Not ebook related, but this is so interesting that I just had to post it.  From Open Culture: The great French filmmaker François Truffaut would have turned 80 today, and to celebrate, we’re bringing back a wonderful series of audio recordings — Truffaut’s lengthy interview with another legendary director, Alfred Hitchcock. Back in 1962, François Truffaut, the inspiration behind French New Wave cinema, met with Hitchcock. And, assisted by a helpful translator, the two directors talked through Hitchcock’s life and vast filmography, moving from his early films shot it Britain (Blackmail, The 39 Steps, Secret Agent), to his later Hollywood productions – North by Northwest, Psycho and Vertigo....

When I was wandering around GenCon, I quite unexpectedly came across a booth where Howard Tayler of the ten-years-old-and-still-going Schlock Mercenary webcomic was selling books, sighing autographs, and personalizing the books he sold with requested character doodles. I hadn’t even known he was going to be there, but naturally, I bought a book and had a doodle made. (Which sort of ties into a point that Michael Stackpole made in the interview with him that I have yet to transcribe—that people don’t buy books at cons as books, they buy them as souvenirs.) And then I asked Tayler...

Consumer Reports has an interview with Jeff Bezos in which he hints at the possibility of an Amazon Android tablet, coyly advising interested parties to “stay tuned.” He did insist that just because the iPad and other tablets are becoming popular solutions for e-reading, it doesn’t mean that the Kindle and other dedicated devices are on the way out. “We will always be very mindful that we will want a dedicated reading device,” he said. “In terms of any other product introductions, I shouldn’t answer.” Bezos noted that whatever Amazon did, it was always...

In this third portion of the interview, I asked about the plotting process, plans for the future, and whether Pete had been inspired by particular sources. Previously: Part One, Part Two Me: You talked in the past about how the huge plot that you've woven together in Sluggy over the years has drawn toward a close. You said you didn't want to start any new plot arcs until that was finished. What happens when it's finished? Do you start another decade-long story arc? Pete: That's the thing, I have the freedom to make the...

In this second portion of the interview, I asked about the ways Pete earns money from the comic, including Amazon and other referrals and his premium subscriber program, “Defenders of the Nifty.” I also asked about his feelings about or experience with e-books. Previously: Part One Me: How did you decide to start the Defenders of the Nifty program? Pete: There again, that's been going on so long I can't remember exactly how it started. I guess it just came from the idea of, instead of just offering donations, kind of giving a little...

It has taken me a while to get around to transcribing this, but better late than never. On May 28th, I sat down with Pete Abrams at the ConQuesT SF convention in Kansas City for an interview about his webcomic, Sluggy Freelance. Sluggy is a rarity in that it is one of relatively few webcomics that provides its artist’s entire living, and it has also been in operation for over 14 years (13 as of the interview). Abrams has been interviewed in a number of places already, and I tried to avoid covering the same territory...

USA Today has another interview with Jeff Bezos (they’re popping up all over given today’s launch of the new Kindles) in which he addresses a couple of points some e-book fans have been asking about for a while. Most notably: Q: Why doesn't Amazon support the popular "e-pub" standard used by your competitors and many libraries? A: We are innovating so rapidly that having our own standard allows us to incorporate new things at a very rapid rate. For example: Whispersync (which uses wireless connections to sync your place in a...