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Physical Books Successfully Coexisting With Ebooks
An anonymous reader writes: When ebooks experienced their meteoric rise a few years ago, many were predicting the death of physical books. Early sales figures seemed to bear that out — ebooks kept getting more popular, and physical books were on the decline. But over the past couple of years, sales for both types leveled off. Rather than simple additive or deleterious effects, we're now seeing how technology has altered the literary landscape in more complex ways. Serials are returning, authors are able to more directly keep in contact with readers, and networks are developing to keep independent bookstores afloat. Libraries are being supplemented by companies who offer free access to ebooks at certain Wi-Fi hotspots. So, given that the changes so far have been less dramatic and more interesting than predicted, where do you think the ebook/physical-book situation will be in another 10 years?
Physical book? What the hell is that? Do you mean an ebook you printed with your home printer?
I didn't think there was room in my bag for both en e-reader and a book!
love is just extroverted narcissism
E-Books are rentable from the library. even the hardware is rentable, so aside from a slight learning curve and different constraints on the total number of titles i can check out, the disruption proposed by e-books is minimal. things like library reservations or intra-library requests are also processed much more quickly, given the nature of the book being digital.
Call me old fashioned, but there just isnt a valid replacement in my world for a physical book. If its a title i truly love, (hitchhikers guide, tolkien, etc...) I'll give sincere consideration to purchasing a copy for my personal bookshelf, but reaching for an e-reader on a rainy day still has no emotional context for me like a real book would. Ereaders are simultaneously more convenient and less convenient...leave one on a plane and its inexorably more expensive than buying a used copy online, but try taking your bookshelf with you everywhere you go. Theres no clear winner.
Good people go to bed earlier.
Where space is limited - such as on a long vacation.
Where the book is really big and heavy.
But when there are diagrams/maps in a book, the ebooks fail miserably.
When I want to read in the tub, ebooks fail.
When I want something that can fit in my pants pocket, ebooks fail - but paperbacks deliver.
When I want to borrow/lend a book, ebooks make it too much trouble, but a paperback is easy.
When I want to throw a book in a backpack, paperback wins.
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To be fair, an e-reader lasts weeks on a charge. I very rarely (maybe never?) charge my old Kindle while on vacation - it certainly won't run out on the plane.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
When I can buy ebooks without respect to region, I'll hop on board. But as it stands, I can't buy books published outside my home country, and as we've seen in the past, if you take your ebooks outside the country and your reader goes on line (particularly the Kindle) it'll lock you out of your books.
On top of that, the ebooks cost more than the paperback.
Get back to me when obvious negatives aren't being piled on to ebooks.
There's a difference though. At a minimum to use a vinyl record player I have to have electrical power, a record-player that's in good working order, and a record that's playable. This is basically the same set of considerations for playing any music recorded on to a physical medium that's machine-interpreted, be it CD, tape, player-piano, minidisc, phonograph cylinder, whatever, with the exception that there are a few mechanically-powered forms (phonograph disc, phonograph cylinder, and player-piano) where there are entirely mechanical machines that come with their own issues.
To read a book I need the book, at least for approximately 50% of the day, and the other 50% of the day I'm stuck with the same constraints as I am for anything else in the form of the availability of artificial light.
For e-book readers, depending on the reader, I need a power source to at least charge, and I need to connect the reader to another device (at least minimally a computer in the retailer if my e-book reader lacks any kind of network/wifi, but most likely a computer or wifi at home). For readers that go a VERY long time I still need a light source, or for readers that work in the dark I need to be able to replace or recharge batteries frequently.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
The obvious first market for ebooks has been anything you read sequentially, like novels. Ebook adoption climbs a hill for works you need to jump around in. That grease-thumbed reference book you keep beside your workbench will be the physical book's last stand.
As the application interface improves for ebooks, some advantages of the medium will open up, such as the ability to search fast and to display complex, interactive charts. In a few years you will be able to have your reference ebook standing up on the workbench so that you can say, "Hey Siri! Play me the install sequence for the right front wheel motor starting from Step 4!"
While we wait for that halcyon day, can we at least have the Kindle app give us a straight count of 'pages left in chapter' rather than trying to compute some mythical reading time?
Are art museums going to go out and replace all of their exhibits with HDPI IPS displays? No. The displays may be far more versatile but they also do not embody a work. They simply display it. A printed book both contains and embodies the contained text. That simple visceral realness of holding an artifact contributes not only to our willingness to step into the magic circle of the book but signals the beginning of a cultural ritual.
Reading is a form of magic that is wholly contained within our culture. Ebooks are yet another step in democratizing the cultural ritual and print on demand publication will provide the methodology to fully entrench these new pieces of culture within the canonic regalia. In ten years the significance of the printed word will not fade even as access becomes more and more trivial because they are canonic to the medium itself. They are inherently part of how we understand all written language in the same way that a live performance is inherently part of how we understand music (even principally electronic musicians engage in the ritual of live music).
Authors go on book tours and connect with their reader base in other ways but the single most defining ritual in the whole of literature has been the receipt of a book. As we go forward this will always be a landmark of success as well as an important if not centrally defining artifact of the medium.
Photography did not displace painting, it displaced the cultural focus on realism in painting. It displaced painting as a medium of simple depiction of the natural world and instead brought a greater implicit understanding of visual composition and other fundimntal principles of art into the every day culture. Likewise, I think that as ebooks become more and more accessible we will see /more/ veneration for the printed medium, perhaps in ways that were previously reserved only for bibliophiles.
The cultural acceptance of technology that is simultaneously legitimized as a medium for art and developed into a nearly risk free scratch pad for personal exploration has historically brought a wider and deeper appreciation. It happened once with the desktop publishing revolution and I believe as people begin to ask themselves /why/ they prefer the printed word over the ebook a deeper understanding of the artistry of the medium will develop.
I think it already has to a degree.
There's no book nostalgia like the smell of leather-bound editions you have never bought in your life read before the baronial fireplace you have never owned.
It is always comical to read the back-and-forths over topics like this. There are benefits and drawbacks of each medium, but arguing over which one is better is like arguing over which flavor of jam is superior.
An internal system operation returned the error "The operation completed successfully.".
You're being sarcastic, right? That's exactly what they're doing, and they are lying through their teeth when they claim it costs just as much to publish an e-book, and all the people supporting the companies by claiming it costs just as much because of editing are either lying or stupidly buying the nonsense the book companies are selling.
E-books are great for a lot of reasons - I have shelves of physical books at home that I have no idea what to do with; libraries don't want them (they have too many of these kinds of books that our kids are reading, they have enough); you can't sell them at garage sales (nobody buys them), you can't donate them to the school (they don't want to be overwhelmed with everybody's used books - they get enough). I can sell them to the used book store for credit, but now I have hundreds of dollars in credit and they have few things I want... I can't use the credit on new books.
E-books let me:
Physical books:
As it is, with the absurd pricing of e-books, it often makes more sense to buy the physical book. The publishers are %#king 4$#holes.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
Your reasons are all good, but there's a few caveats for a lot of other people. My kids don't buy their textbooks in high school, so they aren't writing in the margins or making notes. They also have to carry them around ALL DAY (the lockers are not satisfactory), and my son's latest books are as big as the biggest physics books I had in college.
What I wish they could do is have them as e-books while in school and leave the huge, physical book at home. The school offers "online" textbooks, but the stupid school has a mixed message about using tablets in school, and doesn't even give them wifi access when they can (and no, I don't pay for cell access for their tablets). For the same reasons (mixed message on tablets) my daughter prefers a physical book even for regular reading, because she can carry it around and read it anywhere. My son is happy enough to leave the reading for home, so gets e-books.
But on the whole, text and reference books are simply different... again, a single e-reader is a damn site better than carrying around 2 or more huge textbooks, but for doing homework or something, having the physical book there is nice.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
Amazon lists dozens (for me at least) of books for $0.01+$3.99 shipping from third parties. It has been a long time since I've bought new book and read maybe 20/year. They make great gifts too when you are done.
Until eBooks reflect their true price considering lack of cost to distribute and print, I'm not sure how you can say they are 'coexisting'. eBooks often exceed the cost of their physical books.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
In other news, you can still buy buggy whips, dial-style telephones, and vinyl records, too.
Nostalgia and straight-up Luddite-like behavior are enough to keep almost anything going at some level -- no matter how low its actual utility as compared to more recent replacement tech may be.
Hell, I own a vacuum tube stereo system made by Scott in the 1950's -- my father bought it when it was new, it's been with the family ever since, and now it is mine. I'm really quite fond of it in the "I actually use it" sense, though considered in the light of my home theater system, it's neither particularly functional or particularly high quality (though in its day, it absolutely was The Shite.) Still, it glows in the dark in a most pleasing manner. :)
I keep it in my office and enjoy listening to it regularly. My physical book collection, however... several thousand volumes... in boxes in the basement. I am a total convert to e-books. Textbooks, fiction, reference material... all right in my pocket, 100% accessible 100% of the time in 100% of the places I go (unless I'm diving or swimming, but hey. And I could get a waterproof, good to X-depth case for my phone, and then... :)
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Well it depends on how broadly one interprets your question - she did, at one point, eat a calculator.
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If you want to read at the beach or at the pool, it's the only game in town.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.