Old Books vs. Modern Books

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2 pointshuijzer4 comments

As publishing becomes cheaper, the content quality bar is lowered for creating new books. With e-publication, anything from the slush pile can be excreted onto the servers (and those also tend to have crappy covers.)

> As publishing becomes cheaper, the content quality bar is lowered for creating new books.

Might play a role yes, but I think it’s a more widespread phenomenon because finding quality in our society becomes harder each day. Think modern architecture, modern interiors, modern cutlery, modern chairs, modern tables, or modern washing machines. They say that only great stuff survives as an explanation, but that would mean my grandparents would also throw away their washing machine each few years. They certainly did not.

My theory is that quality was valued and appreciated more in the past.

Alternately, the true dreck from the past didn't survive, so what you do see is biased.

I mentioned that argument already in my comment and provided a counterexample.

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