Kindle Talk on Colbert!

[Addie]

On Tuesday night's The Colbert Report, Stephen Colbert interviewed Sherman Alexie, and Colbert asked Alexie why he didn't have his book on Kindle. His less-than serious response was he is paranoid and terrified of a device that holds everything, and fears Bezos because Bezos says he wants to change the way we read.

But then his serious response was that he fears not making money when everything is digitized due to pirating and losing artistic ownership. *sigh* Oh, and he also said digitizing books is taking away jobs.

See the interview yourself at http://www.colbertnation.com/home

[Aristillus]

I saw that (NEVER miss Stewart/Colbert) and it made me a little sad. My impression was that his biggest issue is the loss of local book stores and the lack of interest in book signings. I, too, mourn that loss but don't think eBooks can be blamed for that. I don't know...maybe they're the final nail in the coffin of Mom & Pop booksellers, but that decline has been going on for a long time and I think has more to do with Amazon and B&N than anything else. I can certainly understand why a Native American might have a mindset of feeling nostalgic for the past. After all, look what they have lost. 

[nogdog~6op6ou]

I saw it (seldom miss the show), and I immediately thought of all my KindleBoards friends, of course.

I agree with him that e-books are changing the face of book publishing. I disagree with his reaction, though ("of course" yet again). I also disagree with the assumption he and many make that ebooks will do to book publishing what the MP3 did to the musing industry. In fact, I'm not sure how much of that was the MP3 and how much was self-inflicted wounds caused by the buy-out of most of the independent record labels in the '80s, followed by a rapid decline in the variety and quality of music being offered.

But I'm not going to sit here and "preach to the choir." I would just like to point out to anyone in the publishing business who reads this that in the half a year or so since I got my Kindle, I've probably spent at least 50% more on books than I would have without it, and a not insignificant part of that has gone to books I would not otherwise have read, due in part to introductory prices and free books for new authors plus the ability do download samples and get tempted into buying books I otherwise would not have risked buying.

[MichelleR]

This is the guy who said he saw a woman reading a Kindle on a plane and wanted to hit her. I think anyone who travels with one needs to watch the interview and memorize what he looks like, just to be safe. 

[BTackitt]

That's why I knew that name. ROFL.. gosh what a dork.
BTW.. his book *FACE* IS on Kindle:
http://www.amazon.com/Face-ebook/dp/B001WAKSBS/ref=kinw_dp_ke?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&qid=1259760228&sr=1-2-spell

[Anju No. 469]

I'm with Nogdog - I have spent a whole lot more on books than ever before.

[Jason in OH]

I've probably doubled my reading volume since owning my DX.

[Chad Winters]

It seems like most pirated ebooks are scanned copies of hardcopy versions. I don't think the kindle is increasing piracy at all.

[4Katie]

I'm reading a lot more since I got my Kindle, even buying books I already own DTB copies of.

Regarding the piracy issue - is it really any different that me buying a book and lending it to friends (who lend it to their friends...)

[marianneg]

Regarding the piracy issue - is it really any different that me buying a book and lending it to friends (who lend it to their friends...)

You are kidding about that...right?

[Ann in Arlington]

Regarding the piracy issue - is it really any different that me buying a book and lending it to friends (who lend it to their friends...)

Well, yes, because that's still just one copy of the book.  If you lend it and don't get it back, you have to buy it again to read it again.  If you give a copy, you still have a copy and don't have to pay again to read it again.

Now, a lot of folks probably don't read books a second time and they only give away ones they wouldn't read again anyway, but the point is they CAN'T read it again if they gave away the book but they CAN if they only gave away a copy.

And of course, there's the whole selling copies thing which is a whole 'nother level of wrong.

[4Katie]

You are kidding about that...right?

I'm just referring to the fact that DTB's are shared just like ebooks - only one sale, but lots of 'copies' being read. Granted, it's much easier and more viral with ebooks...

But there are also PDF's of DTB's being passed around too.

[TheSeagull]

I'm just referring to the fact that DTB's are shared just like ebooks - only one sale, but lots of 'copies' being read. Granted, it's much easier and more viral with ebooks...

But there are also PDF's of DTB's being passed around too.

The way that it's different is that the DTB is solid, there is only ever one copy, once you give it to someone else you lose ownership of that book to someone else, it only ever has one owner. An ebook can be copied so one ebook sale could be owned by thousands of people.

[nogdog~6op6ou]

The way that it's different is that the DTB is solid, there is only ever one copy, once you give it to someone else you lose ownership of that book to someone else, it only ever has one owner. An ebook can be copied so one ebook sale could be owned by thousands of people.

Yes, it's easier to pirate an e-book, assuming either it has no copy protection or (as usually ends up being the case with these things) someone cracks the protection scheme. However, with modern technology and a bit of hardware, it's also relatively easy to scan a paper book into an e-book, then distribute it, too. That's how many of the free books from Project Gutenberg and other free book sites were created.

Publishers should therefore be concentrating on doing everything they can to increase the availability, affordability, and ease of purchase of e-books in order to capitalize on this emerging market, rather than clinging to a dying business model and risk getting left behind with diminishing paper sales and no other source of income. It's happening now, it's going to continue to happen, so I'd suggest they accept it and try to maximize its benefits rather than waxing nostalgic for old technology.

Excuse me now while I go to my vinyl record collection to put on some more music.

[pidgeon92]

Anybody who has used Napster or bittorrent knows that the quality of pirated materials tends to be very poor. As inexpensive and ubiquitous as e-books have already become, e-book readers will not be bothered to go searching for pirated copies. Myself, if I really want to read a book that I cannot purchase as an e-book, I borrow it from the library.

[nogdog~6op6ou]

. . . Myself, if I really want to read a book that I cannot purchase as an e-book, I borrow it from the library.

Luddite.   

[pidgeon92]

I know. I have a library book right now that isn't on the Kindle, and I have a good 100 pages to go and I have to take it back on Friday, somebody has it on hold. My Kindle never nags me.

[Shadowraven]

Seeing Colbert/Alexie tonight made me think of these boards too   I haven't been on in months... but I gotta admit that I feel the same way about Alexie's argument regarding piracy of music.  That's no different then me: lending or giving an already read book to a friend and then them passing it on as well, used book stores (authors don't get royalties from the used sales right?), and libraries.  Based on Alexie's argument libraries would be the worst conductors of piracy as one copy gets read by a ton of people. 

So Alexie doesn't have a computer or high-tech cell phone right?

[MichelleR]

Alexie freely admits to liking all sorts of tech, like his iPod.

http://motherjones.com/interview/2009/11/sherman-alexie-dont-call-me-warrior-extended

MJ: You recently got attacked for calling the Amazon Kindle elitist.

SA: I got hundreds of emails insulting me, accusing me of being some caveman. I am by no means a Luddite. I have two iPods. I have a cell phone. I have cable TV, HDTV! I had some French friends in town last week. The man said, being French of course, "When you're in a bookstore and you're smelling the book and you're touching it, your senses are engaged." His English was a little off. He said, "It’s like—what do you call that word?—the preparation for having sex." I said, "It's like foreplay." And he goes, "Yes!" Amazon had given me a Kindle, and he grabbed it, and he goes, "This is not sex!" Then an American friend of mine took the Kindle home for a night; he wanted to play with it. He came back and he said, "It’s like masturbating with a condom on."

MJ: Two different people, two unprovoked sex metaphors about the Kindle.

SA: We're guys, of course, but it's the whole notion of reading a book, that it involves all of your senses. And to think I might worry that a corporation might not have our best interests at heart. Imagine that. But it's about conservation as well. If I had been talking about drowning polar bears, people would have been weeping with me. But nobody recognizes that a bookstore or library can also be a drowning polar bear. And right now in this country, magazines, newspapers, and bookstores are drowning polar bears. And if people can't see that or don't want to talk about it, I don't understand them at all.

***

Here he talks about a character's relationship to his iPod:

http://bigthink.com/shermanalexie/sherman-alexie-method-author

***

Here's the original incident that made him notorious: http://blogs.buffalonews.com/artsbeat/2009/06/sherman-alexie-excoriates-the-kindle-at-book-expo.html

Mokoto Rich of The New York Times reported that while on a panel of authors speaking primarily to a group of independent booksellers, Alexie denounced digital publishing in general and the Amazon Kindle in particular as "elitist", claimed that he had refused to allow his novels to be made available in digital form.  In what was surely a misguided attempt at levity, he declared that when he spotted a woman in a nearby seat on his plane flight to New York reading from a Kindle, "I wanted to hit her."  

His next move was to apologize for saying it was a woman, because he thought he might have came off as sexist.  

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2009/06/the-absolutely-true-kindlehatred-of-sherman-alexie.html

A few days over that, he said he was willing to rethink the Kindle because of the touching emails he received about people with disabilities, etc... He also said he planned to meet with Bezos, especially since he said that he was one of the most highly requested authors for Kindle.

Apparently, he changed his mind again.

[Ann in Arlington]

He's looking for publicity and he's getting it.

[jason10mm]

Caught that interview last night. I think the guy is an odious troll, he has forever removed any desire I may have had to read his work, which, since he spent the entire interview bashing the Kindle, I still know nothing about (other than it has a pair of shoes on the cover).

I can see why he fears it, he apparently comes from the archaic and high carbon footprint (see what I did there?) method of salesmanship, the face-to-face sale. But he seems to forget that he can STILL do all that stuff, and rather than lug around 400 copies of his books, if the Kindle was wide spread he could simply inspire folks to buy it INSTANTLY, making an even greater impulse decision than buying the book at the talk/signing.

I won't shed a tear for book stores, just like I didn't for CD stores. They employ minimum wage sales clerks and stockboys, this isn't a high tech/high-education job industry here. Printers will still be required for physical copies of books, and if we don't generate megatons of processed paper for throw-away fiction novels, I don't see the downside to that.

I suppose if this guy relishes the touch and smell of books so much, he also carries around parchment, quill, ink, and sand to retain the full "foreplay-like" experience of writing letters, requires a phone operator so the calling experience is as sensual as possible, and eschews television because it doesn't have the sights, sounds, and smells of the local theater-house. Please, this guy needs to grow up. The oppressed Native American schtick is tired as well.

[mwb]

My Kindle never nags me.

The feature will appear in the Kindle 4 as an adaptation of the speech feature and it will come with a choice of modes including snooty French waiter which will make snide remarks about your choice of reading materials.  

As for the main topic, as a writer Sherman Alexie has been off my radar for years as not worth the effort.  So I'm not seeing his absence from the eBook market as a loss.  But his interviews gives me more reasons to not take him seriously.

[Betsy the Quilter]

Interestingly, today I got in a discussion with the checker at the Safeway about Amazon and Kindles and she mentioned this interview.  She had seen the Amazon credit card of the woman in front of me and then I said I had one too and then the checker mentioned the Kindle so I had to pull my Kindle out. (Of course I had it with me, never know when I might need to read.)

The checker asked me if I didn't miss turning pages.  I said that turning pages wasn't reading and that I was still reading.  Then she mentioned the author saying that he didn't want his books on Kindle.  Interestingly, at least three five of his books are on Kindle, not just Face.

Sherman Alexie, Kindle

Betsy

[mlewis78]

So now "turning pages" is one of the pleasures of reading?  I read a DTB last weekend and kept thinking I grabbed more than one page when I didn't.

[Anju No. 469]

So now "turning pages" is one of the pleasures of reading?  I read a DTB last weekend and kept thinking I grabbed more than one page when I didn't.

going back and checking pages numbers is a real pain in the you know what