OT: e-books and heritage

[PHILA -at- Mail -dot- VIPS -dot- com]

<<In fact, within the next 10 years, Barnes and Noble Vice Chairman Steve
Riggio said, "There will be an electronic version of virtually every single
book in print.">>

The idea of an evolving paperless library raises a number of troubling
considerations in my mind...
--Data degradation
--Archival requirements
--Technological obsolescence
--Cost of conversion or upgrade
**Books *not* made available in this format

As an ex-librarian, I'll confess: my personal library could use a reduction
in size. But I'm not willing to trade my groaning bookshelves for technology
that my grandchildren might not be able to use. Nor am I willing to deprive
them of the feeling of continuity gained by reading, for example, the same
well-thumbed poetry book that their mother, grandmother, and
great-great-aunt read...dog-ears, spidery marginal scribbles, yellowing
bookplate and all. 

Those native to this land had a principle of considering the seven
generations - three generations of elders, the current generation, and three
generations of descendants -- before making any wholesale decision. Our
elders, by contrast, are already devalued and dumped in nursing homes; the
books from their generations are steadily being culled from underfunded
libraries and school curricula as "no longer relevant." If eBooks take off,
the paper version may well become a quaint throwback, progressively less
accessible...yet another step in the same trend toward, as Robert Bly called
it, a myopic, self-referential "sibling society." 

Thanks,
Phila 
********************
Philomena Hoopes
Phila -at- vips -dot- com <Phila -at- vips -dot- com> 
(410) 832-8330 ext. 845

		-----Original Message-----
		From:	Emru Townsend [mailto:etownsen -at- Softimage -dot- com]
		Sent:	Friday, January 07, 2000 11:15 AM
		To:	TECHWR-L
		Subject:	RE: Are you debating the elimination of
printed docs?  (An idea..     --     .)

		I had a Rocket eBook for a few months while I was working on
some articles
		on e-books (here's one:
http://www.janmag.com/features/ebooks.html).  I
		think that once you get past the "I can't turn pages"
prejudice, it's pretty
		good.  I also wouldn't mind reducing the shelf space I have
dedicated to all
		my software & hardware docs.  With a few tweaks (color
screens, for
		instance) I don't see any reason why the eBook or its
descendant couldn't do
		away with paper docs.

		Emru Townsend, Information Developer |
etownsen -at- softimage -dot- com
		Softimage, Inc.
		Personal Web site: http://purpleplanetmedia.com
		Recent musings:
http://purpleplanetmedia.com/eye/film/f2k.html


		> -----Original Message-----
		> From: Darren Barefoot [mailto:dbarefoot -at- mpsbc -dot- com]
		> 
		> Good afternoon,
		> 
		> As a point of interest in this never-ending debate,
Microsoft 
		> and Barnes and
		> Noble just today announced that they're going to join
forces on the
		> promotion and development of the Rocket eBook--the
handheld,
		> shaped-like-a-paperback digital book--and associated 
		> software. In fact,
		> within the next 10 years, Barnes and Noble Vice Chairman 
		> Steve Riggio said,
		> "There will be an electronic version of virtually every
single book in
		> print." See the following URL for more details:
		> 
		>
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2417896,00.html
		> 
		> Might this technology, if it gets wide-spread enough, be
the 
		> nail in the
		> coffin of the paper vs. online debate? Can it provide the
best of both
		> worlds? Some might scoff at the possibility of "an eBook
on 
		> every coffee
		> table," but they said the same thing about the television,

		> automobile and
		> ever needing more than 64K. Just a thought. DB.


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