Will e-book readers make your library obsolete?

[round 2]

library means more then books. libraries must find a needed niche for the community it serves or fade away. libraries feed the souls of children with programs, gatherings, and books. libraries provide a place for book talks, movie discusions, art displays, current subscriptions, internet, and in our community the only public bathroom. ;D
S

[stevejay]

I misinterpreted the question. It refers to PERSONAL libraries, not Public Libraries. So yes, I do expect to live with less paper soon when my reader arrives. Certain books like photography, atlases, colorful reference books... these just can't be replaced by a diminutive screen. Fiction seems extremely well suited for a mobile reader.

[beachwanderer]

Will e-book readers make your library obsolete?

Noooo way! E-books are an additional way for getting hold of texts I want to read, study, mull over for private or professional purposes.

I'm very much in for progress, I like my gadgets and computers and handling them and god knows what the children will have in their time.

But I will raise them (the children that is) and live myself happily in the physical presence of letter-printed paper. And I want more. (Yes I have moved with books - several times !)

---

As the author rightly said:

In the end its content, stupid !

[Argent009]

I'm voting no, not because I agree with the author of the article or because I don't embrace the technology but because new technology has not proven to be a replacement for old ways of doing things in the past and probably won't in the future. eBooks are great, they're convenient, handy, less expensive, etc etc, but there will always be books and there'll always be something to be said for reading a book the "old fashioned" way. I own over 20,000 books, I'm not likely to be converting all that into electronic books now or in the future. Why bother? I'll still buy books because not everything will be available as an eBook (at least not for a long time yet) nor do eBooks reproduce imagery well enough yet and there's the tactile element too. I love my eBooks and I love my plain old fashioned dead tree books too! The author of this article is just a doom and gloom type, a fuddy dutty who probably thinks them thar talkin' picture boxes are the work o' the devil. To him I say, ppththththtt!

[stevejay]

The author of the original article did not make his case at all! If it was an argumentative essay in school, I'd say a solid C. He goes on to praise the virtues of MD, (did he mention the environmental aspects at all?) but closes with the idea that these technologies are devices he can live without....

Unless I missed part 2 of this essay, what are the exact reasons he can forgo these technologies?

The book has had a long and robust history, it is a technology in itself. But like many technologies, they reach the end of their viability and must adapt to newer circumstances. It is not a painless transition, there are legal and proprietary concerns, technology concerns, and fear that important works may be lost or altered in some way. But viewed in another sense, a "one of a kind" book or manuscript may be converted and read by millions as opposed to perishing in a basement flood during a hurricane season. The beauty of the technology has a flipside, and tantamount to a publisher's nightmare, the total loss of control over ownership and rightful compensation. Many are honest, some are not, and the honest are under constant temptation. We are just people, and not perfect.



I am enchanted by these technologies, and wish to learn more.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by stevejay

The worth and measure of the public library is not only measured by the books on a shelf. It is a common meeting place for the community, a collective consciousness of sorts, and lets face it...

Will "story hours" ever be replaced? Can poetry readings or author visits be satisfactorily replaced by webinars? Community and inter-connectedness can not or should not be made obsolete by technologies.

There's certainly nothing wrong with the intimacy earned by collecting in a group and listening to a reading or story hour. But for those who cannot get to a location to hear readings and story hours, "technology" provides us ways to experience it from our homes.

Libraries aren't the only places where people congregate and communities form. When that becomes their only useful function, they can effectively be replaced. Yes, I know how that sounds... but romanticism aside, libraries ARE for storing books/recorded knowledge. When they are no longer needed for that purpose, they are no longer needed. Communities can (and will) congregate, and read to each other, elsewhere.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Argent009

I'm voting no, not because I agree with the author of the article or because I don't embrace the technology but because new technology has not proven to be a replacement for old ways of doing things in the past and probably won't in the future... ppththththtt!

"ppththththtt"?

Your points are good, but consider this: In the future, there may well be less and less literature, news and other material that will be made available on paper. Society is realizing that paper use has become unsustainable and dangerous for our ecological situation. What will you do when you can't provide your children more than, say, 10% of the entertainment or informational material out there, because you refuse to "accept the electron"?

I disagree with your opinion that e-book technology won't provide a good replacement for the old way of doing things... I expect it to be much, much, much better. Add that to an expected scarcity of paper-bound literature and news, and I think the rise of electronic text... and the fall of the personal "library" space... is inevitable.

[GeoffC]

it would be interesting to 'see' what has a longer life span for the future .... paper for more books, or electricity to run readers ....

[stevejay]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

... but romanticism aside, libraries ARE for storing books/recorded knowledge. When they are no longer needed for that purpose, they are no longer needed. Communities can (and will) congregate, and read to each other, elsewhere.

Not just storing- for sharing information whatever the format. My local library pays for many database which are expensive, and provides total access with a library card. Examples of this would be subscription business and genealogy databases. The library is also a place to learn and make use of computers and technologies for the economically disadvantaged. It may be true the library will need less physical space in the future, but the fundamental philosophical and democratic justifications for a public library's existence will remain.

The library will continue to adapt to current trends, and help ensure that access to information is equitable to all, not just those who are most technologically literate.

[ShortNCuddlyAm]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Communities can (and will) congregate, and read to each other, elsewhere.

There is already one club (as in physical dedicated venue space) for reading prose aloud. I can't remember what it was called, but it got a mention in a TV program on BBC 4 during National Reading Week

[stevejay]

Hi

Called a coffeehouse Don't be mad at me, I couldn't resist.

[giddion]

I'm in the category of my no answer wasn't available - personally newspaper wise I'm happy to see them go the way of the Dodo, huge waste of space and resources for something that is out of date before it rolls off the end of the press.

However printed and bound books will always have space in my library, actually this very topic was largely the reason for a relationship break up. I had a girlfriend that insisted my library was a huge clutter issue (don't have a separate library room, the shelves occupy one wall of my living room) and she felt I should pack them all in boxes and store them in the basement somewhere. MY GOD, can you think of a worse place to put your books?

I like seeing my favorite books on the wall every day, I guess in some small way it makes me feel closer to the characters and authors I love so much.

I like people to walk in my house to know I am a reader and how much those books mean to me. I like my children to see and experience those books as integral part of their lives - My children are all avid readers and having those books there I think influences that (children's books are on a different set of shelves right out side their bedrooms so not part of the clutter girl friend was complaining about)

When I want to read a book I like to stand in front of those shelf and run my hands along the spines of my books, to look at the covers and remember what reading that book meant to me. This brings me back to the world inside the book and in the case of some books back to the time and place I was at in my life the first time I read the book.

I want to be able to lend my books, to share my favorite authors and to foist my addiction off on my friends, with all this DRM stuff most of the books I download can't be loaned to anyone, yes I know I can strip the DRM, but even then I'm afraid to loan the book cause now I'm putting illegal goods into the hands of my friends.

To be quite honest I've already downloaded some of my books that I have on the shelf as ebooks, there is a easy to having a few novels with me at all times on my phone. It's more support I can give to my favorite authors and in so doing encourage a technology I love. But it's also so that now I can loan out the physical copy and not worry as much about losing access to the novel I love.

Personally I would LOVE very much if book publishers started following what DVD publishers are starting to do. Some DVD's are coming out now with the eformat of the same movie included so you can watch the Blue Ray on your HD TV and at the same time take the lower format copy with you on your phone or other hand held device. I would be extremely happy to pay a couple bucks more if the next Lawrence Watt-Evans book came out in hard cover and at the back had a CD or a coupon code of some sort that I could then turn around and access the same content from fictionwise as ebook.

[ShortNCuddlyAm]

Originally Posted by stevejay

Hi

Called a coffeehouse Don't be mad at me, I couldn't resist.

This place looked more like a nightclub than a coffeehouse!

[stevejay]

Giddion, you should have wrote part two for the original author of the article in question, and our attachments to some paper books. You expressed it well.

[kazbates]

Originally Posted by GeoffC

it would be interesting to 'see' what has a longer life span for the future .... paper for more books, or electricity to run readers ....

Hopefully, technology will evolve to find something even better than electricity! It was a great invention from the last century, but it is that power source that is still keeping us connected to the wall!

When I talk about technology with my elementary students, I show them a quill and inkwell, a pencil, a ball point pen, a typewriter and a computer. It helps them see the progression of technology over the years. Each one was an improvement over the other. I see ebooks in the same way.
Kaz