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I'm not sure about the archival issue. The only problem with archival that would make physical books superior is after civilization collapse that destroys the

I'm not sure about the archival issue. The only problem with archival that would make physical books superior is after civilization collapse that destroys the supply chain for computing devices. Assuming DRM can be stripped, which it can be for most of the major ebook sellers including Amazon, ebooks can then be converted to epub which are just dialects of html with some xml metadata. Even if html becomes deprecated in the future, there will be converters for html to new better formats. Unencrypted ebooks can be backed up off-site, to cloud storage, to m-disc dvds or blu-rays stored in safe deposit boxes. Physical libraries can be destroyed in fire or natural disaster almost as easily as an ebook collection on a computer. Physical books take up space and cost more, and cannot be cheaply backed up. There's a conflict between securing physical books against wear & tear and destruction, and allowing access to them. It's worth distinguishing the sharing/lending issue as a legal problem, not an inherent deficiency of ebooks. Ebooks are better for sharing/lending in many ways... there's no need to spend time or money physically transporting them, and no need to worry about a friend accidentally spilling coffee on your favorite book.

teacup50 12y ago
A book stored on a shelf in a relatively temperate climate can last hundreds of years without issue. For an optical disc to last that long and still be readable, you'll need: 1) Archival-quality discs (e.g. http://www.mdisc.com http://www.mdisc.com). Normal writable discs will delaminate. 2) A drive capable of reading the disc, and capable of interfacing with your computer. Optical drives have a limited lifespan -- the drives used in Sega's Dreamcast, for example, are beginning to fail. Likewise, interconnection standards have a limited lifespan. 3) A file format that can still be read using existing technology. Will converters be likely in 50 years? Maybe. 100? Less likely. 200? Extremely unlikely. That's just optical discs. You're also talking about live archival, for example, to "cloud storage" -- this costs a lot more money than a book sitting on a shelf, uses a lot more power, is locked to a specific set of authentication credentials, must be paid for if the data is not to be lost. That's before factoring in DRM and advances therein. Sure, you can strip Kindle DRM, with extra effort, but how many people will do so and then accidentally store the result in a place where it will keep for 50 years? What about when DRM gets better? Ultimately, we suck at digital archival, and ultimately, there's only so much we can do with a medium that requires a great deal of complexity just to extract any amount of meaningful data whatsoever. There is a huge archival and preservation advantage to simple mechanisms that have fewer failure points.
- ralmidani 12y ago
  Does the archive have to remain frozen in time? When the storage medium gets older, the files can be written to newer, cheaper, faster, denser devices. If a standard becomes old, convert to its successor while converters still exist.
  - teacup50 12y ago
    That requires an attentive, active, and costly effort to maintain an archive, as opposed to a medium that survives even when forgotten.
    - ralmidani 12y ago
      On a large scale, don't physical archives need maintenance, as well? People need to keep the items stored in accordance with some sort of system (electronic formats make this easier), theft and fire prevention are needed, not to mention the amount of real estate that has to be bought, leased, and/or managed. On a smaller scale, when someone moves, they have to move, or pay someone to move, their archive for them (I got a taste of this back in November).
      - teacup50 12y ago
        Many valuable things don't wind up in an archive until after they'd have already been lost; a modern example of "what if she'd used Flickr?" would be: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivian_Maier http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivian_Maier Physical archives do require maintenance, but unlike servers, they don't convert electricity to heat at a prodigious pace, have a much simpler set of failure modes and environmental constraints, and generally remain readable even if you forget about them
zzalpha 12y ago
The only problem with archival that would make physical books superior is after civilization collapse that destroys the supply chain for computing devices. Not at all. Technology is fundamentally opaque, non-durable, and transitory. Hell, just try finding something to read a 5 1/4" floppy disk, assuming the magnetic tracks are still intact. And that's only, what, 25-30 years ago? Imagine what it'll be like in a hundred. Archivists have struggled with this exact problem. Digital data is so ephemeral... how do you persist it? There's been research into more durable forms of storage that might still be accessible, but in the end it's tough to beat physically etching something into stone or writing it on paper or vellum.

teacup50 12y ago

A book stored on a shelf in a relatively temperate climate can last hundreds of years without issue. For an optical disc to last that long and still be readable, you'll need: 1) Archival-quality discs (e.g. http://www.mdisc.com http://www.mdisc.com). Normal writable discs will delaminate. 2) A drive capable of reading the disc, and capable of interfacing with your computer. Optical drives have a limited lifespan -- the drives used in Sega's Dreamcast, for example, are beginning to fail. Likewise, interconnection standards have a limited lifespan. 3) A file format that can still be read using existing technology. Will converters be likely in 50 years? Maybe. 100? Less likely. 200? Extremely unlikely. That's just optical discs. You're also talking about live archival, for example, to "cloud storage" -- this costs a lot more money than a book sitting on a shelf, uses a lot more power, is locked to a specific set of authentication credentials, must be paid for if the data is not to be lost. That's before factoring in DRM and advances therein. Sure, you can strip Kindle DRM, with extra effort, but how many people will do so and then accidentally store the result in a place where it will keep for 50 years? What about when DRM gets better? Ultimately, we suck at digital archival, and ultimately, there's only so much we can do with a medium that requires a great deal of complexity just to extract any amount of meaningful data whatsoever. There is a huge archival and preservation advantage to simple mechanisms that have fewer failure points.

ralmidani 12y ago
Does the archive have to remain frozen in time? When the storage medium gets older, the files can be written to newer, cheaper, faster, denser devices. If a standard becomes old, convert to its successor while converters still exist.
- teacup50 12y ago
  That requires an attentive, active, and costly effort to maintain an archive, as opposed to a medium that survives even when forgotten.
  - ralmidani 12y ago
    On a large scale, don't physical archives need maintenance, as well? People need to keep the items stored in accordance with some sort of system (electronic formats make this easier), theft and fire prevention are needed, not to mention the amount of real estate that has to be bought, leased, and/or managed. On a smaller scale, when someone moves, they have to move, or pay someone to move, their archive for them (I got a taste of this back in November).
    - teacup50 12y ago
      Many valuable things don't wind up in an archive until after they'd have already been lost; a modern example of "what if she'd used Flickr?" would be: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivian_Maier http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivian_Maier Physical archives do require maintenance, but unlike servers, they don't convert electricity to heat at a prodigious pace, have a much simpler set of failure modes and environmental constraints, and generally remain readable even if you forget about them

zzalpha 12y ago

The only problem with archival that would make physical books superior is after civilization collapse that destroys the supply chain for computing devices. Not at all. Technology is fundamentally opaque, non-durable, and transitory. Hell, just try finding something to read a 5 1/4" floppy disk, assuming the magnetic tracks are still intact. And that's only, what, 25-30 years ago? Imagine what it'll be like in a hundred. Archivists have struggled with this exact problem. Digital data is so ephemeral... how do you persist it? There's been research into more durable forms of storage that might still be accessible, but in the end it's tough to beat physically etching something into stone or writing it on paper or vellum.