Questing for Atlantis

In my opinion Reina was far too lenient with her comments on Alexie’s diatribe about the  Kindle and e-books in general.

For those not familiar with his statement (I wasn’t until I read Reina’s post, but then again I’d never heard of Alexie either) here’s what he said:

At a panel of authors speaking mainly to independent booksellers, Sherman Alexie, the National Book Award-winning author of “The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian,” said he refused to allow his novels to be made available in digital form. He called the expensive reading devices “elitist” and declared that when he saw a woman sitting on the plane with a Kindle on his flight to New York, “I wanted to hit her.”

Setting aside my extreme disdain for the populism implicit in his statements, Alexie’s comment demands rejection for the sheer barbarism of the violent impulse driven by something so minor as his distaste for electronic reading devices.

And while Reina thinks his later elaboration help redeem him, I don’t think so. They may make him seem a little less a douchebag, but they don’t change how he is deeply, fundamentally wrong (and incidentally contradicts himself). Let’s go through his claims one by one (skipping ones not really related to the economics of literacy and technology, my main point).

I consider the Kindle elitist because it’s too expensive. I also consider it elitist because, right now, one company is making all the rules. I am also worried about Jeff Bezos’ comments about wanting to change the way we read books. That’s rather imperial. Having grown up poor, I’m also highly aware that there’s always a massive technology gap between rich and poor kids. I haven’t yet heard what Amazon plans to do about this potential technology gap. And that’s a vital question considering that Bezos wants to change the way we read books. How does he plan to change the way that poor kids read books? How does he plan to make sure that poor kids have access to the technology? Poor kids all over the country don’t have access to current textbooks, so will they have access to Kindle?

For being an author, Alexie isn’t demonstrating any awareness of the historic realities of literacy and the role technology has played in its spread. For millenia literacy was solely the domain of the elite – precisely because of economic barriers to the world of letters.

Alexie’s “imperial comment?” Gutenberg may not have said it, but there’s no question he changed the way we read. And it was for the better. The printing press was in many ways compatible with the Kindle. Both require a significant capital investment up front, but significantly reduced the per unit price of the written word. I don’t see him complaining about the elitist origins of the printing press and the printed book.

And the final bit, the part about changing how poor kids read? Alexie has to be an idiot if he doesn’t see that the Kindle may well be the best thing to ever happen to disadvantaged people with regards to literacy since the printing press. It works on a few levels. Perhaps most importantly, the Kindle will ultimately put more books in the hands of the poor. While it is currently expensive, it is far easier to provide a subsidy for a single unitary device to get lower cost books (FYI Alexie, text books available electronically already cost less than their print counterparts and all e-book prices will likely continue to fall in price as their market share expands) on than it is to subsidize getting multiple books into the same person’s hands.

And going back to the printing press, what percentage of people owned one in the first 50 years of its existence? And how many people own desktop printers now? The same thing will inevitably happen with e-book readers, and probably much faster due to advances in manufacturing technology and the faster rate of technological innovation compared to then.

So, on that point Alexie is pretty much wrong on everything. Unfortunately for him he doesn’t get much better later on either. Like here for example:

But I do want to know about Amazon’s social commitments to literacy and other social issues. If eBooks do take over the market, then dozens more independent bookstores will close, and all sorts of communities will lose a vital social force. Does Amazon have any plans to fill the social gaps left by those closed stores?

Apparently Alexie’s commitment to expanding literacy and access to books for the poor doesn’t run too deep. If that’s his primary concern he ought to give up on his concern for the continuing viability of independent bookstores. In my experience most of these sort of bookstores have to charge more than their chain counterparts. If we want the poor to have better reading opportunities we need to give them better chances to get their hands on books – and that means more books at lower cost. It ought to be obvious, but perhaps it isn’t – that is in Barnes and Noble and Border’s comparative advantage, not the independent bookshops (This isn’t to say I don’t like independent bookshops. I think they have great character and love checking them out when I find them. But they are by and large the luxury of the reasonably well-off).

And color me heartless, but I hardly think it’s any obligation of Amazon’s to help spread literacy (although it’s probably in their economic self-interest). But if you’re interested in that sort of thing, it would be pretty easy to do. If we’re assuming book purchase – which we must be if we’re looking to independent bookstores – it’s an easy affair to subsidize Kindles for lower income families, far easier than subsidizing individual books. And it’s not like Kindles are going to stay expensive forever.

Moving on:

I have to make my books available electronically. I have held out on the matter for as long as possible, but I have no author allies in this fight, so I have to submit. I have to sign contracts for eBook rights. I’m doing this in the blind because none of us know what’s going to happen. The last screenwriters’ strike in Hollywood was largely the result of this same issue. The legal issues regarding the Internet and copyrights and revenue are still unclear. And I don’t think I’m so crazy to worry that large corporations may not have my best interests in mind when they are offering me deals.

I don’t really have much to say on this front other than that he might want to try talking to Cory Doctorow.

And finally:

Books saved my life, Edward. I rose out of poverty and incredible social dysfunction because of books. And all of my senses-sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste-come into play when I think and read about books. Books are tactile and eccentric. An eBook will always be a gorgeous but anonymous box. It will also be just a tool–perhaps an amazing and useful tool-but I don’t want it to replace the book. And I’m worried that many people don’t care about the book itself, and see the eBook as a replacement. And I’m worried that Amazon and other eBook distributors will completely replace bookstores. The careers of nearly every successful writer are based on the amazing human interaction between bookstore employees and readers. I enjoy an amazing career because, over the last seventeen years, bookstore employees, librarians, and book lovers have handed a copy of my book to another person and said, “You have to read this.” That face-to-face interaction will become more and more rare. Sure, the Internet can launch careers, but there is a loss of intimacy that should be acknowledged and mourned.

I almost don’t know where to start here. I can see the genuine emotion of his thoughts here, and it almost makes me feel bad for calling him a douchebag (of course, then I remember him talking about wanting to hit a woman for using a Kindle). But to real ideas.

Alexie’s description of what books are is the equivalent of describing humans as bags of skin containing meat and bones. The true reality of books is not in how we experience them, but in the worlds of ideas contained within them. So long as we maintain the actual text, the book endures, regardless of the format. Most everyone would think it foolish to decry the evolution away from the vellum manuscript or papyrus scroll or clay tablet. Each one was also a uniquely tactile and eccentric experience and each evolution, from the cave painting all the way to the modern e-book has reduced those elements without reducing the soul. In spite of the old political adage, it’s the message that matters, not the medium of transmission.

I think the same probably holds true for writers. How many people’s writing careers are really the product of an interaction in a bookstore and how many are the product of a momentous interaction with the words and ideas of another author? I’m certainly no great writer and I can’t say I personally know any either so don’t know the answer, but I’d bet the means of transmission (in this case the bookstore and its employees) matter a lot less than the content of that transmission.

Finally, Alexie closes with the all too common lament that the internet is reducing our connectivity and intimacy with one another. This reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of the internet and social networking. I know without question I am far, far better connected and more intimate with a lot more people because of Facebook and Twitter and this blog than I would be without them. The internet doesn’t disconnect us from others, it reduces the cost of such connections so enables us to have more and better connections with more (and better?) people. I highly recommend Sherman Alexie make his next book purchase be Tyler Cowen’s Create Your Own Economy, it might help improve his perspective on e-books, the internet, and modern culture.

Now, Sherman Alexie, if by chance you read this, I know I’ve been harsh, but I would love to have a serious conversation with you on the ideas I’ve broached here. I honestly think the Kindle and similar devices have great potential, especially for the poor and I’d love to know what someone like you (an author, someone socially concerned in this area, and someone with experience in this environment) has to say about my points.