[WEB4LIB] RE: Books on Demand

[Daniel Messer]

Thomas M G Bennett wrote:

> Remember when computers filled large rooms and cost hundreds of thousands
> (well maybe just thousands)...it was even said when ATT Labs created the
> mouse that it would not catch on (Apple built on that) ... and today you can
> hold a computer in your hand that is many times more powerful than those
> first computers and virtually every computer comes with a mouse (or some
> type of pointing device).

    Just a point of info, the Univac was sold to the Department of Defense for a
little over one million dollars. The funny thing is that they still probably pay
the same for a normal Pentium today :)

>
> At a building planning meeting yesterday, it was brought up that the book is
> here to stay not to be totally replaced by electronic versions because of
> patron demand mainly.  And, the library is not changing from one format to
> another but yet evolving to encompass traditional, current, and future media
> types from scrolls to ebooks and beyond.
>

    I agree with you one hundred percent. Technology is a wonderful thing, but
people will replace and supplant things only when they are sure that the new
thing offers something far better and much easier than the older version.
Scrolls were used for thousands of years (I believe) and were only replaced when
books served the same purpose far better. A book is more durable than a scroll,
it can be produced for less money, it files and stores much neater than a
scroll, and they are easier to read than a scroll. Thus books became the "in
thing" to do.
    Well e-books on the other hand offer none of this. They aren't more durable
than a book. I can throw a book flat against a concrete floor and it might,
MIGHT, sustain some cover and binding damage. It will still be perfectly
readable. Try throwing an e-book against the concrete and seeing what happens! I
may be wrong on this part, but I'm almost certain that an e-book is more
expensive to make than a book. After all, you need circuts and transistors and
motherboards and processors for an e-book. You need ink, paper, glue, and
cardboard for a book. These things usually come far cheaper. While storing an
e-book is pretty easy, it's what's on the e-book that matters. You can have
several books on the e-book, but what if you want to add another? You have to
take one off, and upload the new one. If you want to add another book to a
shelf, you put it there. And I don't know how many people I know have given up
on e-books because they make their eyes water.
    Combine that all with the price tags: US$100 for a CHEAP e-book and the
e-books themselves cost the same as a real book, and you've got a recipe for
apathy. Why should I spend US$125 to get a book and reader when I can go down
and just get the book for US$25? You don't buck tradition overnight. :)

Dan


> Windows 95 is a 32-bit extension to a 16-bit patch for an 8-bit
> operating system that was originally coded for a 4-bit microprocessor.
>  - Chris Dunphy     Boot Magazine

That's beautiful :)

--
Mondai wa
The subject in queston...
---
Daniel Messer
Technologies Instructor
Yakima Valley Regional Library
102 N 3rd St  Yakima, WA 98901
(509) 452-8541 x712
dmesser at yvrls.lib.wa.us
---
On your mark, bokura ga
soredemo yamenai no wa
yume no shamen miagete (itsuka wa)
yuke-sou na ki ga suru kara
     Chage & Asuka "On Your Mark"