doomed books.

Well for one there is the domesday book, with its accurate survey of the landscape of England. Bot what of the doomed day of books? I alluded to this in a previous post, but I've really been thinking about it in light of the way things are in the current consumer climate 0f 2011.

A) you can't peg all the misfortunes of bookstores solely on ebooks. They have been around quite awhile now, but its a fallacy to believe that it only now has wrought the end of stores such as Boarders. Better ereader technology, combined with lucrative tie-ins to online bookstores (Amazon) have made a far greater impact. This is what has nailed it for me, the proprietary dealing of their books to their own device. If you wanted a book, you could go anywhere, but if you want to buy a new ebook for your kindle, where will you go? This has led ebooks to be the biggest seller on Amazon, not to mention that it's cheaper than buying in hard copy.

Another factor I see is the diversifying of large bookstores stock options at the point consumer choices were being siphoned away by online dealers. Everything you can buy at a boarders you could pretty much buy online, right down to magazine subscription vendors like isubscribe.

All in all this is only bringing books in line with other commodities via online shopping. If I wanted to I could live my whole life in front of a computer. And why, because its easy. It also means less time actually reading books. Most of the hardcore readers I know are not of the X or Y gens and are the older patrons of the library, who have no interest in an ebook or its reader. So who is? I see alot of commuters reading on portable devices, and for me, this is also the same time only get a chance to read. There is so much demand for our cash and attention these days its hard to find the time to fit in a book. Hell, I've even abandoned video games, a sad time indeed.

So basically, the way in which society consumes knowledge is changing, just as the way books are written, music is played, art is created, etc. maybe books will come with a free ebook download (like new vinyl is nowadays)as an added incentive, or they become limited edition print runs. Who knows. but if the big sellers in the market can fall, what about all the little independent stores? In the end, if music stores can continue to exist, than bookstores can as well. Unless the whole world forsakes materialism for the avdancement of society ala Star Trek. Then I'm ok with it.

Checking out Checks on Checkouts

Well, it's been a god damn long break between diatribes. but its taken the recent move by Harpy Collins to get my ire all afire. and what is it? They have instituted a new restriction on ebook lending to just 26 checkouts, their equivalent of a digital shelf life. What in blazes? First Amazon with their own little propriety anti-library pro-money kindle, and now this. You could mention the whole Boarders fiasco, but gentle ereaders, your kobo will still be safe. This really gets to me.

A recent article in the Believer focused on the fact that ereaders are really trying to simulate the world of the book, where the technology has so much more to offer than replicating an experience of the printed word. Even Julio Cortezar stepped out of the linear world of words with his novel Hopscotch, so why haven't digital books deigned to offer more? Possible because writers are not exclusively focusing on this medium, and publishers don't know how to market it.

What they do know however is how to restrict libraries from promoting ebooks to a wider readership. Having reviewed ebooks and eAudiobooks for my library recently it is clear that publishers are really out to protect their content (and all the power to them, they are out to make a profit anyway). even reviews of ereaders leads to the Kindle being the most user friendly, but what about library friendly?

I've sat on the fence along time over the issue of proprietary driven ebooks, and still don't own an ipad or ipod for similar reasons: I'm not up for restrictions. Which of course brings me back to Harper Collins. if my ebooks are to be restricted to a device, and now my ebooks are to be restricted to a shelf life, it will really be a backwards step in advancing digital media. For now, I think I'll stick to reading books, blogs and Believer.