A friend wrote me the following yesterday, in response to my piece about the iPod. He suggested I do a follow-up, but I can’t improve on this.
Thesis: Technophoria, rather than technophobia, is what led us to the current dismal state of the music industry. It isn’t so much (or only) that the big labels failed to respond to the technological innovations of Napster and other digitizing file sharers, it’s that the digitizing, in and of itself, carried the seeds of music’s destruction, in terms of the weakening of the influence of the major labels, the de-professionalization of music, the cheapening and commoditization of music, the lower sampling (bit) rates of digital versus analogue, the poorer sound quality, and on and on.
Now the same thing is on the verge of happening to books. As in music, we’re beginning to do things only because they’re possible, not because they’re desirable. But do we really want to see all books digitized (and their contents commoditized and cheapened) merely because we’re all afraid of being accused of being old fogeys and technophobes? Do we really want to throw away thousands of years of printed history just because it’s possible to digitize books? Not all technological innovations are good ones (cf. nukes and frozen burritos.) E-books, in and of themselves, are not a bad idea — but the possibility that printed books and other forms of printed literature will as a result entirely disappear will be very, very bad for literature, in my opinion.
The irony is that the techno geeks who want to shove everything analogue into the shadows are themselves less capable of envisioning the future than the old-fogey technophobes. Because they clearly didn’t see what digitization would do to music, and they can’t see how digitization will destroy books the way it’s destroyed music.
Now, I am not a Luddite. I love my MacBook and my Blackberry Curve. But, in terms of the quality of experience, it seems to me self-evident that:
A home library is better than a Kindle.
The New York Times paper is better than the New York Times online.
The New York Times Book Review is better than the book review section of Popmatters. (And I write for the latter!)
Compact Discs are better than Mp3s.
A stereo sound system is better than an iPod.
Talking on the phone is better than texting.
A letter is better than email.
A great bookstore is better than Amazon.
A great record store is better than iTunes.
But, in ten years, we’re likely not to have the New York Times, CDs, and book and record stores, while talking on the phone (at least for my 17 year old), the letter (we call it “snail mail”!), and home stereo systems are virtually gone already. And, as my friend suggests, will books be far behind? What is it about our culture that we happily trade quality of experience for convenience, portability, and quantity of experience?
Tags: music, technology by Christopher Guerin
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