The demise of books has been foretold by many pundits, but perhaps the writing is now on the wall ... or in this case, the bookshelf. Specifically, the IKEA bookshelf.
John Biggs of TechCrunch wrote:
If you needed any more proof that the age of dead-tree books is over take a look at these alarming style changes at Ikea: the furniture manufacturer’s iconic BILLY bookcase – the bookcase that everyone put together when they got their first apartment and, inevitably, pounded the nails wrong into – is becoming deeper and more of a curio cabinet. Why? Because Ikea is noticing that customers no longer buy them for books.
This isn’t quite the canary in the coal mine – think of it as a slight tickle in the mine foreman’s throat – but all signs are pointing to the end of the physical book. There are plenty of analogs to this situation. When’s the last time you saw a casette tape rack sold outside of Odd Lots? What about the formal “stereo cabinet” with plenty of room for records? What about Virgin Megastores?
As much as it pains me to say this and as horrible as it sounds, the book is leaving us.
Link | More from The Economist
It clearly says that IKEA is making the unit deeper - somehow people are taking that to mean they won't be able to put books on it. It means you'll be able to put your oversized books on it!
And paper books aren't going anywhere soon.
On a recent show, one of the designers complained that the shelves were too narrow. I was thinking they were perfect for books.
The extra-wide bookcases have been available for ages - all of ours have extra-wide shelves. This means they can easily hold our outsized coffee-table books, textbooks and atlases on the lower shelves, but there's also loads of room for coffee cups and ornaments in front of the books on the upper shelves!
All of this "only older people have books" and "books are becoming obsolete" stuff is nonsense. Ikea is simply making its product more flexible. Having narrow Hardback-size shelves restricts the use of the bookcase to books only. By widening the shelves, the product opens up to a whole host of other storage solutions - BUT of course it can be used for books too!
It's just smart sales sense from Ikea - make a single product appealing to as wide an audience as possible!
Is it yet another one of those media myths? Along with the "facts" that everybody has uses Facebook and Twitter and everybody owns an iPhone and/or iPad. What's that you say, the popular media are lying to us? Who knew?
I also don't own an e-reader. I spent my days on a computer in my office job, and I'd rather not continue staring at a screen (even though the Kindle screen is pretty nice). Paper books don't run out of batteries.
I'm 26.
(I did actually recover the Word Perfect story, but I used it as an illustration).
I don't think you can even really compare it to the digitisation of music since affordable personal music collections have only become commonplace in the last few decades whereas books have been wide spread since for centuries!
Now I buy books on the iPad so that I don't have to go into the city on a long train ride to the only bookstore nearby that sells books in English. However I always plan on buying the hardcopy of a book if I really enjoy it, just because I like having the actual book around. But maybe that's just me being an old lady in her early 30s. Stuck in her ways...
1) Clay tablets - lasted 2500 years
2) Papyrus Rolls - lasted 2500 years
3) Codex (what we consider books) - so far 2000 years
4) Electronic books - 10-15 years
They all have significant overlap with the previous taking many centuries to die out. (tablets to rolls, rolls to codex) Will e-books surplant codex books? If they can be affordable, permanently archived (a big read flag), integrated from previous systems, and there is a societal demand. It could happen. It may. I don't think in any of our lifetimes though.
The Codex has proven to be a sustainable form of storing information and knowledge that doesn't need to be upgraded every decade (vinyl record to 8 track to cassette to cd to mp3) I think it's great that we continue to attempt improvement. That's our thing. We shouldn't get ahead of ourselves though. The Codex may be getting old, but just because people say it's nearing its last breath doesn't make it so.
On the other hand deep shelves are exactly what I DON'T need for my ever-expanding collection of DVDs (two 6x3-foot racks have already overflowed) so I'm going for a custom build solution, and have discovered that decking planks are exactly the right width for DVDs. They're also 8 feet long so I can use more vertical space.
In fact for paperback books they are also perfect, so I may go to single-depth book shelves soon. My wide shelves will be released for storage of wide books.
I did once work out how much it would cost to cover every wall in one room with Billy shelves and worked out that I could more happily spend the money on more books :)
As a side issue, if you cover your walls with books they make for great insulation!