people together around a compelling theme, spur creativity and dialogue, and contribute to the commons. Collaborative teams producing a series or artefacts — books, swag, artworks, websites, events. Readers as participants, engaging, contributing, and building on each work. But is it really possible to create books without boundaries? This session will review what we've learned in the process of creating our proof-of-concept project. 

 

• Small Is Beautiful,  Moderator: Alana Wilcox, Coach House Books & TBA. Small presses are used to working on minuscule budgets and doing guerrilla marketing, so the 'new economy' isn't so new for them. They are niche business, and engaged with their readers. Still, as the landscape changes-- financial, commercial, technological - how can small presses ensure that they remain vibrant and engaged?

 

• Discovering Books. Moderator: Craig Riggs & TBA. The web allows us to access a larger selection of books than ever, and we increasingly discover, share, and discuss books online. But are all books equally findable? What factors influence the visibility of a book, and what can we do to encourage a more open environment for search and discovery? This session starts with the example of canadianbookshelf.com--a platform-in-development for Canadian books--and then stretches out from there

 

 

 

 

THE SESSIONS BELOW HERE ARE SUGGESTED IDEAS, IF YOU WANT TO LEAD ONE OF THESE, PLEASE CLAIM IT BY POSTING IN THE "SESSIONS YOU WOULD LIKE TO LEAD" LIST ABOVE.

1. What is a book?
2. Book as social object
3. Gaming: the New Literary Frontier?
4. Interactive storytelling
5. Reshaping the editorial process for new styles of publishing
6. Open Source Textbooks - what the future holds

7.  

CONTAINERS

 

1. Mobile vs the Web
2. Kindle, Sony Book Reader and the future of paper
3. The new face of publishing  eg:  You’ve Read the Headlines. Now, Quick, Read the Book
4. 4.Digital Trends - what's happening now, where is this going, and how does it all affect publishing
5. Digital Nomads - how books connect in a world where everyone is everywhere
6. The future of audio books - a look at Creative Commons, DRM and what's next?
7. Video Books - Harper Collins launched Jeff Jarvis' book, What Would Google Do?, in video format. What is this? Does it help sell books?
8. The Evolving Book (and how we interact with it)
9. Envisioning the sBook: simple, searchable, smart, social, sustainable, strategic
10. It's not just books - an open discussion about magazines, newspapers, text books and the evolution of the printed word in multiple media channels
11. Big words, small screens - books on your iPhone, iPod Touch and Nintendo DS
12. Podcasting Your Fiction
13. Myths and misconceptions about print/web relationship
14. Digital Rights Management - godly or the devil's tool?
15. The future of self-publishing
16. Publishing newbie? Skills you need & lessons to learn in the 2.0 age
17. The Stupid Things Publishers Do - a discussion from readers, authors, book buyers (everyone except publishers, they can just listen!) about what drives people crazy about the publishing business. See: HarperStudio blog post (and ask Debbie & gang to come to BookCamp!)
18. The Smart Things Publishers Do - a discussion about the most exciting, innovative, creative things that publishers are doing, from the perspective of readers, authors, and book buyers.
19. Hire the wired: What and where publishers should be looking for the kind of talent that will save the industry from itself (or "Why your intern is doing more for your authors with their Twitter account and blog than your marketing department has accomplished in a year")
20. Publishing culture and the web - "It isn't a versus": How to advocate for web technology adoption in contexts of resistance. Explaining the metrics, ROI and why to of the web 
21. Dances with developers - how to get a tech project designed and built without losing your shirt, your mind, or your job.

 

CONNECTIONS

1. Building community to build your book sales
2. Twitter 101 - how to build loyalty in 140 characters or less
3. Turning traditional print professionals into digital rock stars
4. Social Media and the power of extending your book and author's brand into many media channels
5. Publicity in a day and age when book sections in newspapers are either being cancelled or shortened
6. What publishing can learn from online communities of book lovers (e.g. LibriVox, Bookmooch, GoodReads, Shelfari, LibraryThing, BookCrossing, eHarlequin, add more here)
7. Digital platforms for authors - does a website, Blog and Twitter account really sell a book? (looking for case studies here)
8. For musicians the website is the new album. How should authors transition their websites from marketing platform to content hub?
9. The New Curators: Trust Agents for the New Age of Book Publishing. When old-style book vetting disappears, how does a reader find that perfect book? Will book bloggers be the answer? Will indie booksellers with their highly skilled sales staffs prevail? Can online mega-retailers (ie: Amazon) perfect their automated recommendations enough to be all the reader really needs?
10. Self-publishing and Built-in Marketability. How can self-published authors thrive without the structure afforded by a traditional publisher? Without developmental editing, a marketing staff, access to retailers and industry reviewers, how can indie authors see substantial success with their books?
11. The Carrot Seed: A new model for book, author and publisher promotion

 

CONSUMERS

1. How is anyone going to make money?
2. The economics of free
3. Lesson learned from the music industry (or how to avoid the same pitfalls)
4. The Future of the Independent Bookseller
5. The changing definition of literacy
6. Creating future readers
7. Book design in the digital age
8. Schools, Libraries and Educational Facilities - how does the Digital Age change the way we learn from books? 
9. Territory copyright - who gets the revenue for digital books in a borderless world
10. Monetizing the reading experience. When content is free, what (or what SHOULD) authors/publishers/booksellers really be selling?
11. Dynamic Pricing for Digital Content based on Demand -- Feasibility and how it can help spread the word (example: Music on Amie Street)
12. Can a literary culture survive without a critical culture?