By Sam Vaknin
Author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited"
A debate is raging in e-publishing circles: should content be
encrypted and protected (the erstwhile Barnes and Noble or Digital
goods model) - or should it be distributed freely and thus serve as
a form of viral marketing (Seth Godin's "ideavirus")? Publishers
fear that freely distributed and cost-free "cracked" e-books will
cannibalize print books to oblivion.
The more paranoid point at the music industry. It failed to co-opt
the emerging peer-to-peer platforms (Napster) and to offer a viable
digital assets management system with an equitable sharing of
royalties. The results? A protracted legal battle and piracy run
amok. "Publishers" - goes this creed - "are positioned to
incorporate encryption and protection measures at the very inception
of the digital publishing industry. They ought to learn the lesson."
But this view ignores a vital difference between sound and text. In
music, what matter are the song or the musical piece. The medium (or
carrier, or packing) is marginal and interchangeable. A CD, an audio
cassette, or an MP3 player are all fine, as far as the consumer is
concerned. The listener bases his or her purchasing decisions on
sound quality and the faithfulness of reproduction of the listening
experience (for instance, in a concert hall). This is a very narrow,
rational, measurable and quantifiable criterion.
Not so with text.
Content is only one element of many of equal footing underlying the
decision to purchase a specific text-"carrier" (medium). Various
media encapsulating IDENTICAL text will still fare differently.
Hence the failure of CD-ROMs and e-learning. People tend to consume
content in other formats or media, even if it is fully available to
them or even owned by them in one specific medium. People prefer to
pay to listen to live lectures rather than read freely available
online transcripts. Libraries buy print journals even when they have
subscribed to the full text online versions of the very same
publications. And consumers overwhelmingly prefer to purchase books
in print rather than their e-versions.
This is partly a question of the slow demise of old habits. E-books
have yet to develop the user-friendliness, platform-independence,
portability, brows ability and many other attributes of this
ingenious medium, the Gutenberg tome. But it also has to do with
marketing psychology. Where text (or text equivalents, such as
speech) is concerned, the medium is at least as important as the
message. And this will hold true even when e-books catch up with
their print brethren technologically.
There is no doubting that finally e-books will surpass print books
as a medium and offer numerous options: hyperlinks within the e- book and without it - to web content, reference works, etc.,
embedded instant shopping and ordering links, divergent, user- interactive, decision driven plotlines, interaction with other e- books (using Bluetooth or another wireless standard), collaborative
authoring, gaming and community activities, automatically or
periodically updated content, ,multimedia capabilities, database,
Favourites and History Maintenance (records of reading habits,
shopping habits, interaction with other readers, plot related
decisions and much more), automatic and embedded audio conversion
and translation capabilities, full wireless piconetworking and
scatternetworking capabilities and more.
The same textual content will be available in the future in various
media. Ostensibly, consumers should gravitate to the feature-rich
and much cheaper e-book. But they won't - because the medium is as
important as the text message. It is not enough to own the same
content, or to gain access to the same message. Ownership of the
right medium does count. Print books offer connectivity within an
historical context (tradition). E-books are cold and impersonal,
alienated and detached. The printed word offers permanence. Digital
text is ephemeral (as anyone whose writings perished in the recent
dot.com bloodbath or Deja takeover by Google can attest). Printed
volumes are a whole sensorium, a sensual experience - olfactory and
tactile and visual. E-books are one dimensional in comparison. These
are differences that cannot be overcome, not even with the advent of
digital "ink" on digital "paper". They will keep the print book
alive and publishers' revenues flowing.
People buy printed matter not merely because of its content. If this
were true e-books will have won the day. Print books are a packaged
experience, the substance of life. People buy the medium as often
and as much as they buy the message it encapsulates. It is
impossible to compete with this mistique. Safe in this knowledge,
publishers should let go and impose on e-books "encryption"
and "protection" levels as rigorous as they do on the their print
books. The latter are here to stay alongside the former. With the
proper pricing and a modicum of trust, e-books may even end up
promoting the old and trusted print versions.
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AUTHOR BIO (must be included with the article)
Sam Vaknin ( http://samvak.tripod.com ) is the author of Malignant
Self Love - Narcissism Revisited and After the Rain - How the West
Lost the East. He served as a columnist for Central Europe Review,
PopMatters, Bellaonline, and eBookWeb, a United Press International
(UPI) Senior Business Correspondent, and the editor of mental health
and Central East Europe categories in The Open Directory and
Suite101.
Until recently, he served as the Economic Advisor to the Government
of Macedonia.
Visit Sam's Web site at http://samvak.tripod.com