Opinions, Predictions and (even some) Hard Data
Many people enjoy debating debating the merits of the ebook vs printed book. Whether one likes to hold it, whether one can visually flip back and forth to find something one read earlier, whether the screen format is as easy on the eyes as paper, whether one can easily share the text with a friend… Personally (and a lot of the writing on this issue seems to be personal anecdote so I’ll add mine here):
-I hate reading on a screen
-I hate scrolling through screen upon screen to find something
-I prefer the sensations of paged books to the grasping-a-picture-frame experience of holding an ebook or tablet.
-I have heard you can actually share a lot of books quite easily electronically (but theoretically it is easier for the publishes to track that sharing).
If one cares less about opinion and more about empirical observation, a recent study in the Journal of Usability Studies concluded that while the usability of the reading device has a profound effect on user experience, the legibility of eReaders is on par with that of paper books (Siegenthaler, Wurtz & Groner, 2015).
Aside from sharing personal preferences and scientific data, what is actually going on here? According to O’Donnell and Bolter, it’s remediation—when one technology tries to ape the previous technology’s strong points until the medium finds its own legs/strengths and becomes a truly new form. In the “Virtual Libraries” piece, O’Donnell himself claims to be fond of quoting McLuhan’s idea that “the content of a new medium of communication is always imagined to be another older medium. Thus cinema at the outset was thought to be a vehicle for filming “plays”, and there are still “made-for-TV movies” and “TV newsmagazine shows”.”(Web.archive.org, 2015)
In the way they take people’s thoughts, stories and information and present them in simple printed format like printed books, ebooks are still essentially remediated books. As myself and others have pointed out, reading an ebook might not offer the same experience as the printed book but the new technology does offer some advantages in terms of storage space, portability and the ability to manipulate the size of the text being read. Similarly, the mp3 audio format may not offer the best sound quality but one can carry a room full of CD’s in a device that fits in a pocket. There is a time and a place for ebooks and mp3s but printed books and hi fidelity audio do not appear to obsolete—in the same way that movies haven’t made live theater disappear.
In “Writing Space”, Bolter talks about how new technologies engage in,”…homage and rivalry, for the new medium imitates some features of the older medium, but also makes an implicit or explicit claim to improve on the older one.” (2001) In thinking about adapting printed books to new technology I started wondering about audio books vs ebooks. Were audio books still selling?
Since I haven’t listened to one since 2010 (ironically, Walden, while doing camp tasks in the evenings and mornings during a bicycle tour from Victoria, BC to Tijaunna, MX) I found a publishing industry trade piece saying that sales are up and that unique, never seen in print ‘books’ are being released and apparently have elements of old radio play dramas in them (Donavan, 2015). This seems like a fairly ‘concrete’ (or do I mean, digital?) example of a story/novel finding a new non-print medium as opposed to repackaging previously printed material in an electronic format. The article goes on to say that the audiobook industry has not yet found the ideal distribution model but that, “it’s time to for publishers to find the optimal publishing and distributing models for them. Whether that’s audio-first publication, subscription models, or serialized releases, it’s still too early to tell.”(ibid)
While the above quote affirms that audio books and ebooks are not mature technologies—O’Donnell claims that it takes, “a generation or three to get past the point of depending on the old medium for a way to think about the new and to the point of exploiting the new medium artfully in its own right.”(Web.archive.org, 2015)–they are slowly developing into new ways to gather, distribute and interact with information. Radio-play style sound effects and music over top of the sound of a human voice telling a story has proven to be a compelling and commercially viable way (at least in the radio era) of sharing stories so it is not surprising that this may re-emerge in audiobook format. Will similar soundscapes or visual information soon be included in the ebooks to take advantage of other developments in digital information transfer and storage? What other affordances of digital technology will affect the presentation of ebooks?
As these new formats for sharing stories and information remediate the printed book experience on their way to becoming full expressions of their respective media’s affordances, pundits will continue to make bold predictions about what will survive and what will not. In thinking about the past and future of ‘books’ and ‘reading’ I am reminded of O’Donnell’s perspective from the Cambridge Audio recording at the outset of our course even more (Engell & O’Donnell, 1999). He encouraged listeners to avoid extremes in their predictions about new technologies—doom and utopia happen far less than we expect.
References
Bolter, Jay David. (2001). Writing space: Computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print [2nd edition]. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Donavan J. (2015). Listen Up! The Audiobook Revolution – Publishing Trends. Retrieved 1 July 2015, from http://www.publishingtrends.com/2015/01/listen-audiobook-revolution/
Engell J. & O’Donnell J. (1999). From Papyrus to Cyberspace. [Audio File]. Cambridge Forums.
Siegenthaler, E., Wurtz, P., & Groner, R. (2015). Improving the Usability of E-Book ReadersJUS. Uxpajournal.org. Retrieved 1 July 2015, from http://uxpajournal.org/improving-the-usability-of-e-book-readers/
Web.archive.org,. (2015). O’Donnell, Virtual Library. Retrieved 1 July 2015, from http://web.archive.org/web/20070204034556/http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/jod/virtual.html
I, like you dislike reading on a screen, especially if it is a long text like a book. I don’t mind reading articles from newspapers or magazines on the “small screen”, but when it comes to reading a book or even a journal article, I like to have the physical copy in my hands. I usually print articles, so that I can read, highlight and annotate as I read. I still am not comfortable performing those tasks on an ipad or cell phone screen.
As a child, and even as an adult, I love walking through the library and/book store and choosing a book, nothing can mimic this experience when it comes to choosing an ebooks. Perusing a website is just not the same; it is so cold and lonely in my opinion, being surrounded by books, asking for suggestions, physically opening the books and reading snippets are all part of the reading experience. Yes, there are advantages to eBooks, last time I went on vacation my luggage was overweight, because I had 5 hard cover books in my bag to read on the beach. If I had those books on my ipad I would not have had that problem.
You mention Bolter’s comment, “new medium imitates some features of the older medium, but also make in implicit or explicit claim to improve on the older one.” (2001). Ebooks have retained features of physical books and I guess “improvements” including aspects, like being able to click on a word and have the definition right in front of you instead of actually going to a dictionary to look it up. Ease of accessibility and ability to carry multiple books at a time. Nevertheless, I am not a fan and I really hope that ebooks does not cause my beloved libraries and bookstores to completely close, because that my friend would be a tragedy.
Great post John! And very interesting, honest reply Haneefa!
This reminds me of Jody’s post: https://blogs.ubc.ca/etec540summer15/2015/06/30/r-i-p-mr-book/ where she looked at the extinction of the book.
I like how you ended John reminding us to not make rash predictions that are extreme, because the extremes are very unlikely to happen! This makes me relieved, because I too, love the feeling of walking through a book store and enjoy the look of a book shelf full of treasures, stories I got lost in and adventures I participated in, all thanks to having read them! Nothing can replace the book in my opinion – although ereaders are very practical and sometimes essential!
A great example of when I would choose an ebook over a real book would be in my classroom when doing a novel study. I work in a public school. We have no money! BUT, 10$ will buy me the pdf which I can display on my smartboard and BINGO – we have a class novel! I am thankful for that!
As I mentioned in response to Jody’s post, I wonder how the book will change, because it will have to. I don’t mind physically, but rather, what we decide to print will have to change, because we don’t need everything in print any longer. I also wonder if it will become more expensive, as less people order copies because they grew up reading off a screen… I don’t think we will ever choose to read to our children using an ereader.. How do you predict the book will change?