By Erin L. Cox
Last week, Steve Haber, President of Sony’s Digital Reading Business, has proven why Sony is lagging behind in the digital publishing and e-reading race. Both at Mediabistro’s eBook Summit and again on the Huffington Post, he called for publishers to “Make your content more interactive” and stated “It’s time for the publishing industry to join them [the projected 10 million-plus consumers with eReaders] in their movement by narrowly focusing on finding ways to enhance their digital reading experience, before it’s too late.”
Now, I’m no expert, but I am pretty sure that words – either printed on paper or an e-ink screen — have fared pretty well throughout, well, history.
I’m also pretty sure that people buying e-readers, such as like myself, are not buying a device because of its ability to play a short film in the middle of Anna Karenina to break up the bleak, Russian storytelling. People are buying e-readers because it’s easy to store a lot of books in one small device, because you can buy your newspapers, magazines, and books in one place and, because it affords you the opportunity to read a short sample of a book before buying it. In short, e-readers are convenient and easy.
In my letter to publishers in our Frankfurt Edition, I warned AGAINST this kind of thinking that Haber is asking publishers to do. Publishers are not in the business of creating dynamic content (though some can), they are in the business of finding powerful writing that will engage a reader. If the writing is strong enough and the story compelling enough, it will compel a reader to buy it in whatever form it exists.
As someone who just packed eight hardcover books in my bag along with my eReader, I think we can safely say that printed books aren’t dying. Do publishers need to be wiser about their e-book strategy and pricing? Perhaps. But do they need to start putting more bells and whistles in the middle of a novel? I think not.
By Chip Rossetti In the fall of 2004, I was an editor at a New York publishing house, [...]
• Cognito Comics is launching an immersive digital graphic novel called Operation Ajax, [...]
Edward Nawotka
7 months ago
From what I know, Sony doesn’t even have a color or video capable e-reader on the market, which means he’s suggesting the creation of something that his company is not yet able to fulfill demand. Sony also doesn’t make tablets, though they have dabbled briefly in handhelds.
The underlying notion behind Haber’s arguments — arguments, that, it should be noted, he is not alone in making — is that publishing companies need to become vertically integrated media companies capable of producing books, movies, audio, etc…Well, we know how well that has worked out of the past ten years. Publishing companies just don’t fit that well into larger media companies and “synergy” is by-and-large a white elephant. Studies have shown that people can’t multitask very well and I would argue companies — publishers in particular — can’t multitask that well either.
karen wester newton
7 months ago
I can see certain kinds of nonfiction going the multimedia route, but not novels. I sure as heck don’t want to stop reading to watch a movie. Color and a big screen matter a lot more to magazines and newspapers. As eReaders progress, it may be that the distinction between a magazine issue and a website that is updated frequently becomes minor– except hopefully people will still pay for the magazine– but a story is a story, and I say that’s a good thing.
Mike Cane
7 months ago
Oh please. If it’s not “I don’t want video interrupting Moby Dick,” now you pull out Anna Karenina?
At least you’re beyond the insipid “I like the feel of a book” moron fetishists.
You miss the point that there are crappy eBooks — which people see as expensive even at US$9.99 — and *digital books*, which are a completely new artform.
Haber is correct.
Erin
7 months ago
Mike, what would be the ideal kind of dynamic content for an eBook? What would be the ideal “digital book?” Is that a book with links to news articles and Wikipedia on certain names so you can click away to get more information? Tell me (and our readers) more of what you see that art form being.
I’m happy to see it from the other side, but let’s hear from tech companies what kind of content an eReader wants. Publishers have been printing bound books with no dynamic content for centuries and have proven that, if the book is good enough, they don’t need anything other than words on paper. With the digital revolution, it is a new day and new media that publishers are not versed in and, for which, there are no rules. But, one of my main arguments is that coming up with this “dynamic content” should not be the main focus of publishers. I don’t want publishers to begin focusing on the bells and whistles that go with a book and not the writing itself. To me, seeking out the next Herman Melville or the next Malcolm Gladwell is more important than a video. If publishers start focusing on these items, what will happen to the written word and the value of reading and writing? With the literacy rates and levels of children in the United States alone, it is a valid concern.
As for the fetish comment, I think that’s fairly dismissive of the art and hard-work that goes into a printed a book. There is the design and layout of the words, selection of paper and color of board and end papers, dynamic cover design. A book, in itself, is a work of art. Not to mention the other things you can do with bound books: you can lend them to friends, you can drop or spill water on them and still read them, you can check them out of a library and not have to purchase them, you don’t need to plug them in, and, for me, I retain the information far better if I read a printed book versus any other digital format.
Bradley Robb
7 months ago
Hi Erin,
I think there are a couple of inaccuracies in your statement. While operating in a digital environment does indeed change the rules that publishers need to operate under, it does not mean that there are “no rules.”
The major shift publishers are facing in a digital environment is how to succeed in an abundant environment – that is what the base item (in this instance, the eBook) need only be replicated once to facilitate all potential demand, rather than repeatedly produced. It’s a scary concept because abundant markets remove a lot of the control from the publisher. In such an environment, the two primary rules are that a publisher isn’t selling a product, they are selling a service which is typically referred to as “convenience” and that a publisher is largely at the control of the consumer.
I know last bit sounds hostile, but I don’t mean the term in any sort of a loaded fashion. Customers in a digital environment are always the same distance from every possible vendor – this takes a lot of loyalty out of the question, and means that publishers need to actively court customers in order to establish a sense of digital loyalty. Publishers need to build their own communities, and give readers a reason to become customers from the publisher.
And it also brings us to your objection to Mike’s fetish comment. It’s a common misunderstanding that a “fetish” is bad, or even has anything to do with sexuality. The correction definition in Mike’s usage is “any object, idea, etc., eliciting unquestioning reverence, respect, or devotion” which accurately sums up many of the objections print fans (and several publishers) have when talk shift towards the digital shift.
Really, it seems that publishers should be embracing customers who do turn books into fetish property just as the film and music industries have managed to do for their similarly-minded customers. The name of the game with these items is limited supply across a measured demand means higher prices. To illustrate, think not of every book as art being equal, but special editions, even exceptionally limited editions, that are marketed and sold to those who buy them at prices that top out the demand. Be it leather bound, personally signed by the author, or accompanied by extras which can’t be digitally replicated and limited low triple digit quantities. But that’s another story.
I am more in your camp than Mike’s when it comes to including multimedia content under the pretense of what is an eBook as I’ve yet to see a compelling example of the convergence. The power of a book is that the content is largely static – not in a connected sense, but rather in the speed with which it’s accessed. To put it plainly, people read at unique speeds and depths – some skim, others measure and weigh every individual word. Some spend hours at a time with a book, others a few minutes at a time. The inclusion of multimedia content – be it audio, pictures, of videos – can fit with depth, but not speed.
Is such inclusions impossible? No. Even with our current technology there are areas where these technologies could be excellently included – text and reference books come to mind, and the 1990s versions of Microsoft’s Encarta really set the bar for this possibility. Granted, these books are typically read in a non-linear fashion, so the shift from static to dynamic content didn’t unsettle the reader.
Including such content in an linear read, be it fiction or non-fiction, will require someone with an artist’s understanding of solid UX principles and a technology that allows the blend to happen in a seamless fashion.
The lesson seems to be that not all eBooks will be created equal. Some will benefit from enhanced content, others won’t need it. Attempting to force all eBooks into the same digital mold will only serve to draw all eBooks down to a lower level.
Erin
7 months ago
Bradley,
Thanks for your thoughtful response. I think this answers some questions and helps to provide the understanding that publishers need to take the next step and understand a new audience of readers.
I understand the definition of fetish and I don’t think it is negative except when paired with “moron,” which Mike did. That denotes a certain condescension that I didn’t appreciate and to which I responded.
Bradley Robb
7 months ago
Ah, I tend to skip those words when Mike is talking. They’re expected. Mike is completely transparent in his biases, it’s almost respectable. Though his tactics are blunt, his intentions are clear – he wants to push publishing from the 19th century into the 21st.
If it’s any consolation, he gives eBookers the same level of grief. See his criticisms of B&N’s nook for further proof.
Theresa M. Moore
7 months ago
While we are all so quick to embrace the new technologies, consider the BlackBerry blackout of last night. My house still runs a landline to my phone and my modem, and my laptop has had its wireless tech cards removed at my request a long time ago. Yet only a couple of years ago, when I was looking for outside employment, HR execs kept sending me messages on my cell phone, which is kept off most of the time, instead of my home phone, which works even in an earthquake. This in spite of the fact that I clearly marked that my cell phone was off most of the time. I’m not old school but I value my privacy. I did not miss one minute of inconvenience in a world which relies so heavily on etech that the first EMP will cripple its power to communicate.
Having said that, I must point out that the ereader is still slow to reach the rest of the world. That most developed countries have embraced this tech does not mean that everyone has it, so printed books will retain their collectible and consistently readable quality long into the next century. But we writers and publishers still have to mind that our market demands accessibility in all types of media. Sony has an obligation to satisfy users used to seeing things in color on their desktop computers, or it will go the way of the Dodo. Kindle is not far behind.