Kassia and Sue,
Thing is, enhanced book capabilities (someday, these may be standard) will change authoring, at least for those who want to use all the tools when ‘writing’ a ‘book.’

Enhanced CDs may have seemed to fail because they became DVDs, or portions of them.

OMG, Trumpet Winsock – I’d forgotten!

Brian, I hope to see those amazing illustrations on the web sometime.

Bob, I did wonder what the focus of yours had been. Thanks for giving us the link.

M Louisa — Great points about eretailers. My panel (I’m moderating, not speaking!) is about modern bookselling because I think this is something we don’t talk about enough.

In my house, the iPad is used for a good amount of reading, but I use my Kindle almost like an extension of my brain. The iPad user has different needs, so both devices get used heavily, just in different ways. Ah, Google. Waiting and waiting and waiting to see.

Brian and Fran — Thank you! As both of you know, you contributed to the “never thought that way” part of this post. Containers and rights are clearly things that matter to me, and you both sparked weird and interesting thoughts. In a good way!

Andrys — Yes, Random House was scheduled to be there, but it appears they (or he) did not make it. Many attendees were looking for him. Surprised the heck out of me that more big houses weren’t there.

Andrys — it was great to meet you, if only briefly. The taxi story is sadly true. I’d blame my abysmal Japanese, but the whole thing was too funny to be just that (we’d had the concierge at our hotel write out directions). Eventually we found the restaurant we wanted.

I am in the enhancements must be integrated school. In past posts, I’ve broken them out into two categories. The first is marketing material — additional bits and pieces to the story, but not integral. Then there are true enhancements, additional media that, well, enhance, the story. Without them, the story is less rich. Following along the idea of progressive enhancement or graceful degradation, the story should work in all media/formats, but the enhanced version should be the optimal experience.

But your point about revisiting the work and enhancements is one I haven’t fully considered (or, thank you for a new idea!). I’m currently mentally slotting it into my integral enhancements — where it’s perfect to deal with the story as only words, but later you want to see the whole enchilada — rather than marketing. For me, enhancements must bolster the story being told.

Thanks for the link to the hatless photo. It took me a while to realize PB was sans hat. I just put it there automatically. Mind control, I think.