The physical book -- the tip of the iceberg

An aha moment for me recently. Two unusual books I have read recently have significant online presences. Rant has a fairly rich site with a lot of content related to the author and the book. Nothing that really changes the book experience, but some useful supporting materials.

The Raw Shark Texts is a much deeper experience – Steven-Hall.org. I can see now that reading the book has only given me a facet of the story, there is a tremendous amount of additional discussion and material online, some of which may be very material to the story and the experience. The physical book is truly just the tip of the iceberg.

I just happened to stumble on the Raw Shark Texts web info, I was looking for the author’s email to send him a note asking about the quality of the Kindle version.

And now I wonder why the Kindle version can’t be more than just a rerendering of the physical book. Why can’t it be a subscription to the ongoing content stream? I’d pay more.