Are Books Becoming Obsolete?

Locke

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Godyth
Film has mostly gone, true. But do digital cameras not take photographs just like film cameras did?

I sort of get what you're saying, but speaking as a person who counts photography among his creative pursuits, no, they don't. Digital presents a whole different set of challenges than film. I realize I'm being somewhat pedantic (FWIW, the old 220 or 35mm film formats which were popular as consumer cameras don't have much if any of an advantage to their digital counterparts), but there really are some limitations, to the point that many professional photographers (protogs, to use the lingo) who keep a film camera or two around, even if not in formats that most people twenty years ago would expect to buy in a convenience store.

But the analogy somewhat holds true. Just as digital photography offers people a lot in the way of cost savings and convenience, as do digital books. But there's a certain art to printed books that's lost in the digital format. You can't rub the nice heavy bond between your fingers or proudly browse the spines on your bookshelf. You also can't collect signed first editions, which is a hobby I find is becoming more and more rare.

And the analogy continues with it's effect on the industry. Since everybody effectively now has a camera in their pocket, there's a proliferation of slightly off-focus, centered subject, completely blown highlights or mired in shadows photos out there, not to mention the people who tote around huge DSLR's that have never changed a lens in their life and leave the camera in its automatic exposure mode. The equivalence in literature is the number of people who have convinced themselves that there exists some guardian controversy among book publishers and have used this opportunity to foist their genius upon the world without a modicum of attention to editing or style.

So, it is what it is, and I expect that books will settle into the same blurry lines as photography has, where anybody can take pictures with a nice camera, but only those who give the prerequisite attention to form and craft can stand apart. Paper books will live on, though they may become more expensive and specialized than their digital counterparts. That's honestly not what writers should really be worried about, however, because it's the words on the page that we need to build in order to stand out from the crowd.
 

Godyth

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Film has mostly gone, true. But do digital cameras not take photographs just like film cameras did?

At the risk of hijacking this thread, my answer is "no, absolutely not". For family snaps going into scrapbooks, basic magazine production or for images online, then digital is fine. But, if you are examining photos on a critical level as a work of art, there is no comparison. There is a quality, a fineness, to film work that digital can never recreate. Never.
If you don't have a basis of experience for what film looks like, then it's difficult to explain, but any film photographer will tell you that film and digital are worlds apart.
Digital will always have pixels that get in the way of the image. Film can deliver a clarity unsurpassed by even the most expensive digital system.
That's why film photographers cling to their cameras and lenses and lighting systems and struggle to keep the art form alive. It cannot be recreated digitally.
 

Hapax Legomenon

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Most people for memory books and such just use digital photos, and for art purposes you use film. There are many, many MANY things that an artist will use that are considered "obsolete" because there is an easier way for someone who is not an expert to do them.
 

Godyth

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So, it is what it is, and I expect that books will settle into the same blurry lines as photography has, where anybody can take pictures with a nice camera, but only those who give the prerequisite attention to form and craft can stand apart. Paper books will live on, though they may become more expensive and specialized than their digital counterparts. That's honestly not what writers should really be worried about, however, because it's the words on the page that we need to build in order to stand out from the crowd.
Yes, agreed.
The analogy between cameras and books extends to the loss of education in the finer points of the art forms. Just as anyone can tote around an iPhone and take pics (they're just as good, right?) now anyone can self-publish. Which means that to add to the plethora of badly composed, out of focus selfies out there, there are also badly composed, poorly edited self-published books flooding Amazon.
Not to say that there aren't lots of people self-publishing whose work isn't good, but so much of it is mediocre.
That's my point.
We are now a consumer society that is content with mediocrity. That's the sad commentary.
The good news is that I expect that there will always be authors who strive to create the best works that they can, who will build worlds rich in language that elevates writing, keeps us entertained, educates us or advances culture. That's what we should be concerned with, and those are the ones that will stand the test of time.
 

Godyth

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Most people for memory books and such just use digital photos, and for art purposes you use film. There are many, many MANY things that an artist will use that are considered "obsolete" because there is an easier way for someone who is not an expert to do them.
Yep, like trying to explain to someone the difference between real printmaking (lithography, etching et al) and giclée prints. Not the same. Just not.
 

ColdWintersNight

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In NY there's this awesome book store that sells books for 1 buck. They have no idea whats new or in, so the newest craze can be just be a one dollar, and a hardbound. It's like treasure hunting. And I get such a rush when I find the book I was looking for. No thrill like that on a kindle.
 

D S LILLICO

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It is the same with video games. There is nothing better than opening a new game box or book and smelling the inside. I am all for digital to help broaden audiences but there hopefully is always a choice.

I choose physical copies where I can, even if it costs a few more quid.
 

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My wife and I did as millions of others around the world did over the holidays; we went shopping at the local mall. On that particular day, nearly every square inch of the building was jammed-packed with shoppers. Every store filled to capacity, except for one, which I’ll get to in a moment. As we walked along a corridor, practically rubbing elbows with others, I turned my head and looked into Waldenbooks. Aside from the clerk at the register and a single individual near the back of the store reaching up to one of the shelves, the store was completely empty! I turned to my wife, who is well aware of my love of books, and I said, “Look at how empty that store is. That is sad. That is really sad.”

She remarked something about how, more and more, people are turning to the Internet or electronic devices for their reading. That picking up an actual hardcover or paperback book and turning its pages is becoming a thing of the past.

That is sad.

RA
For quite some time I've bought print books via Amazon because of the wide selection. I actually started doing that back in 1996 before Amazon was .....well what it is now. I also buy ebooks.

There are lots of online stores for books, I think that's more the issue.
 
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Quentin Nokov

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6fb7e3bb4d76d8ab134f8a76c8aa361b.jpg
 

kylaurel

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I couldn't have said it better, Quentin!

Love the cartoon! Besides being funny, there's a lot of truth to it. I prefer reading fiction and some nonfiction on my Nook for a lot of reasons. I love being able to make the print whatever size I want and being able to search for something I remember reading earlier in the book. I like being able to look up a word that I'm not sure of, and I like being able to highlight and comment, then easily remove both without damaging the "book." And, of course, being able to have thousands of books on a tiny device can't be beat.

That said, there will always be a place for print books, particularly ones with lots of pictures or graphics. And some people will always prefer reading all books in physical form. I do think bookstores are likely to be facing an even bigger struggle in the future. That's progress, as the buggy maker said with commiseration to the ice man. I do like that an ebook lover can buy through Kobo and support the local bookstore at the same time, but I'm not sure that's going to be enough. And Amazon and ebooks aren't entirely to blame--big box stores selling books has also cut into the customer base of bookstores.
 

Voluptua von T

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Hmm. I like the way youtube opens up video content to new and riskier shows and concepts, and to minorities. I like the way Ebooks open up publishing. I'd rather have a book in my hands, but I think we should welcome any form of publishing that weakens the power of gatekeepers.

Just like great cinema talents get discovered in the much cheaper and more accessible theatre spaces, isn't it nice that now Ebooks mean some of the next bestsellers can be picked by readers rather than publishers?

Sorry if this point has already been made over and over, I only had time to read a chunk of the thread.
 

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As long as people write them, no. Also, the fact that you are even asking that question shows people still care.
 

Bryan Methods

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The way we're acquiring books is changing, and there are more and more people who almost never read. But it's also easier and easier to reach a much wider audience and choose books from other cultures. It's pretty exciting!
 

TeamWingless

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Well when the zombie apocalypse hits and all electricity stops circulating, people are going to be really sad when their Kindle libraries blow up in their faces. But honestly books aren't dying, it's the selection process that's becoming stricter IMO. For instance, why buy a dime novel for $5 when you can get it for $.99 on your phone? You were paying for the paper and it's not a very good book anyway. HOWEVER, the Pulitzer Price winning scifi poem ANIARA goes for $149 used! If I really fall in love with a book, I buy the hardcover for my shelf, I'm one of those people who has read every book in their library and painstakingly selected which ones to display (I only say this because I know of people who have Proust and Dumas in their libraries just to appear cultured and have never actually read them). So in summary, I don't think it's all books that are becoming obsolete, just the cheap ones ;)
 

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Quentin's cartoon is perfect.
There will always be a demand for books, and authors. I would guess that digital books outsell paper books in the future, but that's nothing to be concerned about.
 

juniper

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Until last month, I could go browse through a pretty good used bookstore just 2 miles away. It had been in business for 30 years and had 3200 sq feet of space. Last month, it closed. They said they couldn't compete with digital sales.

A few years ago the Borders nearby closed. Now the only options for books for me are about 13 miles to Powells or 13 miles to Barnes and Noble.

There's a store called Book Warehouse that opened in an outlet mall nearby, but it's just remainders, apparently.

I can spend hours in a bookstore. I had a Kobo and now a Nook, which is great for travel, but I still prefer a paper book for most of my reading.

Although the text book for this term I got an ebook, on a rental from Amazon. One-third the price of buying it, and I could make highlights and notes from it that printed out. I really liked that. Much easier to hold the iPad than a heavy textbook.
 
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Chase

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Now the only options for books for me are about 13 miles to Powells

I have four times as far to drive to Powell's Bookstore than your cute little dog chauffeurs you :D, but I never miss a visit there when we're in Portland. Great maze inside, innit?

My WIP's on my laptop, and I edit exclusively online every day, so reading for pleasure is always a book with renewable wood pages :)applause:, Oregon lumberjacks). We also subscribe to a daily local newspaper.

Old school in Albany.
 

benbradley

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I first heard of Powell's in the 1990s, the decade I perused the aisles of the late Oxford Too bookstore (and most other bookstores, thrift stores, library sales and flea markets in Atlanta). Online buying has greatly reduced my need for finding unusual, out of print and other hard-to-find titles (which are not often available in electronic form even in the 21st Century), but I still need to make a Pilgrimage.
 

Kronisk

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There are pros and cons with digital. We all know the cons such as rampant piracy (which I will not go into because get me rambling about the majors' desire to turn the Internet into TV II, and look out) or loss of moderation.

For me, the pros of my e-readers are very simple and impossible to argue with. I cannot stand the Times New Roman style print almost exclusively used in printed books. Something about it just makes me strain to read, and although I respect that the publishing industry has got to have a set standard, it takes a very good book indeed to get past the strain I feel when reading Times New Roman on paper.

The less I say about Jon Stewart and "it's like an iPad, only thicker", the better. But both my iPad and TRS-T3 can do a buttload of things that a book cannot. Annotations, for instance.

So where I am going with this is that I can change the font face, size, and even physical orientation of my ebooks. If I think the text is narrowed into too small a part of the "page", I can invoke a function to zoom in. These little things alone have improved the enjoyability of reading for me to no end. (And this is a big point because I was a hyperlexic child that found reading uncomfortable no matter how much people pressured me to do it.)

When new things come along, it in my opinion behoves the old to either pick up their game in response, or get out of the way.
 

kdaniel171

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I think e-books will never win the e-books vs. printed books battle.
Yes, It's cheaper.
Yes, It's easier and faster to get the book.
Yes, It's lightweight.

But there's something special about holding paper book in your hands, turning pages, smelling it.
It can't be matched with pixels on a screen.
 

The Alchemist

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I don't think book stores will ever completely go away but there is no doubt that people are turning more and more to electronic sources for reading. I believe book stores will become (if not already) a supplier for the "niche" market of people who like having books in paper format. Physical books won't go extinct but they will probably be restricted to hole-in-the-wall type places as opposed to big retail stores like Barnes and Noble. Here in Miami we have a great store called Dunbar Old Books that has a lot of old/out-of-print stuff that would be hard to find elsewhere. Places like that will live on when Barnes and Noble is no longer needed in today's society.
 

heza

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Has anyone posted this article anywhere yet?

Textbook makers, bookstore owners and college student surveys all say millennials still strongly prefer print for pleasure and learning, a bias that surprises reading experts given the same group’s proclivity to consume most other content digitally.