Nick Baker 

Via Library Juice, Thoughts on the reaction to Nicholson Baker's Double Fold: Letters from Lincoln Cushing

Books demise predicted -- again? 

The end of books? by Simon Midgley

Could the advent of electronic texts mark the death of books, for so long the staple fare of university libraries and college students? This will be one of the key discussions at a major conference on the future of textbooks at London's City University tomorrow.

Publishers, university librarians, authors and vice-chancellors are meeting to explore the issues facing academic publishing in the wake of the internet, digital publishing and the government's ambition to increase the number of 18-year-olds participating in higher education to 50% by 2006. [read more]

Not one email in support -- Take that Sen. Hollings 

Digital-copyright bill inspires flurry of criticism by Andy Sullivan

A digital-copyright bill introduced last month has inspired howls of protest from consumers and high-tech firms who say it could slow technological advances and dictate how consumers listen to music or watch videos at home.

Well-connected lobbyists and everyday users alike have flooded Congress with faxes and e-mails over the last several weeks to lodge complaints against a bill that would prevent new computers, CD players and other consumer-electronics devices from playing unauthorized movies, music and other digital media files.

Sen. Ernest Hollings' bill is backed by media firms such as The Walt Disney Co., who fear fast Internet connections and an array of digital devices such as MP3 players and CD burners will encourage consumers to seek free copies of hit singles and new movies.

The South Carolina Democrat has said he introduced the bill to encourage media and technology firms to work together to stop digital piracy.

Instead, it has inspired a flurry of criticism.

A grass-roots group called DigitalConsumer.org, which did not exist a month ago, claims to have signed up 24,000 members, who have sent off 80,000 faxes to their elected representatives. The Senate Judiciary Committee, which has also held hearings on the issue, has received more than 3,500 comments criticizing the bill, a spokeswoman said.

"We haven't received one e-mail in support of the Hollings bill," said Judiciary Committee spokeswoman Mimi Devlin. "It seems like there's a groundswell of support from regular users." [read more]

Amazon goes into the recycling business 

Unloading His Books, but Not His Conscience by Fred Bernstein

A few weeks ago a friend carried a pile of dusty volumes to the Strand, the used-book store in Greenwich Village, to trade clutter for cash. "I would never do that," I thought snootily, as I pictured him haggling over the value of a dog-eared copy of "The Internet for Dummies."

And then I logged on to Amazon.com (news/quote) to buy a book and was startled to see: "Fred A. Bernstein, make $436.32. Sell your past purchases at Amazon.com today!" In an audacious gambit to expand its marketplace, Amazon has not only become a broker of used books but has also found a way to prime the pump: encouraging people who bought books on Amazon to resell them.

The $436.32 represented my potential take from the 25 books I had bought on Amazon since last July; Amazon's computer sees every one of those not just as a past sale but also as a future resale. I was intrigued. Perhaps I could do what my friend had done -- pick up some extra money, make space on my shelves -- without lifting a finger.

But as a book lover, I had misgivings, and it turns out I was not alone. This week, the Authors Guild protested Amazon's recycling program by asking its 8,200 members to remove links to Amazon from their Web sites. Authors, who are generally paid a commission for every book that publishers sell, make no money on resales. Letty Cottin Pogrebin, past president of the guild, said that Amazon's practice was "threatening the industry's ecological balance."

The very day that "China Dawn," a book about the Internet revolution in China, went on sale last month, Amazon was offering used copies (at a substantial discount) almost as prominently as new ones. "Either there are a lot of speed readers out there," said the author, David Sheff, "or people are selling advance copies." [read more]