I'm going to reply in the form of an anecdote but only because I suspect my habits mirror a lot of the ORA book-buying population.

In the average day, I don't pick up a book, though I have lots I could pick up. Most of them are on topics I already know something about: Perl, Java, Linux, network security, etc. I don't often buy or read books to learn something new unless I know I'm going to have to thorougly learn that skill - but most of I have to do dumb little chores - figure out how LILO works (I'm a NetBSD guy normally); figure out how to install Slackware without the luxory of a CD-ROM (hint: Zipslack then use that as the installer); write a grammar for a format I didn't previous know; learn a little Processing and a little Squeak to share the joy; ... that's been my past few weeks. When I hit a whole in my knowledge, books don't serve well. Books are too big, too broadly focused, too expensive, not readily available, and are only printed on cash-cow topics I don't care about or already know enough about.

I hear you suggesting more books, smaller books, on more topics, on topics that Borders (screw 'em) wouldn't even consider stocking (until after they become popular), and more tightly focused (perhaps "Squeak Essentials" rather than "Learning Smalltalk and Graphics Programming oh and by the way we use Squeak"). Well, hello! That's what I want! Praise be!

The suggestion of including "fun" touches on something more profound: books now try to impart knowledge, but they rope the reader off by every plastic chain, picket fence, and moral dictate ever erected in the field. This leaves the reader with an accurate view of the most common cases how the technology has been used in the past but is worthless in giving the reader a view on the interesting uses or potential future uses. These books are obsolete before they're conceived. Case in point: I like where some of the "Hacks" books are going, but the "hacks" are, well, recipies... these things are essentials, or old stand bys... they aren't hacks. A more fun-oriented book that didn't care about its shelf life would explain how to crank the power up to a full watt on common gear; it would show exactly where to put the pig tails on; it'd give the gain ratings for various industrial and commercial antennas such as the 30-footers that set that DEFCON record. Those aren't hacks either, exactly, but we're getting there. It'd list retailers that sell serial-802.11 adapters (these exist) and show how to hook up 802.11 to a BASIC Stamp processor (if you can't wire something up to an embedded controller, you can't hack). It should talk about scripting action so you can walk or drive around with an 802.11 enabled machine and have it perform actions. I'd like to see a discussion of auto-aimers - something the boring grampas with DirecTV have on their RVs. In short, I'd like a book talk about everything that people aren't doing with the technology - at least the boring people.

Right now, as a geek, books on other topics besides the topics I know aren't interesting because they suck the life out of the subject by this kind of pandering-to-the-norm that's exactly what sells a book to a publisher ("my experience shows that exactly half the population knows how to tie their shoes and the other half wants to know how!"... "Great! Let's make a book!"). Someone set up VoIP at Burning Man with a pay phone (real in every way except for the 802.11 link to a sat uplink). After reading a book on 802.11 I should be two steps away from that same idea - I shouldn't suddenly feel like I'm not way overqualified to set up WEP and download crap.

For what little its worth, I've tried to sell off-the-beaten-path ideas to publishers and I've seen them lose interest every time. I've had counter offers that sucked the life out of the idea, and I've proposed counter-counter offers. One of these is due in stores soon - but thinking back to the proposal process, I think I've tricked the publisher, Apress, into printing something bizarre - I've written a book on doing things that approximately zero people are doing right now. May I be your case study?

-scott?