Long gone are the days of the three rules of books – bed, bath and beach. With the new phenomenon of online publishing and on demand print, we can safely say that we have become a world ruled by this ‘Googopoly’ of society. The impending court case is slowly coming to an end with only one winner – Google. No longer shall we go on holiday to see people reading this summer’s number one seller in hardback or paperback form, but it shall be a beach full of people reading from their IPod’s, E-books or laptops.
For students this is a fantastic idea. Instant downloads of academic texts are what we want, but what does everyone else want? Do you want to take your E-book down to the beach or trust yourself not to drop it in the bath? Call me nostalgic but when I get a new book, in the fiction genre, I like to see its individual house style, set out in that familiar format and its creative illustrations/cover. I certainly do not want to scroll down a bright screen giving myself a migraine into the bargain when I am trying to relax.
Publishers are right to be boycotting Google Books and they are being pushed from their ‘wait and see’ attitude into taking direct action too soon. The use of online publishing is fantastic for new authors, customer feedback and academic texts, but not for fiction. Already we have pandered to the supermarket giants who like to ‘pile them high and sell them cheap’ but we do not need to pander to the Google industrialisation. We have a choice and we should use that choice when deciding the successfulness of Google’s new venture.
Guest
Date: Tue Dec 23, 2008 11:18 PM GMT
hank you for all of your comments. Google books may, at the moment, limit the length of the pre-view but this is the argument of the court case. If the court case is approved in their favour then they will be able to show full length novels. It is an issue arisen from the contracts between publishers and authors. There is a rise in new technology; therefore, authors must sign a contract stating that their material can be released in any format, present and future.
Spex
Date: Mon Dec 22, 2008 11:37 AM GMT
I reckon that there will always be enough people who love physical books to support publishing in the traditional format (academic publishing may be a different story). There is a lot of hand-wringing and worrying because eBooks are still very new - but printed books have survived the centuries and I don't think we will lose them any time soon.
The only way I see eBooks really supplanting real books is if eBooks can get loaded onto a bound book with epaper pages. So there is still the tactile sensation of turning the pages, but only one 'book' needed.
Guest
Date: Mon Dec 22, 2008 11:10 AM GMT
To be honest, I'm not all that worried about long fiction. I think enough people do like real books. After all, you can already get free e-books of anything Austen has written, but in every book store in this country, she dominates a good sized shelf. The same with Dickens or Melville or any of the non-copyright authors. Beyond the annoyance of e-books, there's also the fact that google books does limit the length of the preview you're allowed to see.
I do wonder, though, about the implications for poetry and short story collections, where 40 pages is more than enough to read a few complete pieces.
