Binding the Electronic Book: Design Features for Bibliophiles

Abstract

This paper proposes a design for the electronic book based on discussions with frequent book readers. We adopted a conceptual framework for this project consisting of a spectrum of possible designs, with the conventional bound book at one difference pole, and the laptop computer at the other; the design activity then consisted of appropriately locating the new electronic book somewhere on this spectrum. Our data collection consisted of a web-based survey and two focus groups, all of which used a set of questions based on five human factors, to collect information on the opinions and practices common to graduate students in English and other frequent readers. Our goal was to identify features considered crucial by frequent book readers. We addressed the goal of incorporating these features by developing an electronic book design called the Bi Sheng, which attempts to accommodate the significant features of conventional books while adding functionality derived from the electronic form of the text.