Exactly Wrong

In this article Dick Meyer argues that the death of stand alone book review sections in newspapers is the harbinger of the death of books... this is the sort of article that makes me shake my fist and shout STOP! PLEASE!

Bemoaning the state of old media will not save books... because, in fact books  don't need saving at all.

The models are changing, there is an e-volution and many  find it scary but others of us find  exciting and yes it will mean the end of some things but it also means opportunites that we never had before.

I've  read books all my life on paper... now I listen to 50 of them a year on my iPod and read another 20 on my Kindle and read another 20 of them the old fashioned way... and the only difference between what my reading life is like now versus 10 years ago is that it costs me about $700 less since I'm on a plan with Audible and ebooks are less (as it should be) than hardcovers. 

And I'm not aytpical. Are kids reading novels on cells phones in Japan not reading? Is that what people said when Dickens started delivering fiction via newspapers? In chunks? Was that not literature because it was delivered in a throw away vehicle once a week?

The argument in Myers essay is that books are dying becaase review sections are dying becuase people  - esp young people - only want to read in chunks. Maybe when it comes to overly long book reviews and esoteric essays about literature that many of us have complained since the early 90s  have been out of touch and often irrelevant to what we want to read.

Media is moving online and newspapers needing rethinking not because news is dead or journalism is dead but because it's cheaper and greener and way more texturized to deliver news and read it online. 

The reader can go deeper on line in any article printed on paper .

And media is moving online because the advertising opportunities are richer online. Via Authorbuzz.com We exposed more than 4 million people to  book we advertised on a select group of blogs last month. More than 300,000 of them stopped to read the ad  and are now aware of the book and when they're in the store might pick it up. Or will take it out of the library. More than 2700 people clicked through to the book's website in less than 10 days.   It cost my client $3000.

Even if you could even get those stats when you do print advertising - you can't get that price and you certainly can't get the potential immediate sales.

Are books dying?

Did music die? No. The delivery system underwent and is still undergong an e-volution. One that still is in its infancy. But are people still making music and listening to music? You bet.

Same thing for conveying information and storytelling. 

We have to stop being so damn negative and stop confusing the way the loaf of bread is packaged with the bread itself. If you take it out of plastic or paper, if you buy it in a supermarket in Seattle, a boulanger in Paris or bake it yourself... it is still bread and it will still keep you from going hungry.

Comments

[Linda L. Richards]

Very well put! This is a message I keep trying to share as well: stop with the "sky is falling," already. Books are good. People are reading. The delivery formats may morph, the way we talk about books may change but you will pry a book -- be it paper, electronic or some other currently unimagined format -- from my cold, dead hand.

[Kevin Smokler]

Exactly. Sometimes I think the bitter traditionalists in our business never listened to their own mothers and grandmothers. Or shrinks. Relentless negativity and doomsdaying is a sign of self-hatred and insecurity. So I would ask the Dick Meyers of the world: "If they think what they do is so valuable, why are they so quick to predict its demise?"

[Dumbo Books of Brooklyn]

On the other hand, some of us old-fashioned book publishers are in deep doo-doo. Por ejemplo, today we had to issue the following press release:

"Dumbo Books of Brooklyn has announced that it filed for Chapter 11 protection from its creditors on Monday, saying a massive slump in revenue from book sales was to blame.

The company owns a small press publisher of literary books and three nondaily online newspapers, including The Los Angeles World-Telegram & Star, and has about 3.5 employees.

According to Richard Grayson, the company’s chief restructuring officer who filed a declaration in the case, unaudited financial statements for the fiscal year ending Nov. 30 reported $5,963 in assets and $18,692 in debt, including unpaid interest. Revenue has fallen more than 70 percent since 2006, the company said in bankruptcy court documents filed in Delaware.

Grayson said in a statement that Dumbo Books 'anticipates that the Chapter 11 process will allow it to significantly reduce debt from its balance sheet while facilitating a strategic reorganization of the company, which will place it in the strongest possible position to sustain its momentum despite extremely challenging market conditions for books like Who Will Kiss the Pig? Sex Stories for Teens, which up until recently was 3,765,633 on Amazon's best seller list.'

Dumbo Books, based in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn despite its name, proposes a restructuring in which it would cancel its stock — it traded for less than one cent on Friday — and become controlled by its lenders.

Grayson called the filing 'ironic,' noting, 'Just like most of the few remaining readers of our books, we couldn't get past Chapter 11.'"

[Katharine Weber]

Thank you for that, Richard.

This is precisely the reason my forthcoing novel has only ten chapters.

[M.J. Rose]

Richard - while I am totally sympathetic Dumbo's problem isn't because newspaper book sections are being shut down. Book reviews are not what sells books nor what doesn't sell them but are one small part of getting the word out.

There's no question the models are changing and change is tough on us all. But changing doesn't mean dying.

[Paul Elwork]

I have to admit that I'm not in love with the idea of e-books becoming the dominant form, but I'm prepared to see it happen (I think) and I know it's not the end of books in the conceptual--and most important--sense. The sky will not fall. But I sincerely hope and trust that books in the form we've come to know and love, in paper and cloth, print and binding, remain in the world, even if in a smaller, more specialized market, as some non-gloom-and-doomers are suggesting.

[Kevin Smokler]

While I am quite sympathetic to Mr. Elwork's position and don't think that physical books are going anywhere (the format has faced many foes and beaten them all), I would hasten not to frame M.J's post in those terms. What is at issue here is much larger than a simple Ebooks v. Physical Books dichotomy. Instead the absolute need for book publishing to accept and join the realities of being in the culture business in the 21st century. And that's about a lot more than the next version of the Kindle.

[Paul Elwork]

Fair enough--but my point is that I prefer the print book format over any other forms for consuming books, and that it means a lot to me that they'll still be around. I also realize that the larger discussion includes a long overdue rethinking of the traditional print-book business, which seems wasteful and antiquated right down to its roots. So, yeah, ad astra, hey ho let's go, etc. I'm in.

[David J. Montgomery]

The death of book reviews has much, much more to do with the death of newspapers than it does with the death of books or reading. The two concepts are separate.

[Ryan Holiday]

MJ,

I've read this blog for a long time now but never felt compelled to comment.

2,700 clicks on 4 million impressions is a HORRENDOUS click through rate.

I'm not saying your central point is incorrect but that is an incredibly inefficient advertising campaign. I wouldn't be bragging about it.