Last night I started a project I’ve been thinking about for a while – going paperless.
No, I’m not talk about files of paperwork, old bills, medical records etc. I would love to get rid of those – move them all into Evernote and not have to deal with my huge filing cabinet again, but that would require an immediate investment of at least $200 for a decent scanner with a multi-sheet feeder and Evernote functionality.
No, I’m starting, at least, with books.
This was somewhat spurred by My father-in-law bringing 10 bagfulls of books for my 6-year-old daughter after Thanksgiving. A couple times a year he gets books from his wife who is a librarian and has access to lots of extras that the library can’t use. My daughter’s bookshelves filled up at least a year ago and excess books have been in various piles around the house. When the latest selection of 100 or maybe even more books came a couple of weeks ago, a kind of answer for this accumulating sea of clutter dawned on me.
But first, let’s flash back fifteen or twenty years, when CDROM’s were just coming out, and about as cool as tablets are today. I remember having a dream (yes, the sleeping kind), that I walked into a “book” store, but instead of books on the shelves, there were CD jewel cases presumably holding CDROM versions of the books that would have taken up more (although admittedly not THAT much more) space. While this interesting vision might have come to pass had technology more or less stood still for another 10 or 20 years, it’s obviously now somewhat anachronistic now that we can store the equivalent of 10,000+ CD’s on a thumb drive the size of a thumbnail that costs $10 or less retail, and now that we have the Cloud and instant purchases and transfers of large amounts of data in the form of content (movies, mooks, music, you name it), and apps, a variety of subscription, rental, and ownership models models, etc.
Now that eBooks have really come into their own as a sustainable retail reality (albeit one that still sorting itself out with respect to the future of publishing houses), the idea of putting all of my books in digital form and accessible not just in my house but anywhere I go, is kind of irresistible, albeit monetarily impractical for all but the most dedicated, or wealthy, or uncaring towards the legal ramifications of piracy.
Being a technologist and computer owner since the 1970′s, I’ve never had a problem with reading things on a screen vs. paper. Indeed I find it a more powerful experience, although admittedly with some glitches and without the tactile and olefactory niceties that paper provides. But to me the advantages in functionality and space-saving far outweighs those niceties, and really aren’t those things that we just associate with books because they’ve just happened to come with them? If we’d somehow managed to make a plastic version of paper that was easier and cheaper to manufacture 50 years ago, would most of us then associate some plastic sent and feel to our reading? I’m sure of it. I don’t think there’s anything inherently great about whatever those chemicals or textures happen to impart, they just are what we are accustomed to, and that’s all.
That being said, I’m not suggesting that paper books have no value, or no value above their electronic counterparts. Indeed, for now anyway, I’m not buying eBooks for my daughter. Ok, I bought one, kind of as an experiment. But it was one that she probably won’t be able to read herself for another year or two anyway. I do think books have value as physical objects in that they contain artwork, size and shape, occasionally binding decorations, etc., that do not require us to turn a device on and search through a library to enjoy. One can enjoy seeing a book on a shelf just in passing and remember when you first read it, etc. You can do something similar with eBooks, but it’s not quite the same. Then again, maybe that’s just because I generally don’t own eBooks and haven’t had the opportunity to have this experience.
In any case, let’s get on with the story already!
So my project started thus: I brought up a couple of shelves worth of books into my office and one by one entered their ISBN numbers into Amazon and then added them to a private wish list I named “Library.” I used ISBN numbers for the most part because, as it turns out, I have a lot of books that have had new additions since I bought them and I wanted to have a record of the exact edition on my shelves. Simply adding these books to an online catalog is enough to placate my immediate digitization jones. And really, it’s probably many, many years late. I pretty much always had my DVD’s cataloged, albeit with some holes here and there, but never my books, probably because I have way more of them than I ever had DVD’s. It’s nice to know that even if we have a flood or fire and everything is destroyed, I’ll at least have a record of the books I used to own. Is that too morbid? Maybe. It just feels like a kind of insurance, if only informational insurance, since I’m guessing these books are not worth enough to claim much, given that the fast majority seem to be available for twenty five cents plus shipping used at Amazon!
We know a couple who have actually tackled this job for real – converting all their paper books to eBooks (if it wasn’t obvious, they have the financial means to do this), although rumor has it that they still read paper books. I haven’t talked to them about this, but perhaps their strategy is to do the initial reading of the content via book, but once complete, the book gets sold or boxed or given away and an eBook version gets purchased and archived for when needed. I’d love to be able to do this, but then I’d also love to have several tablets, a few smartphones, a new kitchen, and a few other small items.
But here’s the thing. Honestly, I don’t read all that often. Not books anway. The vast majority of what I read are articles on the web, blog entries, and Twitter, Facebook, or Google+ feed items. I mostly stopped buying books (other than programming books for my profession) 10 or so years ago after discovering Audio Books via Audible.com. Since then, any fiction, or even non-fiction long-form that I’ve attempted, with a few exceptions here and there, have been through Audio Books. This is because of being increasinglty busy, but also due to having a slow reading speed. The ability to listen instead of read also means I have opportunities to “read” an audiobook that I wouldn’t have with paper – while doing something else, like driving, taking public transport, washing dishes, doing yard work, etc.
So I guess if I could, I would even opt for audio books rather than eBooks. Optimally it would be great to have both so that I could listen to audio book but then have the eBook handy if I wanted to find a specific passage via searching. Even if all the books I own were available in both forms, buying these would most assuredly bankrupt me. I think if you’ve already purchased a book in paper form, you should be able to get 90% off it’s eBook price, and perhaps 50% off it’s audio book price!
I guess I’ll have to be content knowing that in some distant future there might actually be a time when content is essentially free (and legal), and one can find at least eBook versions of everything in print and out. It doesn’t seem that outlandish. At that time I can then start bemoaning the fact that there’s no way I’ll every be able to read or list to all the books I have, let alone all the books that I’d like to own at some point. But until then, I’m at least boxing and/or donating 95% of my books – so that I can make room for 20 more bags of new books for my daughter each year until she decides that finding something on a 7-inch tablet is a whole lot easier, albeit less fun and fortuitous, than finding it among the hundreds of other books scattered in various rooms of uncategorized shelves throughout our house.
Evernote lets you save all the interesting things you see online into a single place. Access all those saved pages from your computer, phone or the web. Sign up now or learn more. It's free!
I can’t quite give up physical books, so the compromise is that I buy hard copies for those that are by current favorite authors. E-books are for taking chances or stuff that I wouldn’t necessarily feel like I’d need on the shelf or read more than once (ie., an old Elmore Leonard novel or THE HUNGER GAMES series).