So much for the new world of tech-media. Somebody finally asked an obvious question and got an obvious answer:
The belief that the Internet is pushing aside traditional media as a source of news and information may be mistaken, according to a new study profiling online Canadians. The study, one of the largest and most comprehensive ever conducted on Internet users in Canada, found that those who use Google, Yahoo! and other online sources to get their daily dose of news are more likely to pick up a newspaper, read a book or flip through a magazine than non-users of the Internet. Newspapers were cited by 59 per cent of Internet users as an important source of information, compared with 50 per cent for non-users, while books were important for 55 per cent of Web surfers compared with 38 per cent for non-users.Here is the story in the Toronto Star. The internet is a medium of information, not so much a new way of doing things. They best evidence of this is the fact we do things pretty much the way we did them in 1990 except we send more emails and pick up the phone less - but I discuss the same things. I go to a library less and read caselaw on the web - but I look at the same cases. And I no longer have access to the Kenyan Railway Reports, my favorite series of court reports hidden in a back shelf of the Dalhousie law library.
If the internet is responsible for anything it is dumbing down and the confusion of fact with opinion. The upside is largely that we can get access to that flakiness at more places.
Comments
Derek - November 3, 2005 10:17 am
Notwithstanding the (apparent) fact that Internet users read more, I wonder if the Internet is affecting libraries. Initially, there was an influx of people going to the libraries to use the Internet. Now that more have it, I would expect that, people being lazy, more of us are staying at home gorging on the easily accessible online info, and ignoring information "locked" in books at the library. Of course, we are ignoring a rich (but musty!) source of information.
<a href=http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/05/05/issue/readme_libraries.asp?p=1>Here's a story on this</a>. Comments? Will libraries go the way of the town crier as a way to get information?
Alan - November 3, 2005 10:47 am
Hey! You think this is Friday?!?! <p>Good question. So far Kingston still has libraries and still has a Town Crier, too.
brian - November 3, 2005 12:41 pm
It makes sense that web users are more likely to read other news media than non-users. I have found that the internet has not only fed my information addiction, but actually encouraged my addiction to information. I'm so used to getting news & info when I want it, that I devour magazines of all kinds when I'm not around the web.
Readers read; Nonreaders don't read. But would I be less of a reader in general if I hadn't been on the web for the past 10 years? Probably.
Derek - November 3, 2005 1:55 pm
(Friday starts early here at the government)
Since everyone seems to agree that the Internet has fueled our reading addiction, I guess what we readers really need is a way to read books online (on an iPod or e-reader or Palm or tablet) at a reasonable price (a loonie) or at the same price the libraries charge i.e. nothing. Apple has brought us the 99 cent song and the $2 movie. Who will bring us the 99 cent best seller? The libraries/Amazon/Apple iReads (no charge for the name)/the publishers???? ebooks.com wants US$13.45 for The Davinci Code, and $7 for Raising Atlantis. This is a lot of money to move a few electrons around. Perhaps they could sell Google adwords or something to make their product accessible to the masses.
If someone adopts a pricing model similar to what has happened with iTunes, the libraries may no longer be required for anything but rare books.
Alan - November 3, 2005 2:17 pm
That is interesting. If you notice old library buildings they are often called "X-ville free library". I do not want a 99 cent book even if it is digital. I want to lend a free one but I want the library to buy it. I think that has fueled the Boingy non-sense and Google theivery that is now the subject of court cases. The BBC is taking the opposite tack in paying off copyright interest holders for its internal content archives and then giving them out free to the world.
I've solved it! Digital libraries should be built on that same way: Google should be paying for the rights of interest holders and then recover costs by placing ads on the sidebar.
Thank you all.
Derek - November 4, 2005 9:37 am
I like Alan's solution:
(1) Copyright holder (publisher and eventually author) gets paid by digital distributor (Google).
(2) Google gets paid (and stays out of copyright-violation jail) by selling ads.
(3) Amazon stops selling books and CDs (and, eventually DVD's) and concentrates on non-digital "Lumpy Objects".
(4) We (former library users) pay nothing, although we may patronize a few of the companies that place the ads.
(5)The libraries turn into rare book museums/Internet cafés. Ironically, they may be to only ones who actually have to charge.
Fine tuning - how to compensate best-sellers. I think that the payment stream would have to include a way to pay royalties, in addition to an up-front fee for the right-to-copy the book. Popular books will certainly result in more ad impressions, the authors and publishers of popular books should get a piece of this action. Aside: if Google paid Alan $150 for ads displayed to readers of his blog, what must Mao's Little Red Book or the Holy Bible be worth?
Alan - November 4, 2005 11:10 am
They are worth the billions google rakes in - just like the billions they are setting up to take in for the protected works of others. They have to be required, like the BBC realized, to share the wealth with the wealth creators.