6 Reasons We're In Another 'Book-Burning' Period in History

[Keryl Raist]

Originally Posted by wvcherrybomb

: I speak from experience when I say that books don't burn easily. We spent an entire winter once trying to burn a set of encyclopedias (mildew.) No amount of accelerant would speed up the process. It became a neighborhood project that was largely unsuccessful. Eventually, the remains had to be bagged and hauled to the dump.

I can back this up. Unless you've got a huge fire already going, those puppies just do not burn. Especially the huge, dense ones.

[Kevin8or]

My local library is in the middle of an effort to cull 25% (or more, I don't quite recall) of its inventory, to make room for new acquisitions. Their main (but not only) criterion is how long it's been since a book was last borrowed.

[DustyDisks]

It should be a crime to burn any books, Especially now that the Internet has become so powerful. Thye should always be preserved no mater what .

Today it is being seen the great rewriting of history on the web and beyond by almost every group on the planet that has an agenda.

And the sad fact that more people are getting their information on the "Net" with out checking the facts for truth or legitimately of the source. And in time I think there will be big trouble because of it.

E-readers are great for their portability and having the power to have a library fit into ones pocket, but that should not be an excuse to do away with a hard copy book.

It will be a sad day if and when the publishing world goes totally digital.

No book should be burned, but if they incite anger they should be understood and be countered with fact and not burial or burning.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by DustyDisks

It should be a crime to burn any books, Especially now that the Internet has become so powerful. Thye should always be preserved no mater what .

Today it is being seen the great rewriting of history on the web and beyond by almost every group on the planet that has an agenda.

And the sad fact that more people are getting their information on the "Net" with out checking the facts for truth or legitimately of the source. And in time I think there will be big trouble because of it.

E-readers are great for their portability and having the power to have a library fit into ones pocket, but that should not be an excuse to do away with a hard copy book.

It will be a sad day if and when the publishing world goes totally digital.

No book should be burned, but if they incite anger they should be understood and be countered with fact and not burial or burning.

Well, yes and no. The whole point of a book is that it is an information delivery device. Nothing changes when it goes digital -- provided of course there are devices capable of displaying the information. There is no issue with that currently (other than it is made more difficult by drm infestation).

[DustyDisks]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Well, yes and no. The whole point of a book is that it is an information delivery device. Nothing changes when it goes digital -- provided of course there are devices capable of displaying the information. There is no issue with that currently (other than it is made more difficult by drm infestation).

Agreed.

My rant was set off more by the title of the thread and in some ways the trends that I have noticed over the years. In some ways now, we are pushing into George Orwell's "1984" world more and more everyday but at a snails pace.


And not forget Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. Today is much more intrusive than back in the 1950's - 1970's the world has changed and not in many good ways.

My hackles get up when banning/burning/censorship is used in titles.

[Rob Lister]

Originally Posted by DustyDisks

It should be a crime to burn any books, Especially now that the Internet has become so powerful. Thye should always be preserved no mater what .

What if the book burning is a symbolic political protest against the law forbidding burning books?

On the other side of that: is burning, recycling, composting last year's yellow pages included in the new law? This year's? (mine went from my front porch to the recycling bin ten minutes after it was delivered). Do we make exceptions for non-literary works? What about pulp fiction? Worse, pulp serial fiction? Worser still, Reader's Digest condensed books? Are comic books excluded? What about ebooks? Is deleting an ebook the equivalent to burning it?

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Rob Lister

What if the book burning is a symbolic political protest against the law forbidding burning books?
...

Aiiiieeee! Aiiiiieeee! My head is exploding!!

[RichL]

Originally Posted by Rob Lister

Is deleting an ebook the equivalent to burning it?

Of course not, 111000011 is way different than 111 1111