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Comment by dhosek | Hacker News Reader

I have a vague notion that there was something along these lines in the '00s. I think I even tried reading a book with it, maybe Call of the Wild. I imagine it works great for some folks, but I didn't find it an improvement over my existing reading practices in the least and didn't continue with it.

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I bet it was https://www.dailylit.com

It was. For some reason, searching call of the wild in my gmail archive didn't turn up the emails, but dailylit found it and it was, in fact Call of the Wild (yay spectacular memory for useless details). Dailylit does have a click here to get the next installment immediately feature and I read the 37 installments over three days (it's a short book).

In the early 2000s Samuel Pepys’ diary entires from the 17th century were republished online each day online. These were absolutely gripping. Very clever use of internet publishing.

What aspect about reading fiction do you think needs improvement?

None, really. I guess really, what I found was that this was, in many way, a worse experience than I had with paper books.

Got it. It works for more as a nudge for a habit than anything.

But I am wondering what other aspects of reading I can improve for people. For example, I have in mind creating "virtual book clubs" where I match people that happen to be in the same chapter of the same book. This means that the initial reading doesn't have to be through email, it can be anyway the reader prefer.

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