Cracking the Poetry Code: In 1992, the legendary cyberpunk/science fiction author William Gibson created a collaborative poem/art piece called Agrippa (a book of the dead) in collaboration with artist Dennis Ashbaugh and publisher Kevin Begos, Jr. In the back of a beautiful noir art book created by Ashbaugh and Begos, Gibson’s poem was included as a Mac 7 application on a small diskette. Once readers ran the poem, it appeared once – and then encrypted itself, never to be viewed again. A group of academics from the University of California have slowly been unarchiving this project, bit-by-bit, in an exhaustive site called The Agrippa Files, which features a video of the poem’s “transmission,” unarchived pages, a lightbox comparing pages and piles of interviews and academic papers. Now a mysterious new contest has popped up called Cracking the Agrippa Code. The challenge: Crack the code of Gibson’s poem using the resources assembled by The Agrippa Files. The winner will receive a copy of every William Gibson book ever written, in addition to Internet notoriety and respect for the rest of your life, probably. Check out the contest here.
Getting Sketchy at the Gladstone Hotel: A touring library of artist’s sketchbooks from all over the world will soon be coming to the Gladstone Hotel in Toronto. The Sketchb0ok Project aims to collect the work from a diverse array of artists through remote collaboration – artists sign up online for a sketchbook, fill it up and send it back to the project. The full collection of sketchbooks will be permanently housed online and in the Brooklyn Art Library’s collection, and it is currently being toured through art spaces in 15 cities. The project has gathered books from over 100 countries. It stops at the Gladstone beginning July 19, with an opening reception from 6 – 10pm, and will remain on display in the second floor gallery until July 22.
Promotion Comes Cheap: Not everyone needs a publishing house to get the word out about their first book. We really enjoyed this article listing 50 ways to promote your book under 50 dollars. While some of the solutions are straightforward (use a clever email signature! create a Facebook fan page!) they all contribute small parts of a whole and are useful promotional ideas to incorporate in any setting. And we are always big advocates of launching your book at a house party, or doing readings in friends’ apartments.
The Boatman and Bookman: Here’s a funny and weird mini-doc about Paddy Screech, who owns and lives on a Dutch barge somewhere in London and operates a floating bookstore called Word on the Water. As you will see, he is an interesting guy with some thoughtful views on life, love, creation, digital media and the nautical existence. Warning – there are swears!