From: "Jim O'Donnell" <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2015 22:22:10 -0500


Am I the only one to think of Mission Impossible when I read:

http://mashable.com/2015/01/20/james-patterson-self-destructing-book/,

"James Patterson releases the 'world's first' self-destructing book".
Apparently you will buy it in e-form and have 24 hours to read it
(with a clock ticking down on your screen as you go).  A hardcover
edition will be published later.  This could seem like a madman's
version of Digital Rights Management, but it's primarily a sales ploy.
It's enough trouble keeping up with deal-of-the-day pricing on e-books
without this kind of speed reading incentive.  (Though I think it's
Kindle that's now timing my reading and telling me how long I have to
go.  I keep meaning to test it on the Faerie Queene and see if it can
project on a time scale of decades -- I'm thirty years in and not out
of the first canto yet.)  Movie rentals already do this, but it's
easier to project when there's a 24 hour period in which you will have
113 minutes to watch a particular film.

Jim O'Donnell
Georgetown