eBooks: friends for foe?

eBooks - Friend or foe?

I started thinking about this issue after reading an article in the NYBR about google books the surrounding controversy, and it got me thinking - are eBooks friends or foes?

Me and eBooks

I have known about eBook for a while obviously, but I only really started reading them after purchasing an iPhone earlier this year and downloaded an eBook application. What I really like about the eBook is the convenience. I am the sort of person who carried a book with her everywhere. I hate being caught without a book. Whenever I have a spare moment, whether it be when I'm waiting for a bus or sitting on a train or in a waiting room, I want to be able to read. Having said, I can't always have a bag with me big enough for a book (I can be a bit fussy about handbags). The genius of the eBook is that no matter where I am I will always have my phone with me and therefore always be able to read.

Since discovering the eBook, I have developed a new 'system' of reading, which you can read about here. Briefly, I always have at least 2 books on the go, one is the actual book that I'm reading, and the other is a book that I'm reading in eBook form whenever I don't have my other book with me. This means that it takes me a lot longer to finish the eBook obviously. So, for me, the eBook hasn't replaced the book, it's a backup I like to have with me as a safety net for those times that I'm caught without a book and nothing else to do. I don't think that I could ever stop reading real books for the eBook - I love book shopping, I love the smell, I love the feeling of excitement when I buy one and of not knowing what story is coming. I love holding it and being able to completely immerse myself in it. I just don't feel the same when I read an eBook. Having said that, I think that eBooks definitely have their place. Overall, I would say that they are my friend, if not my best friend.

Cultural implications

As I said, what really got me thinking about was an article in the New York Review of Books about the controversy surrounding the free books made available by Google. You can view the article here. There was another interesting article published more recently in the Sydney Morning Herald on 17 December 2009 about the 'eBook revolution' and its effect on the publishing industry, you can access it here.

The article discusses a lot of interesting points; is it a good idea to allow a company such a large range of rights over literature? Should they be able to hold copyright over orphan books? What implications does this have for literature on the whole? The article refers to memorandums from France and Germany; both countries emphasised their national pride in their nations works of literature, they discussed the Declaration of Human Rights and the free access of information in response to the monopoly Google will have digital books if this agreement is successful. They touched on the issue of privacy when arguing against provisions in the contract that state that all authors are assumed to have opted-in to a contract to have their book digitized, unless they make direct contact to say that they do not consent.

There are so many potential problems that it almost seems too immense to think about. I think that there are two different questions that we shouldn't confuse: whether eBooks are a good thing and whether Google Books is a good thing.