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The Book That Contains All Books

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13 pointsgrellas22 comments

Form factor matters. It's not something you can just trivialize. There's a lot of functionality that a paper book has going for it. The question can't be boiled down to a simple matter of being against change or new technology.

You can use spacial memory to find previous passages in a paper book, you can turn down the corners of the pages and write notes in the margins. You can leave your favorite novel in the trunk of your car for 4 years through winter and summer and then grab it for enjoyable reading at a moments notice. You can pack books away in your attic and reasonably expect that your great-grand kids will be able to read them in 50 years if they want.

And when it gets cold, you can burn them for warmth.

Unfortunately, I realized this after renting my house to some freeloaders who burned my library of college books, encyclopedias, work books, car repair manuals, home remodeling books...

I was sick when I found out.

Man, that just hurts.

That should be a crime.

I am pretty sure it is a crime.

I think it was joke.

After reading this, I had to walk over to my bookshelves and look at my books to make sure they were all there. Chills down my spine.

Vinyl has a lot going for it when compared to MP3, but the latter format is so more practical and has such a low marginal cost that very few people stick with the former. Don't get me wrong, I love physical books, but I imagine what it would be like if I had been able to read any book in the world in a device like the Kindle when I was a kid, and the idea is just mind-boggling.

I live in Brazil, where books are relatively expensive and libraries aren't that great, so I understand that YMMV.

Idle question: when a friend visits from South America, he takes back a case or two of books. I suggested burning a few copies of the Project Gutenberg DVDs. He pointed out that the Spanish and Portuguese content was pretty small. For instance, there is not even a copy of El Correo Orinoco.

Can you think of a way to get more people to contribute to PG in other languages?

I first read this headline as "The book that contains all books that do not contain themselves."

Someone has been way too busy with set theory lately.

I thought of the xkcd version of set theory - http://xkcd.com/468/

...and I clicked through expecting some sort of reference to either Borges 'Library of Babel' or Idries Shah's 'Book of the Book'.

Also don't dismiss significant used books market. I hardly ever buy books over $5. Right now, digital books are priced like brand new books, and you can't resell them. There's some price discrimination in terms of how much time elapsed since release and popularity, but, given that I can buy a brand new book on eBay a few hours after it was published (or earlier), destruction of such market would be quite painful for many people. And so far I haven't seen even an inkling of a solution to this issue in any of digital goods categories.

Yeah, I think I am going to keep my paper book library as well. It is just feels good to look at all the books you read and remember what each book was about. In fact when I read a book online (usually on Gutenberg) and I like it, I find myself wanting to buy it so that I can have it in my library.

It feels kind of crazy that I am already becoming a ludite at this young age but there you have it.

It feels kind of crazy that I am already becoming a ludite at this young age but there you have it.

I don't think you are I think you're doing the smart thing. It's not a foregone conclusion that purely digital media is the future. In fact, I still think the smart money is on having physical copies and then using those for digital copies (e.g. ripping CDs rather than just buying tracks).

Especially in books. There's an argument against full CDs because you might only want 1 or 2 tracks. The same can't be said for most books (who would buy Chapter 2 and 6 of a book individually)

Most technical book manufacturers are already starting to include free e-books with their paper copies. I personally think that's the way to go (at least for the next couple decades or so, who knows after that)

I keep flipping back and forth on the digital vs. analog future of media. Digital data can be cheaply propagated forever so long as the technology continuously exists, but won't be easily recoverable from the physical artifacts if the tech is lost. Human-readable analog recordings can remain legible for thousands of years without special tools. But then you have the great burning of the library of Alexandria...

We're in a strange transitional state right now, and the future will probably lie somewhere between these extremes. (I realize that's a really weak stand to take...)

Hell, maybe the Singularity hits and we put aside petty human concerns in favor of figuring out how to escape this Universe which is going to end in the Big Crunch. Or is it the Big Freeze? I forget which is the current prediction.

I am in two minds. I have a small library and has the author's problem of carting them around with every move. I also have hundreds of ebooks (mostly downloaded for free and a few purchased).

For me an ebook is still a simulation, sort of like having sex with an inflatable plastic doll :) Nothing can replace flipping through a real book in a bookstore.

I mean the comparison absolutely as a compliment to Mr. Baker

...but saying so is an insult to Mr. Baker.

Dan Simmons: Hyperion? Nope

Terry Brooks Shannara? Nope

What IS available on Kindle?

Helpful list. http://tinyurl.com/yhecylm

I know there's a list, but I still have to search it, and I couldn't find anything I wanted. To browse by author or genre would be nice.

Author doesn't seem to be readily available but their is a breakdown by Genre in the left-side menu.

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