cread | read & see

While visiting a remote village in the central mountainous region of Bali that could only be reached by foot and hair-raising motorbike ride, the presence of two things surprised me. In a place where there was no running water, sewerage, electricity or proper roads, we visited a substantial Christian church built of concrete and tiles on the side of a mountain. And among the baskets of chillies and other crops being prepared for market, young people were fiddling with their mobile phones. This picture - of the phone use at least - is repeated across the developing world where cheaper, basic phones such as per-paid Samsungs, Nokias and Blackberries are prolific and now a new book reading app has been developed to bring free books to these millions of 'feature phones'. Worldreader Mobile, operating on the  biNu platform, has just moved out of the beta phase and already 10 per cent of biNu's 5 million users have accessed the app - about 107,000 in India, 60,800 in Nig...

With nearly half the Australian population struggling with basic literacy for every day life, 2012 has been declared a National Year of Reading by Australia's libraries and library associations. They are promoting all things books and reading-related in 2012 with programs and events taking place across the country and online with the aim of helping people discover or rediscover the joy of reading. In the spirit of National Year of Reading 2012, here's a look at some of the activities going on in the near future. Reading and counting It is Literacy and Numeracy week, and nationwide events include: Read for Australia – which occurred today at 2pm - a synchronised national reading of Aaron Blabey's Pearl Barley and Charlie Parsley; The Dorothea McKellar Poetry Awards, the winners of which will be announced at Gunnedah in NSW on August 31. Feast of festivals Turning the page, other events in the NYOR12 include the Melbourne Writers Festival which continues this week. Mo...