During our Negotiable Instruments class, Prof. Disini discussed the future of the book industry in the face of the migration of publishers and writers into the use of e-books.
He said many publishers, including the world's largest, are now releasing their titles through Amazon and Apple's e-book service, instead of primarily relying on the old, handy printing press.
And the question that now faced the industry was whether such migration to e-books would open the industry completely to piracy, similar to the situation of the music and movie industries.
Prof. Disini said the book industry would not share the same fate as the movie and music industries.
He said that books, unlike the two other forms, are difficult to consume by the public. A full novel cannot be read in two-four minutes, nor can it normally be finished in a two-three hour span, as would music or movies, respectively.
I think, furthermore, that there can also be no replication of the feel/smell/impact/experience of holding a real book, notwithstanding the building of one's own personal library as a testament of a person's pursuit of knowledge.
Those who stand to benefit the most however, in the piracy of e-books, would be scholars and academics based in the Third World, where book prices are prohibitively high, and university resources are not as vast to ensure the steady supply of new material for their purposes.
Terry Ridon
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