Books Are Here To Stay

This is my second Road Trip Wednesday. If you don’t know what that is, check out the details from YA Highway’s blog.

Today’s question: Assuming we make it through the 2012 apocalypse, what do you imagine the publishing world will look like 100 years from now?

The best answer? I have no idea, and no one else does either.

I do know that digital will be a huge part of the publishing industry.

I also know that physical books aren’t going to disappear.

There will have to be changes. Obviously. Things are changing right now. We’re on the cusp of physical and e-books being affordable for nearly everyone. And pretty soon, e-readers and tablets and such are going to decrease in price so much that e-books are the cheaper option that physical books. This is one reason (along with portability, convenience, etc.) why e-books will override physical books. Not in a hundred years, but like…next week.

But physical books are here to stay, even if in a slightly different way. Right now physical books are cheap. They’re for everyone—indeed, we publish mass market for a reason! In a few (not nearly 100) years, physical books won’t be special enough or unique enough to compete against the digital world.

That’s when we’re going to have to publish ‘different’ physical books. Books will need to feel special and they’ll need to have a reason for people to want to put them on their shelves. Just like during the Renaissance when books were rare, special, and beautifully illuminated, books of the future will need something to encourage consumers to want the physical version rather than the (most likely) cheaper and more easily portable digital version. This can be solved by publishing books that are unique. Books that deserve to be displayed and ‘awwww-ed’ over. These stunning hand-sewn covers that are part of the Penguin Threads Deluxe Classics and the beautiful leather-bound editions that HarperCollins sells at Barnes and Noble are early examples of publishers looking for ways to make books feel special and collectable. I even discovered while reading Dear Genius: The Letters of Ursula Nordstrom (about Harper’s legendary children’s book editor and director) that they wanted to publish the sequel to Little Fur Family with a real rabbit’s fur cover in the 1950s!

While I’m not suggesting that we publish books with fur coats, physical books are going to have to change somehow to compete in the marketplace as digital becomes more attractive and competitive. There are going to be lots of changes in publishing in the next one, five, fifty or one hundred years. Changes that we cannot predict, but I know two things for certain: one, no matter how much time goes by, books are here to stay. And two, I can’t wait to see what happens.

Procrastination

I was going to start this post saying that I’m the Queen of Procrastination, but on second thought I realized that my generation is the entire ruling class of procrastination.  How could we not be?  Easy access to all types of technology and social media was created just when we were on the cusp of adulthood…and thus, during our college years we learned how to procrastinate with those new tools.  We’re experts at stalking people on Facebook until something new comes on the newsfeed, needlessly commenting on photos, staring at Twitter and perfecting our next 140 word update, polishing profiles.  This very blog is my newest method of procrastination…I mindlessly check the stats countless times a day and just a few days ago I spent an hour adding labels to my past blog posts so now they come up in the right hand column.  Such a productive use of time.  NOT.

My guess is that this procrastination talent comes from the fact that nearly everyone of my generation CAN NOT SIT STILL.  Maybe we all have a little bit of ADHD.  Maybe we’ve just been raised in a world where there are soooo many options we just need to do them all.  I am so guilty of this.  Sit down and watch a two-hour movie? How about with my computer on my lap so I can check Twitter during the boring parts?  Write a paper for school?  Only if I can check Facebook as a reward for writing down two sentences.  Read a textbook? Hopefully I have iChat or Skype open so I can instant message my friends while I do so.

I am not proud that I’ve done each and every one of those things regularly.  I CAN NOT unplug and can not fathom when my mom says she hasn’t checked her email for a day or two.  It’s a ‘good’ day when I haven’t checked mine every hour on the hour.  And it doesn’t help that with my new Mac I use Mail which comes up with a tempting little icon every time I have a new piece of mail…whether I want the distraction or not.

So what am I (we?) to do when something actually needs to be done and procrastinating isn’t an option? I’m not sure.  All summer and into this fall when I’ve been writing I’ve set myself a rigid schedule: writing from 10:30-12:30 every day when I don’t have plans (and I try to make that as often as possible).  This has worked pretty well because my brain has gotten into the habit of thinking of my story when it subconsciously knows writing time is close.  I get excited about my novel and want to write, thus those potential distractions are less enticing.  Yet, I naturally write on my computer…Facebook, Twitter, email are all temptingly nearby and sometimes I have to cave, especially if I’m suffering from writer’s block (boo).

Studies have recently said that people can’t multitask- say jumping between writing my YA novel and checking friends’ statuses on Facebook- but somehow, it works for me.  I may not get quite as much work done, but when that college textbook would have put me to sleep had I not been chatting with a friend about weekend plans…I’m pretty darn thankful for all those distractions.

Okay, now it’s time to get back to the manuscript I was supposed to be reading!