Isn’t it interesting how once you’ve used a cell phone with vibrate mode, you occasionally feel something vibrating in your pocket when nothing really is? At least, that is what now happens to me.

I’ve been wondering lately about how the college used textbook market might be able to be further optimized, but one thing I hadn’t thought of is the obvious possibility of using e-book readers.  Some interesting links on the subject I came across today:

• Amazon to Target $5.5 Billion Textbook Market with New Kindle?, TechCrunch
  
• E-Textbooks — for Real This Time?, Inside Higher Ed

I would tend to think that new formats and distribution methods for textbook e-books are more important than new devices to view them on, considering most college students use their laptops a lot, probably even in class often.

As I was setting up my t-shirt pushcart under Macy’s at Downtown Crossing this morning at about 9:30, there was someone talking on a loudspeaker to a group of people walking down Washington Street in the direction of State Street, but I wasn’t really paying attention.  Lo and behold, as I was pinning some shirts on the side of the cart, Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino walked by, not five feet away from me.  He looked at me for a couple seconds, I sheepishly smiled, and then he continued talking about the private development project at Downtown Crossing or whatever it was that he was talking about.