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Hear John Updike’s rant against online books
May 29, 2006 | 4:40 am
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By David Rothman
Details from Rough Type. Speech here from BookExpo podblog. Updike covers other topics as well, and online books come up around 7 minutes 25 seconds into his talk.
You can also hear AAP prez Pat Scroeder on copyright and digitization and Google.
Where I’d agree with Updike: Yes, business models like “personal access to the creator” are no substitute for royalties. All kinds of models should be available, including traditional ones.
Related TeleBlog item: John Updike and the literati vs. the evil technorati at BookExpo: Rabbit, rant!
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Comments:
Being one of those who is very busy in scanning books to become ebooks….Mr. Updike’s comments on the trend of digitizing books is ….to a degree….correct. Google and others like it have embarked on the journey of creating one big messy database …that in the end….will be useless to all. But while Mr.Updike is focused on the issue of Google and others like them, he is missing what smaller but more effective players are doing. For example, on our site, http://www.bookyards.com , we are limiting ourselves to present only classics and/or relevant texts in complete….and clean form. While it is true that nothing can beat seating down and reading a good book, I can say that from my own experience …when I am reading a book on my computer screen…..I can and do get lost in that world in which a good writer can put his or her reader in. It may not be the same emotional feeling….but it is very very close to it.
The internet is a very unwieldy, looping, free-for-all, offering access to many virtual venues for the literary arts. We need writers with experience acting as gatekeepers, or sentinels, if you will, even when they risk sounding preachy or authoritarian. When we have one of the best (and financially successful) of the mid-twentieth century author/critics taking the time to express his concern, one has to assume that it is a genuine concern, and not based solely on a profit margin. Yes, I sometimes read excerpts of this and that on my PC, but there will never be a replacement for settling down of an evening, sipping from a snifter of ice cold milk (maybe stirring in a little Hershey’s syrup), and turning the pages (yes, pages) of a good book. Being very, very close is not the same. You may perhaps begin your discussion now?