Are books dead? An interesting debate

Yes I have heard that before.

I also heard that computers would mean a saving in paper, and that CDs would kill vinyl.

While it remains to be seen, I'll wait until a new trend becomes more widespred - that  of companies shutting off their service, leaving kindle users high and dry without the text they paid for.

http://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/17/some-e-books-are-more-equal-th...

There is a growing list of stories like that if you start searching. As well, there several large publishers want to make the digital text they sell to libraries self-destruct after a few loans:

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/this_library_e-book_will_self-destr...

Never mind that my eyes much prefer the printed page, and some times I like to dog-ear, mark-up and take books camping. Something tells me this technology is more of an improvement for the publishers than for the readers.

(sorry for the delay , and cross-posting. I was writing this in two parts)

As for the predictions, I wouldn't be so hasty.

For one thing, it speaks only to people who have computers, internet and electricity.

Secondly, it ignores that our modern conception of an author is a pretty recent thing. I don't think Shakspeare made a living selling books - but producing plays. Dickens was a serial writer, and also a performer.And many artists survivved through patronage - manly private - and many still do - through private and public.  And even the golden age of such genres as science fiction was not in hardcover, but in the pulp press. Just like early TV, which had an even more openly dependent relationship with advertisers than a lot of TV is now.

And the biggerst unknown is that the whole system of distribution, production and copyright is in a state of flux - or more accurately in a state of war.

Given how we seem to be running through technologies I wouldn't assume this new change is static.

Both articles are very interesting. Where they stop, I think, is in foreseeing the relationship between the public and the artist. Sure, art can be produced in a sweatshop. Musak was supposed to kill creative music too, and I remember when bars stopped booking live bands and brought in canned music in the age of disco. But does that mean art is dead? Because ultimately that is where that equation leads.

All I would say is that we are heading into unknown territory. But I wouldn't  say it ever was easy for artists to make a living. There are plenty enough of them who spent their lives in poverty, or created works despite great financial and technical difficulty - or weren't published until after their death The notion that anything will automatically spell the end of art is, I think more based on our idea of instant gratification than the real world.

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radiorahim wrote:

... we shouldn't think of copying as "piracy" or "theft" as infotainment industry types would like us to.

 

Right. We should think of it as people volunteering unpaid time to popularize products.

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And as has been said, not all artists are opposed to free distribution.Most of the real hard attacks in this war have not been made by artists, but by labels and publishers - people who have little to do with the actual creation of the work. I have no problem with artists determining the restrictions that can be placed on their work. That is not the whole picture of what is going on here.

There are some artists who have thrown their lot in with the infotainment industry...the old-fashioned "what's good for General Motors is good for America" line of argument...but yes...artists are breaking from this idea...and it's good for artists and good for fans.

On the question of killing art, the OP reminds me that we tend to think of art as a finished product in isolation (which when it comes to posterity, is true) .

But in many cases the story behind a work - from Caravaggio to Orson Welles -  is as interesting than the piece itself.

And while I appreciate the question raised - that artists deserve to be able to sustain themselves through their art - ultimately the question is whether money is more powerful than art.

(edit)

And really the only difference here is that we are talking about established artists in established economies.

How is this any different than the discrepancy between financing an distribution for black artists, and the white artists who used and were inspired by their work, or to use another example, the differences between artists from other cultures and the "world music" fusion artists who used their art. 

The only difference is that in this case, we see this as something caused by a new technology which threatens us and what our idea of an artist is. But it has been going on forever in one form or another.

And there was that artist (trying to remember his name) who found himself in infringement of his own work. He did not copyright it on principle, but the Hurrington Post did so. So when he posted it on youtube at one point they issued a takedown order.

Michelle wrote:

This is a really interesting debate.

This guy says books are dead, and so is making a living from writing:

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Will books, as we know them, come to an end? Yes, absolutely, within 25 years the digital revolution will bring about the end of paper books. But more importantly, ebooks and e-publishing will mean the end of "the writer" as a profession. Ebooks, in the future, will be written by first-timers, by teams, by speciality subject enthusiasts and by those who were already established in the era of the paper book. The digital revolution will not emancipate writers or open up a new era of creativity, it will mean that writers offer up their work for next to nothing or for free. Writing, as a profession, will cease to exist.

This guy says that, yes, printed books are dead, but that the death of writing as a profession is baloney:

Disregarding his flat-out wrong assumption that most artists earn living wages in the first place, the digital revolution has no doubt hurt industries unprepared for it. That can be proven.

After browsing through a 'Coles' outlet recently, I'm not at all convinced that the peddling of hard copy nonsense is anywhere near on the wane. I think e-writing as a medium though will likely undergo significant adjustments in the years ahead.

There already exists an electronic market for the same old and new titles being churned out on paper. Quite a significant market of people however; have taken up with the sort of online and electronic writing that has had a rather difficult time to say the least in gaining widespread exposure, or any exposure at all beyond smalls circles...stuff that doesn't exactly correspond to what is being shown on the evening news, or in the morning paper, at the bookstore chains, or the stuff they'll sell in kindle format. We're already witnessing a saturation of so called 'dissident' websites, which are essentially and in nearly every instance becoming for-profit clearinghouses displaying an assortment of writing talents, all with something to gripe about. We've already seen the placements here and there for awhile.

And if we're not already completely stupefied by the sheer repetition, we're should also have experienced by now an intensified migration of hacks from the traditional media...the ones put out to pasture by downsizing, by the redundancy created by consolidations and mergers, or by drifting along with the speculation that the corporate world has already learned to embrace - that this is a frontier of growth....it'll be cheap to produce and market in mass quantities. Another corporate heaven in other words.

Soon we'll be left wondering where the truth went, like trying to follow a particular stripe in a herd of zebras, if we can still recognize it at all.  But paper will be around for some time to come.  Coke didn't disappear when they invented Pepsi...and likewise with cheap Big 8 cola.

What's in store for the poorer kids, one wonders? Perhaps if teachers' salaries (and perks) can be held at the current level, school libraries can again be stocked with a grand assortment? The e-book/public library association isn't turning out worth a damn.

@ Michelle

I agree. I think publishing houses are just trying to cash in on the self-publishing market, which already exists, and they aren't doing anyone a favour.

There is an important distinction between book and periodical publishing, and that it advertising, which I think is the main thing that will keep print alive, because to some degree it is necessary. And I think print advertising always will be necessary. 

Unfortunately right now it  seems to be devolving into ad rags, at least in our area, but in some ways it is turning back into a healthier form of media that existed before the rise of big publishers.

And I'd say many books already do have a pre-release. It is not uncommon for an abridged version to be published in a newspaper or magazine, and nowadays that is usually online as well as in print. As well, we now have writers' festivals, and media - particularly on radio - devoted specifically to literature.

Whether it will turn into what you suggest - a vetting process - is hard to say. But we alredy have that with movies. So why not? But again, that would be the side of the business that is geared  more to making money and pleasing the public than it is to creating art (though really, most things are realistically a balance of all three).

I posted not too long ago that the fellow who bankrolled the first of three parts of the "Atlas Shrugged" movie might not make the last two parts because it was a bomb and he doesn't want to lose money. One instance in which I don't mind money trumping art.

One thing I don' tthink was mentioned in either article was the role of grants and patronage in literature nowadays. I know it is not enough, but it is significant in a conversation of whether or not writing will survive.

I have read 12 books so far in 2012 and will be finishing another this evening. Ms. C and I read over 100 books each per year. They are far from dead in our household.

Yeah there's nothing like the feel of freshly killed old growth tree in my hands. There is no substitute for the smell of old downtown book store to keep me alert while reading Shakespeare and Nietzche in morning. Thinkin' on knocking out the bay window in my living room and putting another bookshelf there to add R factor to my wall, I love the aromatic scent of shredded tree flesh, book glue, and old cigar smoke that much, acshully.

Jonathan Franzen wrote:

"Someone worked really hard to make the language just right, just the way they wanted it. They were so sure of it that they printed it in ink, on paper. A screen always feels like we could delete that, change that, move it around. So for a literature-crazed person like me, it's just not permanent enough."

He's a lucky man to have had good editors (or to be one himself).

A friend of mine once asked me to proofread a non-fiction manuscript of his in advance of a second printing. He just wanted another pair of eyes, as he didn't trust the publisher's editors. It was full (I mean full) of errors of all kinds that the original editors had not caught - besides stylistic clumsiness which a decent editor would have recommended improving.

Someone was "so sure of it that they printed it in ink, on paper." And yet it changed. So all the early adopters were stuck with their flawed edition. Wouldn't it have been cool to be able to send them a url where they could download the updated firmware for their tome?

Paper is humanity's arrogant declaration of supremacy over trees. Let us coexist, I say. We have nothing to prove.

I thought the bullshit  predictions of computer technology  ending the waste of paper were disproven as false (and then some) long ago. THis argument is sooooo 1980s.

Sorry. I like books. Real books, If for no other reason, they keep my walls warm, no one can issue a takedown order against them, I can dog-ear, mark up and lend them, or take them on a canoe trip,  and they still work when the power goes off.

An d when I am really done with them I can give them to the thrift store or use them for kindling.

"Instead of signing out a book from the library, eventually one might be able to sign out an infernal ebook and download the selections from the library's website...with IP protections and such considered."

IP?   I think you mean the much narrower category of "copyright".

Did you say "Intellectual Property"?   It's a Seductive Mirage

John Sullivan has an interesting article on the so-called "lending" features of current e-book readers

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It turns out that "lending" to them means a user can — if the publisher permits it — give a book to another person enrolled in the same ebook system (Kindle users can't lend to Nook users, or vice versa), for a limited and preset time. During that time, the original user may not access her own copy — even though it still exists on her device. This charade can be executed one time ever per book. In order to receive the book, the lendee has to register with the authorities at whichever company the book was purchased from, divulging various bits of personal information and allowing the company to track her reading list (which is then also available to subpoena by law enforcement).

Lending:   A Solved Problem

I'll stick to dead tree books until DRM (Digital Restrictions Management) is history.

radiorahim wrote:

I'll stick to dead tree books until DRM (Digital Restrictions Management) is history.

What about pre-1923 books - there's no DRM on those - you still insist on murdered trees?

radiorahim wrote:

 Did you say "Intellectual Property"?   It's a Seductive Mirage 

Yes, that is what I meant....pertaining to people and organizations who's job it is to consider such things, libraries for instance.  Personally I could care less about it.

Gaian wrote:

What's in store for the poorer kids, one wonders? Perhaps if teachers' salaries (and perks) can be held at the current level, school libraries can again be stocked with a grand assortment? The e-book/public library association isn't turning out worth a damn.

Leaving children out of consideration has bothered me for some time...but then I've seen the condition of school libraries for many years now.

The choice of Apple, whose third-world minions are kept from harm by spreading nets around the higher buildings, is something I commented on last year.

SJ, [url=http://wsws.org/articles/2008/oct2008/ndp-o02.shtml]I think this[/url] is a working link to the article you cited.

Well, I don't know if these sort of alignments have been tweaked during the last little while, and if so our lack of visibility in that respect is likely the result of it having become lost within the general omerta of oppositional politics in recent years.  But we're getting well beyond fancy book learnin now.

NDP Platform Highlights Fiscal Responsibility

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The NDP platform is well to the right even of what the social democrats advanced during the 1960s and 1970s. Nowhere does the NDP speak of placing important companies or sectors of the economy under state ownership. It promises to balance the federal budget in every year of its rule. Layton has attacked the Conservatives for "fiscal irresponsibility" for claiming that they can combine increased "targeted" spending on families and the military with significant tax cuts. And whereas traditionally the NDP has called for Canada's withdrawal from NATO and NORAD, Layton advocates that Canada press for some kind of vague "reform" of the US-led military alliances.

One thing has remained permanent in the NDP's policy positions even as capitalist globalization has rendered impotent all programs of national reformism-the assertion of an economic nationalist posture that has as its ultimate logic the promotion of protectionism, trade war, and inter-imperialist rivalry. This orientation has only served to weaken the working class in its struggles against capital as it pits workers of one country against their class sisters and brothers internationally in a fratricidal struggle for an ever-dwindling number of jobs, wages and benefits. Invariably, the union bureaucracy has spouted this nationalist poison, while collaborating with employers, in the name of saving "Canadian jobs," to impose concessions, speed-up and job cuts. Layton's promises to repeal the softwood lumber deal with the United States, institute "Buy Canadian" federal government procurement regulations, and re-negotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is designed simply to benefit certain sections of big business at the expense of others.

"Viable"  "sustain" and "nihilism" are contradictions in terms, actually. 

Though on a nihilist note, there is also the fact that much of what is currently on paper from the past century or so is going to quickly disintegrate because of the acid paper it has been printed on. 

In any case, I think a good exercise for those arguing about the wastefulness of books would be to go to any paper recycling depot and look at what is actually in those giant pressed cubes. Most of it is packaging and newsprint. 

Again, not to say that ebooks might not be a better option, or a valid one if a person prefers it, I just think that when it comes to the killing trees argument books are far behind magazines, and even further behind flyers, cardboard packaging, and other paper products.

And we have to look at the other side of the equation - the power, and the plastic, metal and other materials that go into making computers. 

And also, who can afford to buy them. 

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What about pre-1923 books - there's no DRM on those - you still insist on murdered trees?

I have a GNU/Linux powered netbook computer.   I'll read my non-DRM'ed ebooks on a computing device where I have complete control over the software that runs on it.   There's no chance of some e-publishing conglomerate accidently deleting my files.

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@Michelle: Do you foresee a name change to "rapple"?

There are times these days where I'm beginning to wonder myself.   I've begun referring to those on the left who give the Apple Corporation a free pass as the "iLeft".

Before in fact there were the Trudeaumaniacs.  They liked to sport their leftish creds in a way.  The whole concept just adopts different names from time to time...like the liberal 'youth' wing, or the NSNDP, or even so far as red conservatism.