One of the interesting things about monitoring new developments in information technology is that they often don’t go in the direction we expect. The demise of books in favor of downloadable electronic books or e-books read from handheld devices used to be the favorite vision for people who were certain that the end of books and libraries as we know them was right around the corner. Instead the book has shown remarkable staying power as a preferred literature delivery system. New ways of buying and obtaining books fueled by advances in IT have grown quickly and the often heralded e-books, although growing in popularity, are still rarely seen.
For example, print-on-demand services such as lulu.com have been around for a while now and they have revolutionized the book publishing industry. Books are preserved digitally and printed on demand when somebody orders a copy. When the book is ordered it is printed, bound and shipped the same day. As you can easily surmise, this has completely altered the landscape for users of rare books, self-published authors, vanity presses and small presses.
Now, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education, customers at the University of Michigan library will be able to use a sort of vending machine to order print-on-demand copies of books from the university’s collection. The Espresso Book Machine, a book-printing machine described as “the ATM of books” will be available at the U of M’s library October 1st. The machines are going online at college libraries and bookstores all around North America.
Just about any digitized, out-of-copyright book from Michigan’s collection can be printed and bound on the spot. Printing takes five to seven minutes, and the cost is about $10 per book. Users will also be able to print books from online sources such as the Open Content Alliance. The Espresso’s manufacturer, On Demand Books, wants to create a network of machines in libraries and bookshops around the world, allowing users to print books from collections anywhere.
What do you think? Given the consumer’s lack of enthusiasm for e-books, is this the way information technology will most rapidly affect the world of books, libraries and maybe bookstores, through a totally new model for delivering good old fashioned books? Or, is this just another technological dead end?
October 3, 2008 at 9:03 am |
October 3, 2008
Blog subject: Shape of things to come?
Question: Will E-books replace the normally printed book?
Two aspects of book publishing has to be viewed before answering that question.
First: The book is considered as a mode of communication; relaying the author’s thoughts/ideas to his or her readers. It is used as a pipeline, so to speak, to the reader. For many, that may be enough. The sole purpose of the book, then, is for the acquistion of information in the fastest and in the most expedient way possible. In this regards, e-book delivers.
Secondly: The book is produced as a collectible object. It has inherent value beyond its function of conveying information. Book collectors, book dealers and the book connoisseur appreciate the book as an “objets d’arts”.
You may ask why does a book collector prefer a hardcover book over an electronically transmitted book?
Because book publishers of bygone days, even some small and private presses of today, took pains in crafting their printed books. You can imagine the time and effort it took to create a book well; from the choice of type face and weight of the paper(sometimes hand-made) to the number of illustrations(some by renowned artists) all gathered with the text pages and bound in cloth or leather covers. Some highly decorative book covers are not machine stamped but are hand tooled by skilled craftsmen.
When you take these factors(and there are many others) into consideration, a true book connoisseur will never hold an e-book in high esteem.
So will e-books replace the normally printed book?
When the book lover ceases to be, when the major publishing houses see little demand for the printed book, when small and private presses fall silent then the e-book may reign supreme.
Bookrunner22
PS. As for me, I’m still searching for that rare first edition of Joyce’s Ulysses(published 1922).