I keep adding to my Kindle. These books are available today from .99 - 1.99 :

The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: William Shirer ($1.99 today only)

The Mindful Writer: Noble Truths of the Writing Live: Dinty W. Moore ($0.99 through Saturday the 15th)

Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness: Walking the Buddha's Path: Bhante Henepola Gunaratana ($0.99 through the 15th)

I have borrowed this book through the Amazon Prime Membership lending program. If you purchase a prime membership, at $79.00 a year, you get streaming video for your Kindle Fire; two day shipping with no price limits; and a book a month on a lending library basis. This month I'm reading:

AWOL on the Appalachian Trail: David Miller (without Prime Membership, this book is $2.99)

I'm well into this book and I'm really enjoying it. I've spent some time on the trail, but only short day stints in North Carolina and Georgia. I find the idea of hiking the whole route oddly tempting, but I will wait until I finish the book to see if he makes me change my mind! Might be one of those things best read.

Creative Destruction* is now a business term meant to convey the necessity of clearing the way for the new -- capitalism's periodic way of preparing the foundation by leveling existing structures, if necessary, all in the goal of new efficiencies, progress, etc., etc. The book business is in the midst of one such leveling. Like all situations where euphemisms are attached, the term is often in jarring dissonance with what is witnessed on the ground, where real lives and livelihoods are impacted directly.

It's common news now for bookstores, long in business, to be closing their doors. Village Voice Bookshop in Paris is closing after a thirty year run. It's also common to say, of course...this is the way of life, as we all turn toward our laptop screens and tablets for more minutes and hours of the day. Most in the book business were never in it for the money; surely, not the independent booksellers, those that provided a physical space where it was never solely about the purchase of a book. In business terms, judging by marketplace efficiencies, the move to e-books has been a no-brainer. What we're losing with this predominately economic mindset is worth noting.

Independent bookstores have long provided their communities with an intellectual space where like minds -- book lovers -- could gather. Each bookstore expressed the quirkiness of the owner and said something about the local community, too. The pleasure of browsing, the potential for chance meeting with an author, usually in the form of a book, sometimes at a reading, or bumping into another patron with similar taste, was always in the air. The business of a bookstore was always socially minded. The pure arrangement of aisles and bookcases reminded you how much the world offered and how little one lifetime allowed.

At the same time that bookstores are folding from economic pressures, library funding is being questioned in many communities. The recession has had a great impact on budgets, and library hours and staffing are being cut back. The library has always been the primary landscape and provider of the common good, where no one was ever turned away for the lack of money.

As books become something only read on devices, we will all be locked into the culture and cultural limitations of the device providers and their shareholders. The grand hope of the democratization of publishing, with the fall of the gatekeepers, will exclude those not able to pay the initial device fee and the ongoing per item cost. Libraries matter, if community matters, and if the common good matters.

Community can be made online, though it is difficult -- not impossible -- to do from behind a screen. With time and thought maybe real communities will form. Matthew Stadler is trying to do so with Publication Studio. I've learned much from him.

I have novels ready to publish. I've been thinking about finding another agent, but I've hesitated so far. For many reasons, I may publish on my own. I do so with full knowledge of what's at stake and what has been lost along the way. We're at a crossroads, culturally; a clear path has not been cut yet. As readers and writers we need to take these steps mindfully, with suasion.

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the history of Creative Destruction on wikipedia

Update on 2012-08-01 17:27 by Therese Flanagan

I agree that businesses are being shaped and reshaped by technology and consumer dollars; the publishing business is not immune to these changes. It's pretty clear that e-books are here to stay, and that books will be around, right beside them. I happen to like the e-book format, but I have shelves of books that I will not be giving up any time soon.

My concern is for the entire book ecosystem. It's always hard to make an argument about something that largely goes unseen, but to risk losing the institutional knowledge of the agents; editors; publishing houses; booksellers; and librarians -- those whose livelihoods have been spent nurturing books into being -- would represent a true loss to the world of ideas. The disruption in the chain is utter, so bookstores and libraries feel the impact, and ultimately every individual will be affected by bookstore closings, and by the libraries reduced hours and staffing. As always, the impact will be greater on those communities and individuals with fewer resources.

These aren't surgical cuts to an industry; this is the wrecking ball applied swiftly, with little regard for any view beyond the immediate economic terrain. No doubt, there are opportunities, but a vibrant marketplace, especially the marketplace of ideas, shouldn't be reduced to a very few moneyed vendors whose primary business interests extend far beyond books. If publishers lose the DOJ lawsuit, it's reasonable to expect a further contraction of competition. It's the concentration of power and market share that poses the greatest danger to those interested in books as culture, and not books as low price point commodities. Steve Windwalker, on Kindle Nation Daily, makes this prediction:

"Amazon is positioning itself to capture something very close to an unprecedented 50% retail market share across all formats in the U.S. book trades by the end of 2013."

This is why Stadler's ideas about fostering communities of writers and readers remain so powerful for me.

The responder's point about creating niche markets is one path to take. I do think that would have an atomizing effect, exacerbating the echo chambers that have become too much a part of our daily fare. What was always so good about a book store was the proximity to other fields under one small roof, reminiscent of a University. We need to find more bridges, more ways to talk to one another.

I say all of this as someone who owns a Kindle Fire, belongs to Amazon Prime, and is satisfied with the customer experience that Amazon has provided. I am also interested in their direct to market publishing program for some projects; I've always been in business for myself and I don't mind being entrepreneurial. Amazon has done so many things right. Their emphasis on customer service is exemplary. I do fear their concentration of power; I wish there was a greater balance out there.

I know that efficiencies come at a price. Cutting the fat is one thing, and knowing where the heart is matters. We owe ourselves our full humanity, something that has little to do with business cycles.

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(I welcome your responses.)

And it begins...Penguin and Random House in Merger Talks

Troy Library -- Open

Books I've purchased today...

What I'm reading...Susan Sontag: As Consciousness is Harnessed to Flesh - Journals and Notebooks 1964-1980

Books I've purchased today...

Man Booker Long List Announced

On the business of books -- Creative Destruction: Elegy for a Bookstore and a Book Culture

On the business of books

On Forgetting