Olson’s Observations

DailyLit truly puts a new spin on reading by allowing users to subscribe to books via e-mail or RSS. Once the user/reader subscribes to a book DailyLit sends a chunk of the book to them each day until the book is finished. The feeds are even customizable which means each user can decide their own delivery frequency and even read ahead if they have some extra time on their hands.

How long does it take to get through a book this way you ask? Here is your answer straight from the DailyLit FAQs:

That depends on three factors. First, on how many installments are in the book (shown when you browse for books). Second, on how frequently you choose to receive emails. Third, on how often you read more than one installment (by using the “send me the next installment immediately” feature). So here is a typical example. I am currently reading Dracula, which has 187 installments and I am receiving installments on weekdays, i.e. 5 days/week. So at most it will take me 187/5 = 37 weeks. But when I am on the train or waiting, I often read more than one installment, so I usually wind up reading about 10 installments/week. This means I will finish Dracula in about 19 weeks or 5 months. If that seems long to you, try something shorter!

The initial thing that got me excited about DailyLit was that they delivered the book content via a feed since I realized how easy it would be to slide a small chunk of a book into my feed reading each day and, thus, read more books. The e-mail delivery is also great as it widens the possible audience to people that may not understand feeds (hard to believe I know but there are still RSS ignorant people out there…) or who may have feed readers blocked on their office computers.

It looks like DailyLit is currently providing older books presumably because they are part of the public domain so DailyLit doesn’t have to worry about copyright issues. Hopefully they will work out content deals in the future to get new(er) books as well since reading in this manner will likely help a lot of busy people be able to read even more. I know I would definitely pay for that service. How much I’m not sure but there is probably a market out there for this beyond me.

Kudos to Chris for the tip.