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Now Arriving On the New York Subway: Free E-Books, Timed For Your Commute (betanews.com)
Brian Fagioli, writing for BetaNews:Andrew M. Cuomo, Governor of New York has announced a new promotion called "Subway Reads," which leverages the free Wi-Fi connectivity provided at the NYC subway. This initiative will help straphangers get some relief from the other nonsense by enabling them to bury themselves in a free Penguin Random House e-book short or excerpt. "As part of 'Subway Reads', Penguin Random House created a special platform to offer subway customers free access to five full-length e-shorts, including High Heat, a Jack Reacher novella by Lee Child; F. Scott Fitzgerald's classic short story, The Diamond As Big As The Ritz; 3 Truths and A Lie, a short story by Lisa Gardner; The Murders in the Rue Morgue by Edgar Allan Poe; and At the Reunion Buffet by Alexander McCall Smith," says the New York State Government.Sounds like a good thing. What's your thought?
Yes, this can help Penguin Random House get sales, but who can argue with a promotion that gets people reading books rather than play games on their smartphone? It is win/win.
If they are anything like I see in the airport book shops - crap, business books with the buzzwords du jour, typical non-fiction best sellers based on pseudoscience, and crappily written fiction - I'd have to say that games are a better distraction.
Let's face it, this is yet another method of getting our attention to buy.
AND I can download all that crap from my public library.
Our consumer based economy is getting more and more absurd everyday along with these advertisements disguised as news stories.
reads that coincide with how long it takes to drink a 32oz soda ... oh wait!
In other words, these select publishers get free advertising, courtesy of the tax payers of New York City subsidizing them. Which authors didn't make the cut and which politicians do they have to butter to get the subsidy?
Congrats to NY for this! Sure, you can subvert this by, yanno, having the files on your device already, or having a book with you, but this is an incredibly novel (pun not intended) approach to keeping people reading.
Dribble?
... before passengers start stealing the ebooks in question
Have gnu, will travel.
But it's that "other nonsense" for which we New Yorkers are riding the subway in the first place...
Wow! Thanks so much for giving me "free" access to five whole stories including two that have been in the public domain for decades!
Support Right To Repair Legislation.
Let's get all the sleep-deprived wage-slave drones reading the same things, then slowly switch them over to fascist government propaganda.
People absorbed in their portables, unaware of what's happening around them.
Pickpocket heaven!
Free second posts, timed for our ridicule. FTFY.
Just another nail in the coffin of real human interaction. Now, instead of engaging in witty banter, sharing touching and heart-rending personal experiences, and forming life-long new friendships, subway riders will all be staring at their phone screens.
Oh, wait...
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This is a neat idea, but won't it just put a lot more iPads out there in the open for the gangbangers to grab?
This would be great in Tokyo, though.
They are all free.. silly people.
People absorbed in their portables, unaware of what's happening around them.
Pickpocket heaven!
Yes, but the delta between 4.1 million people who aren't paying attention and 4.2 million people who aren't paying attention doesn't exactly change whether it's a target-rich environment.
(over 4.3 million people ride the subway every day, according to Google.)
Real lawyers write in C++
Why not bring back the poetry-in-motion ads, except make them longer?
.. read a book? i don't want to be accused of being a hipster millennial.
That's what they did in Japan. You can use your phone to read whatever you want in pretty much all subway lines. Why limit it to just crappy public wifi and a few books?
*Timed* books? What the hell does *timed* mean here? I'm suspecting something pretty gruesome.
Perhaps I've become over-sensitive, but just in case: look, when I buy a book, I'm gonna read it as often as, when and in the physical and mental position I choose to. Should that mean sticking to paper, so be it.
If *timed* means what I think it means, then you can stuff your e-books up some body cavity of yours, at your choice.
Everything is on their website:
I guess erotica has its place :)