IMO Precedents: Why the Book?
Starting on a Blank Page
Last week, we announced IMO - the first physical publication we’re planning to create for The Creative Crypto. Our initial magazine offering won’t just be some typical book launch. We’re instead looking to compile all of the latest innovations in art, provenance, authentification, creative production, and so on with the book asset itself. To make sure we do embody all of the relevant and necessary components, we’ll be doing a series of ‘precedent’ articles to explain and work though our creative process.
Today, we’re looking at books themselves - why we decided to great this particular form of information and past examples of innovative publications that approach the medium in an unexpected way.
Whitepapers are too Flat
Besides being a natural progression from the ‘magazine’ model of The Creative Crypto, our goal is first and foremost to capture the gravity of the creative space in blockchain. With new companies and technologies emerging every week, the industry can seem too ephemeral and risky, relying on cheesy tutorial videos and digital PDFs to build public trust. Just as milestone works like Digital Gold: Bitcoin and the Inside Story of the Misfits and Millionaires Trying to Reinvent Money by Nathaniel Popper and The Internet of Money by Andreas Antonopoulos bring legitimacy to blockchain as a whole, we recognized the need of some volume that verified the general direction of art marketplaces, NFT collectibles, and collaborative social media.
Books Offer a Public Presence to Forward-Thinking Concepts
It’s one thing to have infinite pages of downloadable material on-screen and another to have some solid weight and authority in a reputable archive. For creative and art-oriented books for example, the MoMA Bookstore in New York is a premiere location for some CryptoArt representation.
The "Book" as a Canvas for Creativity
IMO won’t just be a compilation of stories and writing. The book itself will integrate sculptural design elements, codes, crypto Easter Eggs, and more to be in itself a story and embodiment of what is going on in the crypto space. By playing with various features that often or only sometimes appear in books - i.e. images, composition, watermarks, flip-book elements - we can begin to integrate the existing and usable technologies, platforms, and games of the blockchain world.
We’ve written before on the design strategies that help nurture engagement, including this recent article on the role of UI/UX for Narrative’s social platform. Designing and experimenting with a book structure itself offers a level of refinement that is difficult to achieve with 12pt. Times New Roman. The goal for us is to not only create a thing that appeals to and excites existing crypto users, We’re going for the inverse - create a thing compelling and engaging enough to draw new people into our domain of thinking and working. As readers look through and explore each facet of the project and ask “how was this made?”, our answer will be proudly “with blockchain.”
One incredible precedent for reimagining what a book can be is “Absence” by Howeler + Yoon, a book dedicated to the World Trade Center and made of sectional cut-outs of the towers’ footprint from top down. The architecture firm integrated the physical form of the former monument while still utilizing the typical binding and single pages that usually seem limiting in its medium.
The book made headlines upon release, offering a model for inscribing the legacy of a historic moment in a reinvented medium, without a single printed word to distract from its spatial interpretation.
A book can be much more than a pile of words.
Layout, structure, progression, reference, design, spacing - these are all critical pieces of how a book comes together and new formulas can convey new messages. Experimentation will be a primary goal over the next few months as we take in both graphic and compositional designs of creative books in the past and come up with our own chemistry.
Reading On
These are just some of the initial concepts we’re beginning to play with as we try and shape the future of IMO. Learn more about the campaign here and be sure to stay tuned for more ideation and production on our @creativecrypto account!
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Good idea. I saw someone mention on an online forum a little while back that books are irrelevant and outdated, to which I and several others strongly disagreed. Sure, there are other mediums out there with their own strengths over a physical book, but there are still benefits to books.
Unlike many digital assets which may require an internet connection and possibly account creation to give someone access, a book can be handed to someone with no further setup required.
Thank you @rhethypo! Absolutely, our hope is that this project can bridge an understanding between a familiar object (book) and a digital ecosystem (blockchain). A physical thing that someone could feel stewardship over... and collect / own / share.
As much as we sit on our phones or laptops there is something about holding a book. Our digital media seems far more ephemeral, compared to a book with it's words printed in ink.
Good luck @creativecrypto!
Well put @critday, thanks for the support!
That's cool, a unique way of doing things. Wish you the best of luck!
Thanks @rhyscn!
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STOPGreat & interesting project. I can't wait to see the evolution of this idea as I love books (with paper, touch & smel) and crypto. All the success @creativecrypto
As a longtime collector of books, I welcome your endeavor to merge the two in a new context. I love everything about books, each is a work of art from its paper, layout and text. Book art is a creative alternative for expression in a world obsessed with all things digital. I’m a touchy feely kind of person who feels fully engaged when opening the cover of a book.😉
This is a very creative idea, I like the idea of the book as a canvas for creativity. I have a couple of exhibition books that have that look and feel of being a piece of art in their own right- the material and finish of a cover play a huge part in this. Plus I am a sucker for a bit of embossing on a book cover. These things all bump up the price though.
Do I judge books by their covers? Guilty as charged.
I'm sure the content of your book will also be fantastic too!