Pulling in readers with Social Reading
What’s better than reading alone – reading together? Social reading is not a new phenomenon, and even in the digital form, various attempts have been made to pull it off over the years. From Bob Stein’s work on the topic and Kindle’s popular highlights, to platforms like Wattpad.
Last year in The Netherlands, reading tech startup Immer worked with public broadcasting organization VPRO to implement digital social reading in a new way. In their Club Lees smartphone app, one novel is made available for the entire country to read for free, and readers can choose to post either public or private social notes in the book’s margins. No matter what they choose, by the end of the month everything is gone, not just the novel but also the comments, because Club Lees is ephemeral like Snapchat.
In this talk, Immer co-founder Niels ’t Hooft will share various examples of social reading and dig into the research. Then he will present technical and design details of the Club Lees app, as well as its first results (data and learnings). Finally, he will give recommendations in case you are planning your own foray into digital social reading.