1st October 2008   The Print of Words to Come  (from book to ebook)

So the transformation of handheld books into handheld devices that allow you to read books may at last be underway.   The purpose built electronic reader (eReader) seems to have resurged in recent months.  Is now the beginning of the switch away from traditional printed books?

In abstract terms, the promise of an improvement on the book isn’t a surprise – we’ve had electronic devices that allow us to create and view the written word for some time. We’ve also had devices small enough to pass as portable for a decade or so now. However, in real terms it isn’t as simple as that – some media and mediums have proven more resistant to the otherwise unstoppable march of the digital.

To lean on a phrase that’s become all encompassing these days, it’s the reading “experience”, most say, that can’t easily be replaced. The book is durable, flexible, portable, personal - accommodating brief notes to self; and over time a good book can become a treasured artefact embodying what we thought and felt at the time of first or most recent reading. There’s something about ink on a page which makes for comfortable browsing, and the tactile nature of a neat paperback that makes for ideal any time, place, where reading.

Still, for some reason 2008 is proving to be the year when manufacturers of eReaders (in league with book retailers) appear keen to win the reading public over with their substitute for the book. I’ve come across three such devices in latter times: Sony PRS505 Reader, iRex iLiad and Amazon Kindle and some of the new range promise improved technology; e-ink for example, which it’s claimed reproduce the look and feel of the printed word on paper. Of course, eBook-type readers have been emerging for some time and even these have had to compete for attention with the many and varied PDAs which first found their market base in the 90s.

This time a key difference is the tight coupling of online eBook download services to the eReading devices themselves. This represents a two pronged attack which is surely following in the footsteps of the grab-a-track music downloaders.

In this guise all sorts of opportunities are opened up. Why buy the entire book, when the bloggasphere are particularly raving about chapter 3 of the latest bestseller? Why not substitute book charts for chapter charts? Why expend so many resources hardcopy publishing all those books when you can simply digitise once and sell many variants? And, moving away from the end product itself, closer to the producer, what’s the difference between a publisher and a content provider anyway?

To many readers I suspect this is an issue that divides heavily along age lines, a world without printed books will seem unimaginable. To many authors however, the unimaginable isn’t an option it’s an opportunity.
  

© Khome, editor@unheardwords.com, 2008 (all rights reserved)

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