E-Books

I was going to add this to yesterday's post, but then I thought I'd blog about it on a different day and make two posts. Tis the season right?

I'm basically just posting about this because I've had a couple conversations over the past few months about the emergence of e-books and the eventual decline of paper books.

I'm a big fan of paper books. I don't own a kindle or ipad...yet. I'm sure I will someday, and that day will probably be sooner than later. I'm not making any sort of Christmas hints or anything, but just a statement about how the e-readers are taking over. Which is kind of a bummer if you are like me and you like the paper books and you always thought it would be really cool to have a library in your home filled with hardback books. That dream can still happen of course. It's not like actual physical paper books will become extinct, but if you are denying the e-book takeover, it's time to accept defeat and change your Christmas list. Why? Because Google just announced they are joining the e-book marketplace:

Google Opens E-Books Store

And what do we know about Google? Google is life. They are our life and are slowly controlling our lives. And I'd be upset about that except that this is their blog, and they generally make my life easier and I like their products. So I have a hard time complaining about their eventual world domination.

The take over of e-books does make me wonder about libraries and what will become of them. Although libraries, at least on college campuses, are just glorified study halls. Sure they are filled with books, but few students actually read the books as most just use the library as a wall and barrier to block the public from their study flirt session with their significant other. I know this because I was once a college student, but also because I held the prestigious position of library security guard. Few people are actually in the library studying. Most are just socializing and getting their flirt on. What better way to impress a girl than pretend like you are smart and care about studying and invite her with you to the library for a nice quiet evening together?

I digress. Libraries will still exist but I think they will have to take on a new role because the actual books they offer will be used less and less. At first I thought that e-books would really only be available for "newer" books published within the last 10 years and everything in the future. Of course classics would be made available electronically, but there are a lot of books in the library and surely they all wouldn't be available electronically. Most of them are hardly read as it is, so why bother to make them available electronically? Because we are dealing with Google here. The company that wasn't satisfied just providing you with a map of where you were going. They felt it necessary to drive a car covered with cameras along every single street in the world in order to let you know exactly what your destination looks like. So just making only newer or classic books available electronically doesn't really fit with Google's identity. It's all or nothing. I give it 10 years before you see a sign that says: Welcome to the BYU Libarary, powered by Google.

The other big thing will be textbooks. Again, I like the paper books and I think it's easier to read paper books, but I'm also not part of the generation the grew up with the internet and cell phones in elementary school. That generation is used to reading and watching things on a screen, at least more so than I am. Plus, books are heavy. Who wants to lug a 600 page biology book around when you can just store it on your e-reader? I don't. I hate biology.

Anyways, I'm rambling. I know that this post isn't some sort of prophetic statement as people have been predicting the emergence of e-books for quite some time. It's just interesting to see it actually unfolding. And sad to realize that the library in my home dream is dying. Well, sad on one hand. On the other hand, it's actually a good thing. Maybe some day I'll have a home with so many extra bedrooms that I have to fill one with books because I can't come up with anything else to put in it; but in the meantime and while I'm living in a two-bedroom apartment where extra space is a rare commodity, I'm fine giving up the dream.