Thoughts on Sherman Alexie’s criticism of eBooks

While I was reading up on the news from this year’s BookExpo America, I was struck by the comments Sherman Alexie made about Amazon’s Kindle.

As I’ve written at some length about the Kindle, I thought I’d continue my exploration into the eBook controversy and consider some of these criticisms.

At one of the panels, Sherman Alexie was asked about the Kindle and he stated that he thought they were elitist, priced far beyond the means of poor kids, and went further to state that he saw a woman on his plane while flying to New York who was reading a Kindle, and he wanted to hit her.

I really hate this kind of stuff. It reminds me of a time in the 1980’s when I went to see Hunter S. Thompson speak at the Chautauqua Auditorium in Boulder, Colorado. I had, in my teens, been quite a fan of Thompson and his insanity, so I was very excited to go and see him speak. I tell you that I lost all respect and interest in the man there and then. He showed up over an hour late, ranted and raved incoherently for a few minutes, then took some questions which resulted in him throwing a glass and taking some verbal shots at a “lesbian” in the audience and leaving. It was, in a word, disappointing.

For some reason, I get a similar feeling when I read Sherman Alexie say stupid things about people reading Kindles. Not only does it miss the point entirely, it causes us to question him more than the point he was making, namely, technology.

As a technologist, I firmly believe that technology has to be tested. Part of the test is of course done by the people who develop the technology, but the real test comes later, after a market for the technology has been established. Alexie makes a very good point about the difficulty poor kids face in a world of expensive electronic reading devices. I’ve been researching the role of Libraries in the so-called “conversion to digital“ books, and it is very clear that if devices replace printed books, the role of libraries will change dramatically, and possibly in many less-then-favorable ways. I for one have no interest in seeing libraries unable to provide a full range of titles because they are in some way limited by restrictive Intellectual Property laws from distributing digital copies. I also believe strongly that writers must have the ability to benefit financially from their work. These positions are not at all balanced in the current structure of copyright law primarily because digital books, like MP3 files are uncontrollable in the same way that printed books and CD’s are controllable. Similarly, I see no value in any process which seeks to divide rich from poor, especially when it comes to access to books. One of the greatest achievements in modern society is the concept of the public library. I visit my own local library on a near daily basis, and I believe they are one of the most valuable and vital institutions mankind has devised. It is also arguable though, that the library of the future will take a more important role in distributing materials evenly and expanding the access of the general public, rich and poor, to books as well as to computers and technologies.

Do eBooks challenge the Library? Perhaps.

Mr. Alexie: Do Kindles make poor kids less likely to get at good books? Do they really add such a weight to the current social imbalance? Do you seriously think that expressing anger towards people who own them is a productive way to counter the technology?

One of the primary reasons why I took an interest in the Kindle stemmed from my work with blind/visually impaired students. I strongly believe that eBooks are key to making content more accessible. The answer is in the formats and the availability of texts in the mainstream (meaning that a blind person need not have a separate means for getting a book than a sighted person). Now, whether reading for school or pleasure, a blind student needs to add 5-6 weeks of advance time to get books. Many of these books have to be manually scanned, and then are delivered to the reader in some far from suitable proprietary digital format. Consider if a student could simply buy the book in a digital format and have a device which performed text-to-speech or was readable on a refreshable braille display? For these people, the ability to rely on the same mainstream formats as the rest of the world is huge.

I wish I could present Mr. Alexie with a similarly compelling argument in regards to socioeconomic inequalities. I cannot. A middle class person (when there was such a creature) who digests 25-50 titles a year would find that owning a Kindle was in fact economically beneficial. Consider that most hardcover, front-list titles retail for $24.99 or more and retail on the Kindle for $9.99, this presents a $15 dollar savings to the consumer. Save that on 25 titles and you’ve just reduced the cost of your investment by $375. As the 6-inch Kindle sells for $359, it’s a pretty economically sound purchase. (A new company from the UK called Interead has just gotten into the market with a device called Cool-er which is around $250 and more are sure to follow.)

Funny how two writers whose work I have been amazed by, Sherman Alexie and Mark Helprin would sacrifice themselves so on the altar of negative press. These are two of America’s finest living writers, and their opinions should matter. Alexie posted a response on his website which reads: ”Even as I’m being insulted by hundreds of strangers, I am grateful that the Internet literary world is a bit abuzz with discussions about the negative and positive aspects of eBooks.“ Again, I state that I support Alexie and will continue to do so regardless of the bad press surrounding this incident. He is a writer who brings insight and important questions to our world from a valuable perspective and a valuable place. I’m not quite so willing to say nice things about Mark Helprin because I happen to think his ideas go too far, but I will state that he is a remarkable writer, and his insights too matter very much.

My conclusion: eBook readers are in my opinion not the ultimate answer. Many of my reasons for saying this mirror Mr. Alexie’s criticisms. They cost too much. One interest is in control: Amazon. And I’d add: The device is limited by its exclusive link to Amazon content. It is far too much an interface to Amazon’s service. The real shift is going to come when Intellectual Property Laws (US and International) have matured to deal with digital content, and the devices are built commercially agnostic. No one business interest can represent the reading public, and any device which limits us that much is doomed to fail. And printed books, while they may become more expensive, will never disappear. They are too cherished, too much a part of us to be cast aside completely.

In the meantime, I continue to research and get opinions about the impact of digital content on libraries, and hope to post something worthy in the coming weeks. Comments are most welcome here.