[Worldwalker]

So Harper Collins wants libraries to pay for books on an annual basis. Rent, in other words.

Actually, it looks like Harper Collins wants to hammer more nails in the already-closing coffins of libraries. This isn't surprising; libraries benefit the many (the public), not the few (the publishers' management). In the eternal tug of war between the seller (who wants buyers pay everything for nothing) and the buyer (who wants to pay nothing for everything) they're firmly on the side of the buyer. They came about at a time when the needs of the public were considered important, instead of merely interference with the desires of corporations, and at a time when fulfilling such needs was considered a virtue, not a vice.Yes, there was a time when taking care of other people, and a mutually-supporting society instead of a cutthroat mob of antagonistic individuals, was believed to be a good thing. Kinda weird, isn't it? People who didn't even know that greed, arrogance, and hate were civic virtues, and thought it was a good thing to be nice to each other?

Here's what Harper Collins is forgetting, though: In their greed to squeeze every penny out of today's book buyers, they're losing tomorrow's. The book buyers of today became what they are because of a lifetime of access not just to new hardcovers, but to public libraries, used books, borrowed books, and all sorts of other things that don't give money directly to publishers. If the only way they could have read books was to pay hardcover prices for rentals of those books, they would have used any of the many other available sources of entertainment. And the more forms of entertainment emerge -- streaming video, for instance, or computer games -- the more competition books have. The more distractions the next generation of book buyers has. And the fewer reasons, therefore, they have to establish a book-buying habit that will benefit a company like Harper Collins in the long run.

So, they're squeezing a little more money out of the customers they already have in exchange for losing the customers that will sustain them ten years from now. Typical modern business short-sightedness: It's all about boosting the short-term stock price for the benefit of the speculators. "The long view" means thinking about next fiscal year rather than just next quarter. The Rupert Murdochs of the world win. And everyone else...?

Here's a thought: Andrew Carnegie was a robber baron. He was greedy, ruthless, and very, very good at what he did. He started from poverty and made a huge fortune. But he would be mocked, today, especially by the Murdochs of the world and their kin, because he was "too nice". He spent his money. Worse, he spent it on the "undeserving" -- people who hadn't accumulated wealth of their own, who, in modern belief, deserve only poverty. He bought libraries for towns who couldn't afford them, and pipe organs, which don't get quite as much press. He helped people with that money. He believed it was his obligation to use his wealth for the benefit of others, and he did. And, apparently, had a hell of a lot of fun doing so -- more fun, I would think, than partying on a yacht ever could be. That would be laughable today. People believe wealth is virtue, and should never be shared with the less virtuous (that is, the less wealthy), and things like libraries are liberal nonsense.

There was a time, too, when the owners and managers of businesses wanted those businesses to be strong and healthy in the long term. Firing the R&D department to boost short-term profits used to be the subject of jokes, not business as usual. That's what Harper Collins is doing here, though, in other terms. They're trying to squeeze a bit more money out of current customers at the expense of future customers. Like a company that fired its R&D department because it's better for immediate profits but leaves them with no products in the pipeline, they're eating their seed corn.

They don't care, of course. And society has been taught not to care. But those of us who remember a time before the 80's, who remember a time before "Greed is Good!", remember other sorts of virtue than the accumulation of wealth. A time when libraries were considered a public good to be encouraged, not a profit center to be exploited. And I don't think we're better off for discarding that notion.