Internet killed the paperback star - Writers Forum

dejudicibus · 04-17-2008, 07:43 AM

An article published on my blog about how Internet is changing the way people look at the real world, and which is the risk: «Internet killed the paperback star»

PS: Article is in English language, blog in Italian one. Feel free to write your comments in English, Italian, French, or Spanish.

phurst · 04-18-2008, 03:15 AM

Just post it here so I don't have to travel all over the place. This site is too slow to go back and forth..

dejudicibus · 04-18-2008, 04:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by phurst

Just post it here so I don't have to travel all over the place. This site is too slow to go back and forth..

OK.... Here is... But I would appreciate comments on blog to avoid to manage two different threads

Internet killed the paperback star

Few months ago I had a very heated argument with a guy from France. He insisted on saying that I never published the books that I wrote since he was not able to find them in Internet by ISBN. It was probably only a provocation, of course, since it is not so difficult to find my books in Internet, both on the publisher sites and in the major Italian on-line bookstore, but it was founded on a fact too: most of the search engine for books are based on few databases owned by a limited number of providers, and very few of them list Italian books. Generally speaking, few of them list non-English books. The most famous one is probably Amazon. Now, if you search for 88-344-1882-4 in Amazon you will get no result. So, it looks like that book does not exist! Curious, isn't it, since I have that volume just now in front of me on my table, and it is not a self-published book but it was published by one of the most famous Italian publishers of fantasy novels, the Armenia Publishing Group.

Of course I am not a famous writer, so you may think that Amazon will list only the most popular titles. OK, let us make an experiment: look in Amazon for 88-045-2046-9. No result again. Another unknown Italian author? Well, not really: that code is the ISBN of "Tutte le Cosmicomiche" by Italo Calvino, one of the most famous modern Italian writers, published by Arnoldo Mondadori Editore, one of the most important publishers in Italy! Do you still think that such a book does not exist since it is not in Amazon? Search for 01-562-2600-6. Got it: "Cosmicomics" by Italo Calvino, published by Harvest Books! Of course it is the English translation of the original work, since Calvino wrote it in Italian language. So, here is the first problem: not all Italian books are listed in Amazon, even if the author or the publishers are very famous. Well, I feel better. It looks like Calvino has my same problems. Note, anyway, that you can find a lot of information on Calvino in Internet, but that a significant percentage is in English. Only 60,000 pages out of more than 900,000 are in Italian language. If fame would be measured only by the number of pages in the Calvino's language, that is, Italian, he would have a rating lower than Dan Brown, who can count on more than 6 million pages.

If you are really determined to find any Italian books, anyway — probably that French guy was not — you may want to try another book finder, but be careful: a lot of them use Amazon catalog under the cover, so not necessarily changing the finder will change the result. Fortunately there are now various services which are indexing non-English books too. One of the best ones is BookFinder which indexed more than 150 million books. Try it, and you will find both "La Lama Nera" and "Tutte le Cosmicomiche". So, may Calvino and me heave a sigh of relief? Not yet. Even in Bookfinder a lot of books are missing. Why? Because many books are out of catalogs, they are no more for sale, and since book search services are usually provided by companies who are interested to sell books, they are not interested to index out of sale books. But can you say that a book does not exist simply because it is out of sale? I have more than 5,000 books on my shelves. Most of them are no more available in the bookstores. Not just those specific editions, but the titles themselves, since no new editions were published. They are great books from great authors. May you say that they do not exist? That they have never been published? Of course you cannot. But this is what you may say if you rely on Internet only. They cannot be found by search, so they do not exist. Simple, isn't it?

You may think this is a problem related to English sites only, but this is not true. Let us visit an Italian popular bookshop, IBS, and let us search for 88-344-1882-4 again. No result again, and now we are in an Italian bookshop. So what? Well, try now to search for La Lama Nera or my family name. Got it! Why? Because ISBN is not so popular in Italy, so a lot of bookshop do not use it. Up to few years ago most of Italian books did not even have an ISBN identifier. At least a third of the books on my shelves have no ISBN code. Even nowadays that all published books use 10-digit ISBN code or the new 13-digits EAN code, if you go to an Italian bookshop — a real shop, not an on-line one — and you ask for a book, they expect you give them the author's name and the title, not ISBN, to search into their digital catalogues.

Therefore, assuming that a book does not exists or that an author did not write or publish a work because you cannot find it in Internet is totally wrong. However this is exactly what more and more people, especially younger ones, think. And this is only the tip of the iceberg. One year ago I was invited by a friend to his house. He had a very beautiful painting from a very good Italian artist, Giannetto Schneider Graziosi. His watercolors are masterpieces. He has no site in Internet and, as far as I know, he is not interested to have it. He is also not interested to sell paintings by web. In fact, he is used to sell them in the traditional way, that is, to people he can see and speak with. So you will not find any image of his works in the web, nor you will ever find his name. Does he exist? Is he a good artist? Surely he is, but not for those ones who think that search engines are a reliable way to estimate the rating of artists: more hits, higher rate. Simply crazy!

Today, mostly in USA, people, companies, and academic institutes are used to digitize any kind of information: books, paintings, photographs, list of people, addresses, mostly everything. So more and more people are using Internet not only as a way to find something, but as a way to verify if something exists or does not, it is right or wrong. For example, there are people who verify which is the right way to write a word or an idiom by using Google: the version obtaining more hits is the winner. So, if most of people is writing in a wrong way, that way, soon or later, will become the right one. Same for people. How much famous is an individual? Just enter his or her name in Google and count the hits! Of course English-speaking people are advantaged in such a game. If you are a famous Armenian poet or a great Estonian writer, or a fabulous Zulu musician, you will probably get less hits than some second-rate American porn star. Of course, if you live in USA and you write in English, it is another cake, but if you are famous only in your own country and all articles and reviews about you are in your language, you may have a very limited visibility in Internet. It is even possible you will not get a single hit in search engines. For example, search for Pascarella Storia nostra: you will get only 279 hits. But Cesare Pascarella was really a personality. He became famous after the positive review of his work by Giosuè Carducci and was friend of Gabriele D'Annunzio. While I am writing this article, I have a copy of a work of his, "Storia nostra", published in 1961 by the prestigious Accademia dei Lincei, on my table. Of course, there is no ISBN number, but you will hardly find any info about that book in Internet. If the number of hits would be a reliable rating of fame for an author or a book, Pascarella should be considered just a hack!

In USA a lot of schools are used to publish books with names and portraits of students, so it is quite easy to find alumni lists in the web, nowadays. But in Italy we have not such an habit, so there are no list to digitize. And even when some is available, nobody is interested to do it. We do not suffer the digitizing fever. At "Massimiliano Massimo", an institute of Rome, there is one of the most famous and important private Italian secondary school, or liceo, as we call them. I am an alumnus of that school, which was attended by many famous Italian personalities like Luca Cordero di Montezemolo, Ettore Majorana, and Francesco Rutelli. But you will not find alumni list for that institute, even if it publishes a small booklet every year with just a plain list of names of all enrolled students. Nobody transcribed those list in the web: thousands and thousands of students who... did never exist, according to the current view.

This manner of thinking is not so surprising. My grandmother was used to say that something was true because she "read it on the newspaper" or she "saw it in the box". A lot of people still think that if something is televised, it is true. So, it is not surprising the success of the so-called reality show in the world. Of course, you can always shoot a scene or edit a clip to show whatever you want, but even if most people know how easy is today to manipulate a film, they still think that if something is broadcasted on TV, it must be true. So, if video killed the radio star, the web is killing any non digital work and artist. You must be in the web, to exist.
I could make dozens of examples like the foregoing ones. The conclusion is definitively worrying. Several years ago we were used to think that Internet was a virtual world. Nowadays, if something is not available or mentioned in Internet it does not exist, it is not real. Does not matter if there are million books, poems, paintings, sculptures, articles, people who have no citizenship within the web, especially if they live or exist in the real world in non-English countries. They are just ghosts, because today the real world is Internet. If you are not in the web, you simply are not.

The Australian aborigines believe that the Dreamtime is at the end. Probably they are true. The real life is just a dream and the dream is ending, or better, has been moved into the web. The web is the new Dream and if you are not in the dream you are just a ghost of the past, a vanishing entity that is designated to be forgotten. And your culture is going to vanish with you. Whatever have been written, thought or said, unless it is transcribed to the web is destined to disappear. Whole cultures will vanish because they have no passed through the looking-glass as Alice, and even when they tried the digital adventure, they are often ignored and insulated in some digital enclave if content is not in English language, as it happens for most of non-English blogs. Non-English blogspheres are mostly ignored and loosely linked to the big English-based blogsphere. The only one who can compete with the English blogsphere is the Chinese one, but it is on another planet.

So what? Well, I do not expect this trend will change. Really I think it is getting worst and worst. So, be prepared: it is drawing near the day that you will be accused not to exist if you have not an avatar in the Second Life or a site in MySpace. Time magazine stated at the end of 2006 that YOU are the person of the year, but they forgot to say that you are not really you, but your digital counterpart in the new Wonderland: the World Wide Web.

babeonownbike · 04-18-2008, 11:55 AM

I had trouble with the site; namely that I don't read Italian so had no idea how to post.

Let me say, however, Video killed the Radio star only in the sense that people listened to radio less, and watched TV more for their musical entertainment.
The Internet won't kill the paperbook star until online books are more popular than hardcopy. Much as downloading movies may kill DVD.
For anyone to make the assumption something doesn't exist because it cannot be located on the Internet is ridiculously extreme. When phone books were the norm, if I could not find something I didn't assume it didn't exist - it meant I had to broaden my search. The same should apply to anyone intelligently and honestly seeking.

*Angel · 04-18-2008, 09:34 PM

i highly dis-agree with everything here

first off that french man you talked to must of been highly ignorant if he believed that if something wasn't on the web it didn't exist.

secondly i've never met a single person(on or off the internet) who believed hits were a way to rate quality, "hits" are not what people use as a determining factor if something is good or not or if it's right or wrong, it only proves if something was marketed good.

papertears · 04-19-2008, 12:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dejudicibus

OK.... Here is... But I would appreciate comments on blog to avoid to manage two different threads

This manner of thinking is not so surprising. My grandmother was used to say that something was true because she "read it on the newspaper" or she "saw it in the box". A lot of people still think that if something is televised, it is true. So, it is not surprising the success of the so-called reality show in the world. Of course, you can always shoot a scene or edit a clip to show whatever you want, but even if most people know how easy is today to manipulate a film, they still think that if something is broadcasted on TV, it must be true. So, if video killed the radio star, the web is killing any non digital work and artist. You must be in the web, to exist.
I could make dozens of examples like the foregoing ones. The conclusion is definitively worrying. Several years ago we were used to think that Internet was a virtual world. Nowadays, if something is not available or mentioned in Internet it does not exist, it is not real. Does not matter if there are million books, poems, paintings, sculptures, articles, people who have no citizenship within the web, especially if they live or exist in the real world in non-English countries. They are just ghosts, because today the real world is Internet. If you are not in the web, you simply are not.

First, I am far from fluent in Italian, so I apologize for replying here.

Second, you make some interesting points and caused me to think, which is always a good thing. I am going to disagree with them, but I am one of those who feels its okay to agree to disagree. Opinions are free and the diversity of them stimulate a lot of productive ideas.

From my POV, I pretty much see the arguments you gave as examples--especially the one about your grandmother and the newspaper as backwards. I am still of the mind "don't believe everything you read", don't believe that just because you saw it on tv" and likewise "don't believe everything just because you read it online." Its possible that I am missing the boat entirely on your message. If so, I apologize for wasting your time.

It just seems far too easy for people without credentials to get published, and especially to be seen as "credible" on tv and online.

I blame the problems that caused the mode of thinking that one shouldn't believe something just because they read it, saw it on tv or found it on the internet not on freedom of speech. Instead I believe its more a problem of just plain old greed. Scandal sells. For some reason the trend of late has been that to some extent its easier to play dirty and sensationalize crap, that was once private to make an extra buck or two. The medium doesn't matter. Certainly not everyone fits this mold and that is why I believe that Internet will never truly kill books.

There will always be those who don't care for that garbage and will want something good in a physically tangible form to read. Not just the collectors of rare editions either--there is still a market for good writing that you don't have to download.

Its possible something may kill books as we continue to overpopulate our planet. I don't think the internet has that power. The best reason for that is that you will find people that are absolutely, 100% convinced that vinyl records (analog) still manage to sound better than the best digital recording played on the most expensive stereo ever. I believe they truly enjoy records more than CDs even though its getting super expensive for bands to convince their labels to put out records. Also, even with the availability/ease of music to download, there are still those that get in vehicles and seek out the actual CD for various reasons. Are they craving some sort of touchable tangible necessity that still outweighs the ease of of the mp3 download perhaps?

For me, I can't imagine reading a book online. I loathe getting 40 page memos printed out, when they could have easily been emailed or shown over a projector. The book though has been around for much longer, it has some romantic quality to it and I'm not ready to call it a waste of paper. This is even true of some of the crappiest novels I've read. They at least taught me how not to write.

There is something lasting, and romantic about reading from pages bound together--something timeless.

Just my opinion.

Foxee · 04-19-2008, 06:55 AM

Like the others, I have to apologize for replying here. I admire your linguistic skills, however, and appreciate the passion you have for your subject.

However, I think you're making some assumptions which are not entirely true.

First, that people search Amazon or other sites by ISBN number. I've never done that! I always search by title, author, or subject. After all, if I don't know that the book even exists how can I search by it's ISBN number?

Second, to say that Americans in general go by the number of hits on Google to verify something is not true. This is, on the face of it, a silly way to look at it. I've never heard anyone say "Well, see how many hits it gets on Google and then we'll decide." We're a tiny bit more savvy than that. (For instance, your second-rate porn star might get a healthy number of hits, putting their page way ahead of more legitimate enterprises.) Hit numbers represent attention, not veracity! And with Google searches returning many pages of results we may never get to your page or result if it is past the first few pages. This is why there is a business science growing up around keywording and other ways be competitive on the web.

However, there is a small grain of truth here that can't be ignored and that is the idea that if something can't be found at all on the internet we wonder why. This is true.
Even look at the 'Adventure Writers Wanted' thread in 'Introductions.' One of the reasons that the author of that thread was given such a hard time is because he has no website to show and couldn't post a link to the sample he did have to show. There were other issues as well but not having a website brought his enterprise into question.

The fact is, whether Americans are buying a book, magazine, toaster, clothes dryer, or car these days they like to be able to shop and compare information on it online. This is how they research almost any purchase.

I'm not sure that I would worry about the ISBN numbers (although that sounds like something that may become a global standard eventually) because I think it makes more sense that people are looking for titles, authors, and subjects. Keyword carefully!

A third assumption you made was that perhaps Amazon only lists popular big-name authors. This made me laugh quite a bit. I know for a fact that you can self-publish an awful book, list it, even have an ISBN number for it, AND write yourself a glowing review...all on Amazon. I have seen this very thing done which was a little frightening!

Still, it was interesting reading the perspective of an Italian author and some of the hurdles that international authors may need to overcome. Thanks for sharing your blog!