Jonathan Franzen: e-books are damaging society - Page 5

QuantumIguana · 01-31-2012, 11:59 AM

I suppose when matches were invented, people complained that people were too lazy to use flint and steel. Humans always attempt to save labor. When homo erectus migrated to what is now China, something interesting happened: evidence to stone tools disappeared. The reason was that bamboo was available. It was much easier to work with. I suppose some of the older generation complained that the art of the stone tool was being lost, but it was no longer needed.

Large print books are great, but they are hard to find. There will be a limited selection at the bookstore, if they are available at all. With e-books, large font is available on every book. A vast library of public domain books is available for free.

QuantumIguana · 01-31-2012, 01:32 PM

Here's another advantage of e-books. The nearest bookstore to my hometown is 60 miles away. With e-books, books can be on my device in a minute. Where I live now, I can easily get to a bookstore, but when I was growing up, a trip to the bookstore was a treat. It was something we did when we went on shopping trips to the "Big City". (It was only about 45,000 people, but big is relative.)

I do like bookstores, and divide my books between paper books and e-books. For my science fiction books, I buy from my local science fiction bookstore. But there are a lot of people for whom bookstores are highly inconvenient.

Fbone · 01-31-2012, 02:12 PM

I do agree with this in general terms.

Quote:

The author of Freedom and The Corrections, regarded as one of America’s greatest living novelists, said consumers had been conned into thinking that they need the latest technology.

JDK1962 · 01-31-2012, 02:28 PM

I admire Franzen's written work for its technical quality. I happened to hate The Corrections, but that's just because I failed to connect with the story, and had a negative reaction to all the characters (that's my loss, I suppose). But I'm kind of surprised to see an obviously intelligent person taking such a reactionary either-or stance.

I have a wall full of books, and have had at least a wall of books for the past two decades. I love them. I bought a Kindle 3 last year. I love that, too.

I respect the notion of permanence, and I also like the rights that I get when a book's content is entombed within a physical artifact (i.e., love used book shops).

But really, newspapers and magazines have always been transitory in nature, and from a literary perspective, 90% of what's on the NYT bestseller list in a given week is a throwaway. I'm pretty sure people aren't storing up "James Patterson"-branded thrillers as literary gold, just like they weren't keeping Jacqueline Susanne or Sidney Sheldon or Arthur Hailey or Danielle Steele or <insert your favorite airport novelist here>. You buy, you read, then off to the thrift store or used book store or church/school/library book sale it goes. Old popular/pulp novelists die off, new ones come up. So if we stop pulping trees to make the book equivalent of a newspaper, is that a bad thing?

I guess I'd be pretty astonished if the book, as a physical thing, vanished any time in the next 50 years (at a minimum). When I start seeing mainstream respected/literary work offered as e-book only, then I'll start thinking the end is nigh. But for now, I kind of like having both around.

And you kids, stay off Franzen's lawn, OK? You're just making him more cranky.

HomeInMyShoes · 01-31-2012, 04:11 PM

Hmm...perhaps Mr. Franzen has a new book coming out and wanted a bit more fuel on the marketing fire?

Kali Yuga · 01-31-2012, 04:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HomeInMyShoes

Hmm...perhaps Mr. Franzen has a new book coming out and wanted a bit more fuel on the marketing fire?

Considering that the guy snubbed Oprah, I'm gonna say he doesn't care about the public consequences of his statements.

It seems he's spent the last 20 years lamenting the state of the culture. The guy's a wet sandwich.

QuantumIguana · 01-31-2012, 05:07 PM

"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they allow disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children now are tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.” -- Plato

"I see no hope for the future of our people if they are dependent on
frivolous youth of today, for certainly all youth are reckless beyond
words... When I was young, we were taught to be discreet and
respectful of elders, but the present youth are exceedingly wise
[disrespectful] and impatient of restraint" (Hesiod, 8th century BC).

hidari · 01-31-2012, 05:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

Considering that the guy snubbed Oprah, I'm gonna say he doesn't care about the public consequences of his statements.

It seems he's spent the last 20 years lamenting the state of the culture. The guy's a wet sandwich.

Never heard that he snubbed Oprah....but I reckon that is a good thing...........

khalleron · 01-31-2012, 07:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Redcard

All his whinging about "permanence" is really just whining about control. They don't have the control. Paperback novels HAVE changed. The version of the Great Gatsby I read in college was actually DIFFERENT from the version I read in high school. Nat Hawthorne's Scarlet Letter has been revised multiple times.

Heck, the version of Bujold's 'Shards of Honor' I bought in 1987 is different from the one I bought in 2000.

Made for interesting discussions until I found that out.

BeccaPrice · 01-31-2012, 07:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by khalleron

Heck, the version of Bujold's 'Shards of Honor' I bought in 1987 is different from the one I bought in 2000.

Made for interesting discussions until I found that out.

I'm a big Bujold fan, but didn't realize that. How are they different?

carpetmojo · 02-01-2012, 06:07 AM

Thinking about it again, there could (and has been over the ages) an arguement for saying books , as a group, could be seen as damaging to whatever society is judging these things - but thyat, nowadays, could apply to TV's, radios, certainly the Web, etc....

The recent flu virus research incident could be seen as a perfect example.....

anamardoll · 02-01-2012, 10:06 AM

New Technology Is Evil

LuvReadin · 02-01-2012, 12:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

I suppose when matches were invented, people complained that people were too lazy to use flint and steel. Humans always attempt to save labor. When homo erectus migrated to what is now China, something interesting happened: evidence to stone tools disappeared. The reason was that bamboo was available. It was much easier to work with. I suppose some of the older generation complained that the art of the stone tool was being lost, but it was no longer needed.

Quote:

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

Large print books are great, but they are hard to find. There will be a limited selection at the bookstore, if they are available at all. With e-books, large font is available on every book. A vast library of public domain books is available for free.

And the font really isn't that large - typically not more than about 16pt Arial. Whereas I would judge the Sony T1 goes up to about 48pt - my MIL has glaucoma and cataracts, and large-print books are now too small, but she can read text on the Sony, and still has a couple of sizes to go. I've had old people start crying when I demonstrated the ereader and they realised they could read again - that alone makes an ereader deserve its place in society, IMHO.

Harmon · 02-01-2012, 03:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by taustin

The real problem is, languages change. This includes computer languages, for a pretty flexible definition of "language." Media changes; there are mission records on magnetic tapes from the Apollo space program that are probably uncrecoverable because nobody has a drive that can read them any more. If they are recovered, it'll cost millions.

I dunno. I just read an article about the recovery of Bismarck's voice from an Edison roll, made sometime in the 1890s. The physical media was actually lost for many many years, and when it finally showed up, the transcription on the roll couldn't be read by the playback device. But some guy figured out an alternative method of recovery, & now we have the voice.

Couldn't be done, & then it was...

Harmon · 02-01-2012, 03:37 PM

Maybe it just boils down to a control issue. Lots of authors don't like to lose control of how they said what they said. They perceive digital works as being out of their control, in comparison to physical works. And they are right about that, even if one does not share their need for control.

But the thing is, culture is not about control, unless it's dead. (You can pretty much control something that isn't changing.)

Culture is not really culture if it isn't changing all the time. It's like a conversation. When people just say the same thing over & over, the conversation dies. The books will change; the books MUST change. They change, as has been pointed out, when they are translated or even reprinted. Over time, the very meaning of the words in the books change, and they start saying things they didn't used to say. Context changes their social meanings, linguistic drift changes their definitional meanings. Uncle Tom's Cabin, a revolutionary book, came to symbolize reactionary racism. "Colored People" turned from a proud description (NAACP) to an outmoded and politically incorrect term, then resurfaced as "people of color."

Franzen thinks that ebooks represent a lost of control. He's right. He's just suffering from the illusion that he has control in the first place.

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01-31-2012, 11:59 AM	#61
QuantumIguana Philosopher Posts: 2,034 Karma: 18736532 Join Date: Jan 2012 Device: Kindle Paperwhite 2 gen, Kindle Fire 1st Gen, Kindle Touch	I suppose when matches were invented, people complained that people were too lazy to use flint and steel. Humans always attempt to save labor. When homo erectus migrated to what is now China, something interesting happened: evidence to stone tools disappeared. The reason was that bamboo was available. It was much easier to work with. I suppose some of the older generation complained that the art of the stone tool was being lost, but it was no longer needed. Large print books are great, but they are hard to find. There will be a limited selection at the bookstore, if they are available at all. With e-books, large font is available on every book. A vast library of public domain books is available for free.

01-31-2012, 01:32 PM	#62
QuantumIguana Philosopher Posts: 2,034 Karma: 18736532 Join Date: Jan 2012 Device: Kindle Paperwhite 2 gen, Kindle Fire 1st Gen, Kindle Touch	Here's another advantage of e-books. The nearest bookstore to my hometown is 60 miles away. With e-books, books can be on my device in a minute. Where I live now, I can easily get to a bookstore, but when I was growing up, a trip to the bookstore was a treat. It was something we did when we went on shopping trips to the "Big City". (It was only about 45,000 people, but big is relative.) I do like bookstores, and divide my books between paper books and e-books. For my science fiction books, I buy from my local science fiction bookstore. But there are a lot of people for whom bookstores are highly inconvenient.

01-31-2012, 02:28 PM	#64
JDK1962 Groupie Posts: 154 Karma: 2054094 Join Date: Apr 2011 Location: Boulder, CO Device: Kindle Voyage, Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 (for PDFs)	I admire Franzen's written work for its technical quality. I happened to hate The Corrections, but that's just because I failed to connect with the story, and had a negative reaction to all the characters (that's my loss, I suppose). But I'm kind of surprised to see an obviously intelligent person taking such a reactionary either-or stance. I have a wall full of books, and have had at least a wall of books for the past two decades. I love them. I bought a Kindle 3 last year. I love that, too. I respect the notion of permanence, and I also like the rights that I get when a book's content is entombed within a physical artifact (i.e., love used book shops). But really, newspapers and magazines have always been transitory in nature, and from a literary perspective, 90% of what's on the NYT bestseller list in a given week is a throwaway. I'm pretty sure people aren't storing up "James Patterson"-branded thrillers as literary gold, just like they weren't keeping Jacqueline Susanne or Sidney Sheldon or Arthur Hailey or Danielle Steele or <insert your favorite airport novelist here>. You buy, you read, then off to the thrift store or used book store or church/school/library book sale it goes. Old popular/pulp novelists die off, new ones come up. So if we stop pulping trees to make the book equivalent of a newspaper, is that a bad thing? I guess I'd be pretty astonished if the book, as a physical thing, vanished any time in the next 50 years (at a minimum). When I start seeing mainstream respected/literary work offered as e-book only, then I'll start thinking the end is nigh. But for now, I kind of like having both around. And you kids, stay off Franzen's lawn, OK? You're just making him more cranky.

01-31-2012, 04:11 PM	#65
HomeInMyShoes Grand Sorcerer Posts: 19,226 Karma: 67780237 Join Date: Jul 2011 Device: none	Hmm...perhaps Mr. Franzen has a new book coming out and wanted a bit more fuel on the marketing fire?

01-31-2012, 05:07 PM	#67
QuantumIguana Philosopher Posts: 2,034 Karma: 18736532 Join Date: Jan 2012 Device: Kindle Paperwhite 2 gen, Kindle Fire 1st Gen, Kindle Touch	"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they allow disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children now are tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.” -- Plato "I see no hope for the future of our people if they are dependent on frivolous youth of today, for certainly all youth are reckless beyond words... When I was young, we were taught to be discreet and respectful of elders, but the present youth are exceedingly wise [disrespectful] and impatient of restraint" (Hesiod, 8th century BC).

02-01-2012, 06:07 AM	#71
carpetmojo Wizard Posts: 3,117 Karma: 9269999 Join Date: Feb 2011 Location: UK Device: Sony- T3, PRS650, 350, T1/2/3, Paperwhite, Fire 8.9,Samsung Tab S 10.5	Thinking about it again, there could (and has been over the ages) an arguement for saying books , as a group, could be seen as damaging to whatever society is judging these things - but thyat, nowadays, could apply to TV's, radios, certainly the Web, etc.... The recent flu virus research incident could be seen as a perfect example.....

02-01-2012, 10:06 AM	#72
anamardoll Chasing Butterflies Posts: 3,132 Karma: 5074169 Join Date: Mar 2011 Location: American Southwest Device: Uses batteries.	New Technology Is Evil

02-01-2012, 03:37 PM	#75
Harmon King of the Bongo Drums Posts: 1,630 Karma: 5927225 Join Date: Feb 2009 Device: Excelsior! (Strange...)	Maybe it just boils down to a control issue. Lots of authors don't like to lose control of how they said what they said. They perceive digital works as being out of their control, in comparison to physical works. And they are right about that, even if one does not share their need for control. But the thing is, culture is not about control, unless it's dead. (You can pretty much control something that isn't changing.) Culture is not really culture if it isn't changing all the time. It's like a conversation. When people just say the same thing over & over, the conversation dies. The books will change; the books MUST change. They change, as has been pointed out, when they are translated or even reprinted. Over time, the very meaning of the words in the books change, and they start saying things they didn't used to say. Context changes their social meanings, linguistic drift changes their definitional meanings. Uncle Tom's Cabin, a revolutionary book, came to symbolize reactionary racism. "Colored People" turned from a proud description (NAACP) to an outmoded and politically incorrect term, then resurfaced as "people of color." Franzen thinks that ebooks represent a lost of control. He's right. He's just suffering from the illusion that he has control in the first place.