The Fate of the Book
Back in ye olden tyme, when graybeards would dismiss supposed ephemera like safety razors and indoor plumbing, the wise and knowing liked to dismiss the dismissers. They would recollect the days when urchins barked, "Get a horse!" at motorists whose new-fangled auto radiators had boiled over. In other words, old-timer, wait a bit before prophesying the doom of anything new.
Or old?
The announcement by Amazon.com Inc. that e-book sales for its Kindle reader are outpacing sales of hardcover books inspired a New York Times writer to a reverse take on the get-a-horse theory; to wit, "The heft and musty smell of a hardcover book are one step closer to becoming relics in a museum."
That might be taking things, ah, just a bit further than facts would indicate. Though, in a down economy, it's nice to know people are buying books in any format: my own books included, I can only trust and pray. Over the past three months, Amazon says, the pace for Kindle books is 143 sold for every 100 hardcover books purchased. The company's policy is not to release exact numbers, so we don't know either the sales figures or the titles. We do have a pretty good idea that Amazon's decision to slash Kindle prices from $259 per device to a still-pretty-pricey (seems so to me anyway) $189 has stirred up some business.
The get-a-horse fraternity are no doubt aghast. Who'd read a book on a screen? Not I, but clearly some would.
I have pondered and pondered and can come up with no substantive objection to the use of an electronic reader for the consumption of information and entertainment. Maybe you and I wouldn't do it, but that doesn't make the procedure immoral or a threat to Civilization as We Know It. Nor does it cut off access to real books. I think it has disadvantages. I shall state these for the record.
For one thing, a succession of dots against a lighted background is an odd mode for the recording of the more or less permanent. One screen goes away, another succeeds it, then another, then another, then . . .
It's there but not there, this "book": hidden away, not precisely inaccessible—let's say difficult of access, unlike a book, through which you can page at will. Nor do I care for the format of one-page-at-a-time, unlike the two that a book provides. I think, in short, the standard hardcover book is the more flexible, the more reader-friendly, of the two modes we talk about here.
I've wondered likewise what you do with an e-book when you're done with it. File it away somewhere in the electronic bowels of your Kindle or iPad? But in that case don't you forget all about the thing, unlike a book you put on the shelf, alongside other books: collective reminders of knowledge acquired, joys and pleasures, sadness and sensations realized?
The library and the museum—another place crowded with tangible objects—are the symbols of civilization: places where the accumulated wisdom, not to mention follies, of our lives are on constant display, filling minds with ideas about ideas about ideas. A world without the "heft and musty smell of a hardcover book" would be an impossible kind of world in which to breathe, far less to thrive. Which is why the New York Times' grabby, overexcited forecast, mentioned above, is so, forgive me, dumb.
I see no reason that people shouldn't read Kindles or such like at the beach or the bus, if only for convenience sake. Are lovers of reading, nonetheless, really going to sit around for long stretches of time watching dots arrange themselves on a screen? Smelling warm plastic rather than pages and bindings and glues?
In a free society, consumers always get their way, so eventually we'll see about all these matters. Meanwhile, I am compelled, sonny, to cast my own ballot, upon which are hand-tooled in gold, with morocco binding, the immortal injunction—Get a horse!
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Well, I am certainly doing my part to keep the hardcovers alive and well, much to my wife's (and my pocketbook's) chagrin.
If those illiterate boffins can re-create the traditional dog ear book marker they will have their fingers on something really useful.
I am informed that hardcover book sales are up some 22 %, according to (I believe) Amazon.com. So don't go writing any eulogies QUITE yet.
I am going to check out Kindle for one reason: my ninety-three-year-old mother loves to read. She has macular degeneration and reads with strong glasses and a magnifying glass, a very tiring process for her. If Kindle can get the print so that she can read it, we will get one for her. As for me, however, I am adverse to things that whir, that need charging and that beep. The books which I have do not do that. I will stick with them.
I really like it when I order a used book and it turns out to be a volume that sat on a library shelf, say, in England, for fifty or sixty years before it got listed online. I also like it when a book I buy online still has the library card in it showing when it was checked out over the years.
I like ebooks for many reasons, but they can never replace the good old paper and ink and book, especially when the power goes out.
The Washington Times is in trouble, and the Post is becoming very slim these days. But the Examiner and Express tabloids are doing very well thank you very much. Riders on the metro rail can hide behind them. Plus, if you fall asleep with a paper in your hands, nobody will steal it. Your Kindle must be put away prior to falling asleep.
Paper is more fun, provides work for Oregonians, can be recycled, can be clipped, can wrap fish, can soak sweat out of ski boots, and feels good on the fingertips.
Plus, if you fall asleep with a paper in your hands, nobody will steal it. Your Kindle must be put away prior to falling asleep.
Best argument against Kindle, ever, only because all the other arguments do not touch the practicality aspect. Still, Kindle is one thing, even though I will hold out as long as I can. The iPad, on the other hand, has to be the single worst invention since the automobile. The iPhone is a close second.
(FULL DISCLOSURE: I have an iPhone. I do not have an iPad, a Kindle or a car. However, I recognise that this last has indeed become a necessity for a great many people; not everyone can live in a city with rapid transit.)
I bought the larger, 9.7" and just updated Kindle DX the day it came out and I LOOOOOOVE it!
I definitely appreciate books on a shelf as "collective reminders of knowledge acquired, joys and pleasures, sadness and sensations realized".
However, some books are just meant to be recycled after being read, such as many computer books.
This is not the iPad. I don't think anyone here understands what eInk is.
The problem with reading on a typical screen is reflection and as e-reader screens are not LCD but eInk technology (images stays after power is off) they can be read as comfortably as any book. This helps with reading reams of online articles and ebooks. As a programmer a lot of my reading is functional, not for pleasure, unfortunately, and the Kindle DX makes this much less painfull.
My wife gave me a Sony Daily Edition E-Reader for Christmas hoping that I would stop buying real books. I'm running out of shelf space for them, although my library, at under 2,000 volumes, is modest. I used the e-reader to read Trollope's Dr. Wortle's School, which I downloaded from Project Gutenberg, during a recent "group read" facilitated by Dr. Fleming. It has been so long since I last used the e-reader that it needs to be recharged. I continue to buy real books, which are stacked two-deep on some of my bookshelves.
Regarding e-book sales, based on the email ads that I get from the Sony E-Library, a substantial portion likely consists of Romance novels.
@Andrew, is that the Sony touch screen version? I looked at those, bad reflection problem.
There's a lot of pulp published, and it's great to know that a lot of it is being directed to eInk technology.