On the Media - Bookish

[Paperbackstash]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

The phrase "serious readers" should really be retired (or at least renamed). Its use rarely seems to convey its intended meaning, and typically only angers those who get left off of the "serious" bus.

Agree. Serious reader, "true reader", "real reader" - it gets old.

[Apache]

I just claim to be a readaholic.
Apache

[JSWolf]

A book is a book regardless if it's eBook, pBook, or audiobook. It's not the container that makes the book, it's what's in the book that makes it a book. How you digest the information doesn't matter.

[SteveEisenberg]

I think this post summed up why eBooks have not taken over:

100$ in my country is like 3 months salary

Reader prices have not fallen enough. When the eInk patents expire, I think the picture will change. But reader prices today are still a barrier.

[jhowell]

E-ink devices are far from being a necessity for reading ebooks. Sure they are easier on the eyes but cheap smartphones have become common and can be used for books. They certainly get a lot of use for reading social media.

[ekbell]

Originally Posted by issybird

They get checked out the most at least in part because they’re short, quick reads. One Harlequin-type romance could be borrowed, read and returned 10 times in the time it takes to read the latest Walter Isaacson or Simon Schama, say.

When it comes to physical books I liked what one library did. They set up a shelf where their patrons could dump read romances and obtain unread romances. The shelf was never empty and not unfrequently overflowing with a constantly changing selection of romances without costing the library more then shelf space. Not something possible with ebooks unfortunately.

As for the ebook section of the podcast I think that the reasons given for the ebook particularly appealing to readers of genre fiction are not particularly snobbish. The speaker believes that narrative works are easier to read as ebooks then nonnarrative works (which appears to be true for many people), and he notes that many readers of romances are finished with a book once read and ready for the next one which leads to the desire for cheap and readily disposable books. And if that wasn't true, the romance shelf trading system wouldn't have worked as well as it did.

Otherwise it appears to be a value-neutral assessment of the current state of ebooks being published by mainstream publishers. The speaker did note that this left out a very important chunk of the ebook market.

The term 'serious readers' was nowhere to be found although there was an earlier discussion of book-lovers on tik-tok (booktokers ?) who prefer physical books, presumably for display purposes. I don't think that quite counts as saying that 'serious' or 'true' readers dislike ebooks, rather that people who want to show off what they are reading prefer physical books.

[meeera]

Originally Posted by issybird

They [romance novels] get checked out the most at least in part because they’re short, quick reads. One Harlequin-type romance could be borrowed, read and returned 10 times in the time it takes to read the latest Walter Isaacson or Simon Schama, say.

You're speaking of Category Romance, which is only one subgenre of romance novels. Most other romance novels - contemporary, non-category historical, etc - are pretty standard length genre novels. From a quick squiz at the last few I read: 249, 413, 434, 368, 436, 393, 350, 418.

someone can read 10, 20 romance novels to one academic history. This is one of my issues with libraries in general, that they buy a lot more romance and chicklit than other fiction and serious nonfiction.

I'm still not seeing the unfairness. Those category romances are probably about $4-7 also (that's retail; not sure of library package deals), while your academic history is going to cost a fair bit more, for many fewer checkouts. As you say, they're catering for their readers, which is their job description.

I've found my local librarians are very good at ordering books that their patrons request.

[Quoth]

About x10 to x30 more for academic books. POD costs vs short print runs don't seem to affect it. It's what the market can bear.

[tomsem]

Ebooks have not followed the digital trajectory of video and music for the simple reason that the latter have always required some device to decode the stored information. And clearly the devices have gotten more powerful and portable and inexpensive and digital media more easily produced and distributed, to the point where physical media (wax cylinders, vinyl disks, VHS, k8 track cassettes, CDs, BluRay) have become less compelling. While the transition has been disruptive, and continues to be, there's no turning back.

Print books can be consumed without any technology apart from what is between the ears. And for whatever reasons, many people like collecting and displaying them.

For more casual readers, it's convenient and immediate to simply pick up the book and read. Devices aren't required, and can even get in the way. It doesn't matter how cheap or pervasive (e.g. smartphones) the devices are. So the market for print books isn't going away any time soon.

It's also true that book publishers have been reluctant to fully embrace digital. Even with all the inefficiencies of producing and distributing and possibly pulping paper books. But it's mostly because they are serving a market, and it is more or less working out. For now.

[j.p.s]

Attending a live performance does not require the consumer to have a device.

Whether a physical book is more convenient is very subjective. I did a lot of recreational book reading from second grade through high school. Closed stacks in the college library put a serious dent into my book reading and the demands of grad school deepened that dent. After school, I continued reading magazines cover to cover for a few years, but almost completely reading books. Recreational reading, even magazines, dropped to near 0 for decades. Off and on, starting in the 90's, I tried reading on laptops. No go. I would occasionally start reading a paper book, but almost never get very far. In 2009, despite the high cost and reluctance to get such a specialized device, I bought a kindle. Since then, my book reading has pretty much monotonically increased, almost entirely ebooks.

[Paperbackstash]

Originally Posted by tomsem

Ebooks have not followed the digital trajectory of video and music for the simple reason that the latter have always required some device to decode the stored information. And clearly the devices have gotten more powerful and portable and inexpensive and digital media more easily produced and distributed, to the point where physical media (wax cylinders, vinyl disks, VHS, k8 track cassettes, CDs, BluRay) have become less compelling. While the transition has been disruptive, and continues to be, there's no turning back.

Print books can be consumed without any technology apart from what is between the ears. And for whatever reasons, many people like collecting and displaying them.

For more casual readers, it's convenient and immediate to simply pick up the book and read. Devices aren't required, and can even get in the way. It doesn't matter how cheap or pervasive (e.g. smartphones) the devices are. So the market for print books isn't going away any time soon.

It's also true that book publishers have been reluctant to fully embrace digital. Even with all the inefficiencies of producing and distributing and possibly pulping paper books. But it's mostly because they are serving a market, and it is more or less working out. For now.

All of these reasons as stated. Some technology advances are superior, but print books are not obsolete since they still work well for most readers. With music, there was a cost behind a lot of the advancement, it's so easy now to stream music. When we went to the CD format, I started hated that format. Same with DVDs, at first collected them, but find them a failure with holding up and endless issues. Cutting cable cost and streaming movies and shows became an in thing, a way to save money, a way not to buy hardware. You will get the music and movie collectors who still buy physical and display, as you do with books, but the differences between viewing a VHS tape versus a DVD, then a blue-ray, versus streaming, can all be so different and heavily affect the product.

[tomsem]

Originally Posted by Paperbackstash

All of these reasons as stated. Some technology advances are superior, but print books are not obsolete since they still work well for most readers. With music, there was a cost behind a lot of the advancement, it's so easy now to stream music. When we went to the CD format, I started hated that format. Same with DVDs, at first collected them, but find them a failure with holding up and endless issues. Cutting cable cost and streaming movies and shows became an in thing, a way to save money, a way not to buy hardware. You will get the music and movie collectors who still buy physical and display, as you do with books, but the differences between viewing a VHS tape versus a DVD, then a blue-ray, versus streaming, can all be so different and heavily affect the product.

I was astonished to learn that streaming services do not offer the ground-breaking soundtrack to A Clockwork Orange, or any of Wendy Carlos' catalog, for that matter. Apparently, though being a pioneer of electronic synthesizers and their usage, she doesn't support the move to digital (well, Moog is an analog synth after all -- I have the iPad app! not so analog now...). Even the CDs are out of print. Digital resistance was not unreasonable in the MP3 era, but fortunately we have moved beyond that and have Hi-Res Lossless streaming. Somebody should let her know.

I ordered the soundtrack CD last night (I am going to add it to iTunes Match, sorry Wendy), my first CD purchase in years.

And even the Pulitzer-winning Gödel, Escher, Bach is not available as an ebook (apart from a bootleg on Amazon in Print Replica format). I bought a book scanner a couple of months ago and might have to roll my own.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by tomsem

It's also true that book publishers have been reluctant to fully embrace digital. Even with all the inefficiencies of producing and distributing and possibly pulping paper books. But it's mostly because they are serving a market, and it is more or less working out. For now.

I'm not so sure about that. Borders closed, Barnes and Noble isn't what it used to be. The decrease in traffic at places like Half Price Books is noticeable.

No, not all that traffic is moving to ebooks of course. But the genre readers are. The ones that apparently buy and read more books than others.

I remember in the '90's when Miramax's indie movies were making such a splash, all the studios started their own 'indie productions'. Fox started Searchlight, Warner's had Warner Independent, Paramount had Paramount Vantage/Paramount Classics.

Maybe the big 5 should learn from that. Start their own division copying Open Road and Amazon's publishing. It seems it would be trivial for them to bring back cheap ebook exclusive editions of old OOP genre books that they originally published. They could likely even reuse the original cover artwork.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by tomsem

I was astonished to learn that streaming services do not offer the ground-breaking soundtrack to A Clockwork Orange, or any of Wendy Carlos' catalog, for that matter. Apparently... she doesn't support the move to digital...

Yeah, I'm having the same issue with some of the great comic artists. I'd love digital editions of Dan Clowes, Charles Burns, R. Crumb, Harvey Pekar and Scott McCloud's stuff*

At least Los Bros. Hernandez are okay with digital.

*McCloud and Pekar wound up getting some work published by the big 5, so they have no choice, some of their stuff is digitally available.

[tomsem]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I'm not so sure about that. Borders closed, Barnes and Noble isn't what it used to be. The decrease in traffic at places like Half Price Books is noticeable.

B&N seems to be doing better with the new ownership, and is opening new stores again, letting the locals manage the displays instead of taking money from publishers to dictate it. And supposedly there have been 600 new independent bookstores opened in the last couple of years.

May be one of the few positive pandemic after effects, and temporary.

As for the Big 5, 4, 3, 2, 1? They will adapt.

I don't have any personal anecdotes to contribute, as there aren't any bookstores near, and it's been years since I've gone into one. And I am not one for nostalgia.