The Kindle Two: Audio Controversy or Industry Stupidity?
No release of a new and improved version of an already powerful piece of technology would be as interesting without a little controversy. Apparently the Authors Guild is upset about the new Kindle’s text-to-speech feature, claiming that it could “undermine the market for audio books” (Associated Press). The Wall Street Journal has a bit more to say on that: Some publishers and agents expressed concern over a new, experimental feature that reads text aloud with a computer-generated voice. “They don’t have the right to read a book out loud,” said Paul Aiken, executive director of the Authors Guild. “That’s an audio right, which is derivative under copyright law.” Now, quite a few folks with far more authority than myself have already spoken up on the issue, including Robert J. Sawyer and Neil Gaiman. They’ve made some fairly good arguments about the whole thing and I’d like to toss my two cents into the game. The problem with all this is that it is flirting dangerously close to the same line the music industry so idiotically crossed. And the music industry hasn’t contracted so much as literature has. True, as I’ve mentioned before, readership hasn’t actually drastically changed. Book sales are still high, with exception to everything following this massive recession we’re so firmly stuck in, and the same amount of people, if not a little more, are reading books now as much as they were about ten years ago–not to mention that most teenagers read a lot more these days than their parents did simply because access to the written word, particularly on subjects kids are interested in, is far better thanks to the Interwebs. What does this mean for the book industry if it crosses the line? It could spell disaster for it. The music industry was enormous when piracy first came into the public sphere. When they tried to stomp down on it by imposing harsh punishments and DRMing everything imaginable, they found that folks were far more willing to flip the bird to the big record labels and switch to the indie scene. But, the music industry didn’t die. It was big enough to survive its mistakes and it has done a decent job doing so. iTunes, as much as I despise it, has helped curb the piracy empire, though it hasn’t stopped. The music industry was at least smart enough to realize that it needed to begin changing its ways if it wanted to continue being profitable. The book industry, however, could find themselves in a horrible position by trying to impose the same rules. With all these electronic reading devices out there, if the book industry isn’t careful it could find that people will stop buying books entirely and use the electronic formats to get books for free. Add on to the fact that there is a thriving indie book community (podcasting, blog novels, etc.) and you can see where being music-industry-anal could spell certain doom. Audio rights are important; I’m not going to deny that. All rights are important, but when we start talking about suing Amazon for having text-to-speech technology installed on the Kindle Two, it’s like saying we’re going to sue mothers for reading to their children. Why should Amazon have to pay what would likely be an absurd amount of money for a feature that isn’t all that great anyway? Yeah, okay, I get the argument that some day technology will progress enough to make text-to-speech sound like something other than a craptastic, semi-realistic, mostly-robotic, humanoid demon. But that’s not happening tomorrow and it’s probably not happening for years. When that happens, then start bitching. Until it does, why can’t we stick with this feature? It won’t influence audiobook sales because people who like audiobooks are still going to buy them. A robotic voice cannot meet the production quality of a good audiobook. Period. And the people who are likely to use this feature regularly are probably not going to be people who would have paid the somewhat high price for an audiobook in the first place. Before we toss the almighty book of lawsuits at Amazon for adding a useful feature to their new techno-gizmo, we should consider the ramifications of that and the reality of the situation as a whole. We’re treading on dangerous ground in considering using the law to thwart technological progress; we’d be one step away from suing parents for reading to their kids, or blind people using a computer to read a book to themselves (a book they already paid $14.99 for)–or people reading to blind people, perhaps. When Amazon’s technology is able to actually replace audiobooks, then you can start demanding compensation. And maybe that will never happen. Maybe the next step for the Kindle (the Kindle Three, perhaps) is to make it capable of having both eBooks and audiobooks. That would make everyone happy, right? Imagine if Amazon’s enormous selling engine made it easier to buy and sell audiobooks through a wireless device? Consider that before we start making rash decisions and crossing the line.
Book News: Realms of Fantasy, the Kindle Two, and Magazine Woes
Here are a few big stories for today: Kindle 2.0Apparently the new Kindle has been revealed (CNET has the story). The prognosis is good, but not great. While it has a lot of new features, there aren’t any features, according to CNET, that make the Kindle Two more appealing to the mainstream market. I have to agree and disagree. I think the fact that both the Kindle and the Kindle Two offer an easy, modern way to read books is appealing to the mainstream, but the price tag for both ($240 and $359 respectively) will turn people off. I’m certainly not going to spend that kind of money for a reading device when the books themselves are almost the same cost as paper books. Then again, if you made it really easy to put stuff into it that isn’t an eBook (.pdf, .doc, etc.) and had a way to do editing and the like inside it (maybe writing notes in the margins along with strikeouts, etc.), then I’d probably pay for it. Having a cool reading device with built in functions to make my life as a writer easier when I’m riding the bus, etc. would be great.The good news is that the new one does look a bit better. I can’t say it’s beautiful, but it doesn’t look like something stuck in the boxy days of handheld technology. Realms of Fantasy Up For Sale?SF Scope has some clarification to rumors spreading around the net that RoF is up for sale: Hintz did say that the magazine is near and dear to Sovereign, and he expressed sorrow over its demise. While he was unwilling to comment on any specifics of a potential change in ownership, he did say a “purchase is possible.” Whatever the magazine’s final disposition, Hintz promised more information by early March, saying “we won’t let this drag out.” Translation? It’s up for sale, but they’re not going to sell it for a cheap price. But that does mean that someone with some idea of what they are doing could purchase it and revitalize it. We’ll see. I’m hoping it happens. Distribution Execution (the Magazines Get Hit Again)As if things weren’t bad enough for the big three, Anderson News, the folks behind distributing F&SF and Asimov’s, have ceased doing what they do (a.k.a. gone under) when publishers refused to pay an additional fee for, well, distribution. Apparently they closed down because they just couldn’t afford to keep in business. Course, I suppose you can’t blame them. It can’t be cheap to ship stuff around.Then again, I keep saying that all the old-format magazines should consider, you know, looking at all the newfangled methods out there. Like this thing called the Interwebs and that other thing called POD. I mean, really, let’s get on the wagon of the future people. It’s not 1950 anymore. If you honestly think you can survive in this business dealing primarily in ancient technology, then don’t be surprised when you have to cut back on your publishing schedule…oh crap, that’s already happened…Get with the program. Short fiction doesn’t have to die, but at the rate these folks are going, the big three mags are going to find themselves extinct. And that is all!
Otherism: The Dissection of Humanity and the Human in Science Fiction Film
The title is a mouthful, but represents the core idea behind the research project for which I received a monetary grant from UC Santa Cruz. Given that, I give my the proposal for my research project: What is the human? What does it mean to be human? These are questions that motivate many, if not most, fields in the humanities. I’m applying for the Humanities Undergraduate Research Award (HUGRA) because I wish to address these deep-rooted and enduring questions, albeit using a relatively new medium: science fiction television and film. As a genre, science fiction (SF) lends itself easily to investigations and interpretations of the human-other dichotomy. How does SF grapple with this dualism? How does it challenge our preconceptions of the human and offer new definitions? And does the genre make sociohistorical processes, such as racialization and the vilification of difference, more accessible due to its futuristic and fantastic narratives and settings? These are the questions that motivate my project, “Otherism: The Dissection of Humanity and the Human in Science Fiction Film.” My primary focus is on science fiction film—such as Battlestar Galactica, Space Above and Beyond, Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell, and others—and how the relation between the human and the other is represented. Drawing from post-colonial discourse, I argue that science fiction negates the existence of a human category, with exception to biology, by blurring the line between human and non-human—the cyborg, android, humanoid alien, non-humanoid alien, robot, etc. This negation is, in my mind, a challenge to our preconceived notions of humanity and a challenge on a fictive level to the foundations of human indifference and intolerance. As an ardent SF fan, I’ve read numerous science fiction novels and short stories. Additionally, I’ve taken courses at UCSC that have allowed me to pursue my passion. These courses include AMST 109B: Science Fiction in Multicultural America; Lit 101: Animal Theory; and an independent study on the writings of Philip K. Dick. Moreover, I’ve found immensely helpful LTWL 115A: Fiction in a Global Context (from the African Continent) and LTEL 160C: Postcolonial Writing. Through further researching colonial/postcolonial discourse I hope to relate the conditions and issues of colonialism to the otherworldly portrayal of human “racism” towards the other, slavery, post-slavery, and cultural merging and its effects. With a HUGRA, I intend to spend Fall Quarter primarily researching at UC Santa Cruz, either viewing materials available to me in McHenry Library or finding materials at other libraries that I find to be of interest. During Winter Quarter I will visit the Science Fiction Foundation Collection at the University of Liverpool and in Spring Quarter I will attend the Eaton Conference at UC Riverside—where John Rieder (author of Colonialism and the Emergence of Science Fiction) will be giving a lecture. Also during Spring Quarter I will spend time in the Eaton Collection and hopefully attend the Science Fiction Research Association’s conference.A HUGRA will enable me to achieve the goals I put forth in this timeline. Ultimately, I intend to produce a research paper and to continue to pursue this question of the human in graduate school—the University of Liverpool’s Science Fiction Studies MA and Brunel University’s Contemporary Literature and Culture MA are programs of significant interest to me. The paper will comprise an important part of my undergraduate dossier. So, any questions?
RIP: Michael Crichton
Bloomberg.com recently announced the Michael Crichton has passed away (I didn’t even know he had cancer, which is probably true of a lot of people). He was only 66. You all might remember him from things like Jurassic Park or Congo. He will be missed and my heart goes out to his family. (Don’t click the read more, there isn’t any more after this!)
Graphic Novels and Novels Are Not the Same
I’m sorry to say it, but even though it hurts that a book that deserves to be on a bestseller list doesn’t get there, if it doesn’t belong in the same category as the other books on that list, then it shouldn’t belong on that list at all. Over at Suvudu this was a point of concern in regards to the hardcover collection of the first four graphic novel/comic issues of Jim Butcher’s Harry Dresden series. The problem? Well, while it sucks that the hardcover collection wasn’t allowed onto the list, I understand why. Graphic novels are not the same as traditional novels. They’re visual and while there tend to be very in-depth and fascinating stories behind those visuals, they simply are not the same as traditional novels precisely because they do not rely entirely upon the writer’s words in order to succeed in forming an image in the reader’s mind. Traditional novels only have words to work with. To try to compare a graphic novel to a traditional novel would be like trying to compare flying in an airplane to riding on a bus. As such, you can’t really put the two on the same list. It wouldn’t be an adequate assessment of the material.That being said, it’s entirely reasonable to desire a graphic novel/comic category for the bestseller list. This might take time, but I would think that such a category would be a good thing. I happen to like graphic novels (and comics, although I’m more favorable towards the former), but I do understand the reason why they don’t end up on the New York Times Bestseller List along with traditional novels. It’s sort of common sense, you know?
Books as Sculpture
I just stumbled upon this post about sculptures and art pieces made out of books. This is absolutely crazy! Like the below example:Cool huh? Check out the rest of the stuff there!