Books and the power of print ch. 10

Why was the printing press such an important and revolutionary invention?

1.       The invention of the printing press produced the first so-called modern books. Printers gradually reduced the size of books and developed less expensive grades of paper, making books cheaper do more people could afford them! This lead to a social and cultural transformation. When people could learn for themselves by what the printing press was producing they could differentiate themselves as individuals. A person’s social identity was no longer solely dependent on what their leaders told them or on the habits of their families, communities or social class. Information and knowledge was able to spread outside local jurisdiction. Slowly, people had access to ideas far beyond their isolated experiences permitting them to challenge the traditional customs and wisdom of their tribes and leaders.

•What has undermined the sales of printed and CD encyclopedias?

2.       Large encyclopedia companies are going digital and leaning online making them CD based. They struggle today as young researchers increasingly rely on search engines such as Google or online resources like Wikipedia to find information. Although people are using these more today, many critics consider these sources inferior in quality to the classic paper encyclopedias.

•What is the relationship between the book and movie industries?

3.       Books have a mutual relationship with the movie industry; TV can help sell books and books serve as ideas for TV shows and movies. According to a national poll, nearly 30% of respondents said they had read a book after seeing the story or a promotion on television. Oprah’s afternoon talk show has become a major power broker in selling books. The film industry gets many of its story ideas from books, which results in enormous movie rights revenues for the book industry and its authors. Examples of this are Nicholas Spark’s books, Gossip Girl,  and Pretty Little liars.

•Why did the Kindle succeed in the e-book market where other devices had failed?

4.       Original portable reading devices were criticized for being heavy, too expensive, or too difficult to read on, while their e-book titles were scarce and had little cost advantage over full-price hard covered books. Amazon’s Kindle did however catch on. The first kindle had an easy-on-the-eyes electronic paper display, held more than 200 books, and were the first to allow users to download e-books from the Amazon’s online bookstore wireless! Also, book prices were around half the cost of the normal book!

•What are the major issues in the debate over digitizing millions of books for Web search engines?

5.       The Google Books Library project started to make online books available, but only a limited portion. Companies sued them because they claimed Google did not have permission. Now Google must have full permission from authors to make them available at all. Currently, Google is trying to digitize books with expired copy rights.

•What's the difference between a book that is challenged and one that is banned?

6.       Unlike an enforced ban, a book challenge is a formal complaint to have a book removed from a public or school library collection. Common reasons for challenges include sexually explicit passages, offensive language, occult themes, violence, homosexual themes, promotion of a religious viewpoint, nudity and racism.

•What was the impact of the growth of book superstores on the rest of the bookstore industry?

7.       Superstores developed and catered to suburban areas and to avid readers. Barns & Noble is an example of this. Superstores began to dominate bookstore sales and severely cut into independent bookstore business, making the number of independent stores drop.

•What are the concerns over Amazon's powerful role in determining book pricing and having its own publishing divisions?

8.       Amazon quickly grew of the e-book market, which it used as leverage to force book publishers with comply with their low prices or risk getting dropped from Amazon’s bookstore (also done in print book sales). Amazon also has to compete with Apple’s iBook and has experienced lawsuits by the US department of justice. Bookstores responded that investigators should have been more concerned about Amazon because they have been expanding into traditional publishers with the establishment of Amazon publishing. Traditional publishers are beginning to fear Amazon because of that.

•What is Andrew Carnegie's legacy in regard to libraries in the United States and elsewhere?

9.       The industrialist Andrew Carnegie used millions of dollars from his vast steel fortune to build more than 2,500 public libraries across the US and other countries such as Brittian, Australia, and New Zealand. He believed that libraries created great learning opportunities for citizens, and especially immigrants like him.