Twitter is so fun.
We’ve been on it for less than a week, but the random things you stumble upon are fascinating.
My current favourite Twitter find is seenreading - www.seenreading.com The url is self-explanatory. Basically it goes like this: site creator Julie Wilson sees you reading a book, makes note of what you look like, the name of the book, and estimates where you are in it. Then she blogs about it. Creepy? Maaaybe. But kind of cool. My favourite line from the ‘about’ section on the site is simply ” Sightings must take place in the wild.”
The Twitter version, limited to 140 characters ends up reading something like this:
“Spadina. Woman. 30s. White cap. Pea coat. The Book of Negroes, Lawrence Hill (HarperCollins)”
“TODAY: Spadina streetcar. Woman. 20s. Eating dried mango. The Gabriel Hounds by Mary Stewart”
Odd? Mayhaps. But, a really cool idea. It’s a neat alternative way to see what people are reading without visiting your generic review sites, and provides you with the teeniest bit of 3rd-party-observed reader info that they would never provide you themselves.
Unfortunately, this literary voyeurism is tricky to do with audio books. Unless you have magic x-ray vision and can see the title name and track listing on someone’s mp3 player tucked away in their pocket. And sadly, I rarely, if ever, have pulled up to a red light to overhear the car next to me blaring a James Patterson audio book.
BUT, I put this to you - if you have co-workers or family that listen to audio books, spy on them and report back to us.
E.g. “Work, corner office. black hair and headphones. Freakonomics CD on desk.”
“Neighbour, mid-forties, brown hair, bad tie, red honda, pulling into driveway. The Gate House, Nelson DeMille.”
But, if your not-so-stealth skills of observation find you cheek to cheek with your boss, trying to over hear what audio book is playing in his headset - we did not send you.
