Will cellphones save books?

[DaleDe]

Here is an interesting article from Mike Elgan of the Computerworld.

[T]he secret to getting young people excited about books isn't about taking our existing published books and formatting them for cell phones. Instead, we need to figure out how to let readers publish their own books in a way that can reach a mass audience -- not just on obscure blogs, but on all media: print, online, audio and, yes, even cell phones.

Was Jobs wrong? Were we premature in replacing the MobileRead logo?

Dale

[Gudy]

If people won't even listen to written works, why would they actually read them?

*facepalms*

Seriously folks, if that questions is representative of the intellectual level of his analysis, I'm not sure what to say, as all Mr. Elgan would hear is a whooshing sound while things keep on flying over his head.

He's also trying way too hard for that participatory angle, IMHO. Furthermore, while I'm unsure whether books actually need saving or not, I can say with confidence that talking me into reading things on a postage stamp sized phone screen is not the way to go about it.

[RWood]

If people won't even listen to written works, why would they actually read them?

I have never liked audio books. Even the best of them that I have heard always seemed to drag on (and on.) Recently Fictionwise offered an audio version of a book that I was interested in. The ebook was less than 1/2 the price of the audio version and even by their metrics could be read in far less time than the time required to listen to the book.

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by RWood

I have never liked audio books. Even the best of them that I have heard always seemed to drag on (and on.) Recently Fictionwise offered an audio version of a book that I was interested in. The ebook was less than 1/2 the price of the audio version and even by their metrics could be read in far less time than the time required to listen to the book.

I would say that is always true. I do listen to books while I am driving sometimes and while I walk the dog. However, reading is several times faster unless I am reading out loud. I do not think the quote was very meaningful and was comparing apples to oranges.

Dale

[TallMomof2]

Not an audio book fan, either. I've borrowed some for the kids on long trips (Harry Potter) but I always find my attention wandering when trying to listen.

Personally, I think the participatory model is a niche market. And if you have a windows, palm, or symbian phone you can already read ebooks on it by downloading and installing the appropiate reader. And if your phone is internet capable you can purchase books at ebooks.com and read (most) online.

You won't catch me reading books on a cell phone except if I'm stuck somewhere and I forgot my reader or my Palm.

[RWood]

Originally Posted by DaleDe

I would say that is always true. I do listen to books while I am driving sometimes and while I walk the dog. However, reading is several times faster unless I am reading out loud. I do not think the quote was very meaningful and was comparing apples to oranges.

Dale

I agree with you about the apples and oranges; however, industry statistics treat both as parts of the entire book market. For example they often quote that ebook sales are only X% while audiobook sales are Y%. Both are treated as derivative components of the total book market.

[Steve Jordan]

According to the Department of Education, between 1992 and 2003 the average adult's skill in reading prose slipped one point on a 500-point scale, and the proportion who were proficient -- capable of such tasks as "comparing viewpoints in two editorials" -- declined from 15% to 13."

Okay, first of all, I'm not going to lose any sleep over a 1 point decline on a 500-point scale in an 11 year period. Second, if the proficiency rate of readers comparing 2 paragraphs is only 15%, you know where the real work of your teachers needs to be concentrated. A loss of 2% isn't nearly as significant as the fact that the rate is so frickin' low to begin with!

Next: Elgan, like Jobs, conveniently forgets that this country does read, voraciously... they have simply switched their reading to newspapers and magazines. Magazines are in every bookstore, in every grocery and drug store, in airports, in shopping malls, in convenience stores, and in gas stations. Newspapers are also in all of these places, and in kiosks all over town. If Americans weren't reading, you wouldn't see all of those mags everywhere, plain and simple.

I'm not against e-books for cellphones. But Elgan points out that the people reading these are stuck on long, cramped public trains every day, with no room to hold open a book. I hate to say it, but you won't find a significant portion of America's commuters in that situation... most of them are driving their cars. So, until global warming finally drives Americans into the arms of public transportation, I wouldn't depend on it to create a demand for your product.

That said, I've maintained that an attractive-enough device can bring more people into reading e-books, quite likely as an after-market to follow e-magazines and e-newspapers. If a cellphone proves to be that popular for reading content on the go (the iPhone or iPod touch, for instance), great. I'd guess at a larger device, at least the size of Sony's reader. But the important part is the features people want, combined with the content they want.

[Gudy]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Second, if the proficiency rate of readers comparing 2 paragraphs is only 15%, you know where the real work of your teachers needs to be concentrated. A loss of 2% isn't nearly as significant as the fact that the rate is so frickin' low to begin with!

A-fucking-men.

That said, I've maintained that an attractive-enough device can bring more people into reading e-books, quite likely as an after-market to follow e-magazines and e-newspapers. If a cellphone proves to be that popular for reading content on the go (the iPhone or iPod touch, for instance), great. I'd guess at a larger device, at least the size of Sony's reader. But the important part is the features people want, combined with the content they want.

Yup. I'm not sure that a phone is actually the device that will get e-books into the mainstream, for the simple reason that screens for reading large amounts of text generally need to be bigger than what is a convenient size for a phone. (Also, I'm not in the habit of taking my phone into bed, but that may be just me.) Still, the iPhone is *almost* that device, and may end up being just good enough. It's a PDA done more or less right, with a phone and an interface that's basically all screen real estate. Maybe the right way is something like a phone with a roll-out flexible e-ink screen like the Readius, although that solution feels slightly clunky to me, conceptually speaking.

[RWood]

The percentage of people reading books (other than for school) has changed less than the sample error so it may in fact have gone up rather than down. It has never been that high in history -- from the early priests that kept the others "in the dark" to the modern day, reading has always been an activity of the upper educated (school or self.) If it was popular then we would have more square feet of libraries than we would of prisons.

In today's world a book represents an investment of time and mind, a magazine can be sampled on the run.

If I read a novella in Analog it is classified as a magazine, if I read the same story as a standalone it counts as a book. Go figure.

[Steve Jordan]

Originally Posted by RWood

In today's world a book represents an investment of time and mind, a magazine can be sampled on the run.

If I read a novella in Analog it is classified as a magazine, if I read the same story as a standalone it counts as a book. Go figure.

Well, given a device that is so usable "on the run," sounds like a good reason to adapt magazines to digital reading matter.

Your point about reading short stories and "serialized novels" in magazines is also well-taken: We have used labels like "book" and "magazine" for so long, that it can be hard to remember literature can be packaged and delivered in other ways, and those labels may be due for updating. Doing that might help to re-imagine modern packaging and delivery systems for literature.

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Well, given a device that is so usable "on the run," sounds like a good reason to adapt magazines to digital reading matter.

Your point about reading short stories and "serialized novels" in magazines is also well-taken: We have used labels like "book" and "magazine" for so long, that it can be hard to remember literature can be packaged and delivered in other ways, and those labels may be due for updating. Doing that might help to re-imagine modern packaging and delivery systems for literature.

eContent Readers? eLiterature Readers?

Dale

[Steve Jordan]

Originally Posted by DaleDe

eContent Readers? eLiterature Readers?

Pretty much. (e-tent and e-Lit might roll off the tongue easier...)

But the point isn't the name, but the packaging of content, that can be revisited. To an extent, simply adding links or live glossaries in books can qualify them as a unique package from a 20th century book. Adding multimedia can redefine the concept of a magazine.

Making a magazine a customizable repository for desired content is a possibility: The magazine becomes more of a template for a particular theme, and you choose what you download into it, making it a personal collection of material (more of a "folder" than a "magazine").

Something tells me this threatens to go waaay off-topic... I guess that, in relation to the subject, I'm suggesting that the hardware won't "save the book," but the creative packaging of content might...