Printed Books vs Ebooks

So why do people want to save the printed book? I have a Facebook group on the subject and I've noticed a lot of common reasons. Here are some of them.

"I spend hours and hours in bookshops and libraries. I love buying books, displaying them. I never throw books away, I always keep them, but if I read a particular good book that I think a friend would like I either buy them a copy or lend them a copy, which in turn they usually go out and buy for themselves. I would never ever buy an ebook, EVER. I'm sure many people like them, but they will never replace real books for me."
Emilia Carina Valentine

There is a wonderful feeling in being surrounded by shelves of books, one that draws both readers and writers to it like bees to pollen. It's calming and studious and atmospheric. And for some there's even a kind of magic to it. J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter books, said, "That beautiful image in C.S. Lewis where there are the pools - the 'World Between Worlds' - and you can jump into the different pools to access the different worlds. And that, for me, was always a metaphor for a library. I know Lewis wasn't actually thinking of that when he wrote it... but to me, that was... to jump into these different pools to enter different worlds -- what a beautiful place." (BBC Radio 4, 2005)

"I have a close relationship with the ALIBRIS site - for me, obtaining a first or early edition truly enhances the reading of any book."
Ilyne Peters Weinburg

If a complete transformation to ebooks took place then apart from existing early editions books would no longer be a collector's item. And there's a particular thrill in getting a book signed by its author at a publicity event, which you can't do with ebooks. Getting a piece of paper or notebook signed just isn't the same.

"Most people look at me like I'm insane when I say how much I love the smell of books. Favorite smell in the entire world."
Sabrina Verchot

Reading is a sensory experience that stimulates four out of the five senses - sight, in the page layout, font, pictures etc; hearing, in the satisfying rustle of the pages as you turn them; smell, in the scent of the ink and paper filling your nostrils as you read, especially with new books; and touch, in the feel of the spine and the thickness of the book in your hands. An ebook only uses two senses, sight and touch, and it doesn't stimulate either in quite the same satisfying way. A cover for your e-reader makes it look and feel far more appealing because it makes it more like a book - but then you open it.

"How can ebooks possibly compete with the colour, feel and smell of a tangible paper book? Books are to be cherished, passed on to children, kept on display, dropped in the sand on the beach, re-read, to have the spine held in your hand as you enjoy an accompanying drink."
Colin Smith

People feel a connection with their copy of their favourite book, the same way as one might have a connection with an old childhood toy or a piece of jewellery or an item of clothing. The more worn it gets the more it reflects how much you love that story.

These are sentimental reasons it's true, but we choose our entertainment by how much pleasure it affords us, and throughout the rest of this article I hope to show that ebooks are not always more practical.

There are many advertised advantages to ebooks, and certainly they can be a valuable resource.

1. If you are a person who reads a lot of books in a year then the e-reader or computer's ability to store thousands of books is a real space saver.
2. They're more cost effective for publishers, which is likely why they're being pushed so much.
3. They may have a smaller carbon footprint for the publisher (see the disadvantages of the ebook section for more details)
4. With their ability to be downloaded for free and read instantly they are perfect for books where the author's primary purpose is to spread information as widely as possible and for the researcher who needs the information urgently.
5. They can be used to give readers sample chapters, which might then prompt them to read the full book.
6. I did an internship in the publicity department at a major publishing house and one of my duties was to put review copies in giffy bags and stick printed address labels on them. I was disconcerted by just how many there were - dozens and dozens for each title, plus the materials for the boxes used to send them to us and the giffy bags used to send them out. And the thing is that not only are these copies not making money but most of them won't even be read let alone reviewed. I couldn't help thinking that if ever there was a use for ebooks it was that. A reviewer only needs the text, a jacket image and a press release after all.

So ebooks can definitely be a good thing. They have advantages where the printed book has disavdantages. However they do have their own drawbacks too.

When you think about it, not all of the ebook's purported advantages are all that they're cracked up to be.

One of the primary advantages of ebook readers is that they're supposed to be more eco-friendly. However there are apparantly debates on this. The jury is still out I believe, but as an example, The New York Times published an article in April 2010 about how green ebook readers may actually be compared with printed books, which you can read at the address below. For myself I'd like to add one point to that debate. I've heard it argued that reading an e-reader at night is more ecofriendly than reading a book because for the latter you need to have the light on. But that is assuming that people with e-readers turn their light off while they read at night, which they probably don't. They'll use both the light and the battery. And if they did turn the light off it's still bad for your eyes to look at a lighted screen in the dark for long periods of time, even if some types of screens are worse for this than others. Ebook readers and computers also need batteries and/or electricity to run, at any time of the day.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/04/04/opinion/04opchart.html

Ebooks are also supposed to be cheaper for the customer than printed books. This depends on what kind of book you're buying. The difference in price between a hardback book and an ebook is greater than that between a paperback and an ebook, where on average there's often only really a small difference if any difference at all. And while they may be cheaper they're not very cost effective for an average customer buying an e-reader, as you need to save back the amount of money you spent on the reader before they become better value for money. This can only really work if you find the ebooks cheaper than the average paperback, or free, and even then it will take you possibly years to start saving money, especially if you, like the average American (accourding to a poll by the Associated Press and Ispos) only read seven books a year.

It also has to be considered that electronics companies are going to keep developing new technology, new formats and new readers all the time, meaning that you may need to keep buying new devices as the old ones that you've already bought become obsolete. Ebook readers can also break if they get dropped or have liquid spilled on them. A printed book can easily survive a fall. Even if you accidentally dropped it in the pool, so long as it wasn't in there too long (which it likely won't be because a paperback will float and be easily retrievable) it will dry out and still be reasonably readable. And if the average American reads seven books a year then do they really need a device that stores thousands of books?

Of course you don't need an e-reader to read ebooks because you can read them on your computer, and if you have a laptop, notebook or netbook then the books are still portable. But if you are reading them on the computer, especially if you're reading for long periods of time, you then have the associated health problems that comes from staring at a screen for too long - primarily eye strain and headaches.

Ebooks have also been suggested for use by students. When I was at university I spent a load of money on some of my textbooks and then only needed them for one term. After a while though I stopped buying them because I found I didn't need to most of the time. All set books were stocked in the university's library, usually several copies. Of course depending on the size of the books and how many you need in a day you could still end up carrying around a lot of weight. But ebooks would still need to be purchased, so it's a question of whether money or weight is more important to the individual. School students would likely benefit more from the reduced weight, so long as they could get both e-reader and ebooks for free, because it wouldn't be fair to expect their parents to start paying for books when they currently don't have to.

One last disadvantage is that publishers who push ebooks could actually be shooting themselves in the foot. If people who have written a book can just create and distribute a PDF over the internet then that could lead to publishers being taken out of the picture altogether, particuarly in some non-fiction markets where the ability to spread information quickly is particuarly useful. And if, as the YouGov survey found, 70% of people who read ebooks only or primarily read free ones, that also isn't good for publishers. At least with libraries people who want to actually own the book still need to buy it.

So it seems that both the printed and electronic formats are good for some types of books but not for others, and both would present problems if they were the only thing on the market. Customers currently prefer printed books but their production is possibly harsh on the envionment and they're less convenient to get hold of. E-readers however are not cost effective for the customer, and reading ebooks on the computer has an impact on the individual's carbon footprint and health. What is the answer then?

Perhaps a co-existance - both formats doing what they do best and helping to counter each other's drawbacks.

1. If a portion of book sales were ebooks then less paper books would need to be printed, so the publisher's carbon footprint could still be reduced somewhat.
2. Risks of eyestrain and headaches, and the customer's own carbon footprint, would be reduced if people were reading some books on the computer and others on paper.
3. Using ebooks for review copies would also decrease the publisher's carbon footprint.

There are also other ways to reduce the environmental impact of producing printed books. For example:

1. Using recycled paper and soy-based inks rather than petroleum-based ones
2. Offices at publishing houses reducing their own co2 footprints by using laptop computers, turning lights off etc (our office had great huge windows but still had the lights on)
3. The shops that sell the books reducing their own co2 footprints by turning lights off, using low energy bulbs in shop displays etc
4. Using less packaging to ship books from one place to another, e.g. instead of putting them in both plastic wrapping and cardboard boxes as they currently do, just use non-see through plastic. This could also save some space in the lorries and mean that less lorries would be needed to transport them.
5. Print on demand technology to reduce the need for storage and shipping
6. More eco-friendly fuel for lorries

These are just some of the small methods that can accumulate to have a bigger overall impact.

Finally, each customer, whether printed book fan or ebook fan, would be able to buy what they want to buy, instead of being forced by only having one option available to them.