Many of us in the MCDM have taken on the challenge of reading through Yochai Benkler’s masterwork, The Wealth of Networks, a foundational text for any media program. Benkler makes the case that social production (collaborative content produced by widely distributed individuals, sometimes numbering in the thousands) is more effective and economically efficient than a centralized information production and distribution system that is controlled by a small number of organizations. Benkler backs up his arguments with several examples, such as the highly successful GNU/Linux open-source Web server software; Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia created and edited by thousands of Internet users; and the scientific experiment of NASA Clickworkers in which more than 80,000 public volunteers replaced a handful of scientists and graduate students to mark and classify Mars craters.

One problem with Benkler’s illustrations of these examples is that in extolling their successes, Benkler does not sufficiently examine the potential limitations of these projects. Is GNU/Linux so successful because it has allowed many large (and small) corporations to generate profits by selling their products or services online? And Wikipedia may be losing editors, which could lead to its future decline.

Jaron Lanier, Internet pioneer and scientist, has an opposing perspective on free, collectively produced content. “On one level, the Internet has become anti-intellectual because Web 2.0 collectivism has killed the individual voice,” said Lanier in a recent interview. In his book, You Are Not a Gadget (2010), Lanier wrote that the concept of free content requires “that authors, journalists, musicians and artists are encouraged to treat the fruits of their intellects and imaginations as fragments to be given without pay to the hive mind.”

Lanier’s 2006 essay, “Digital Maoism: The Hazards of the New Online Collectivism,” highlighted the problems of collectively produced content. He also cited Wikipedia as an example for its sometimes-erroneous content. Lanier’s essay prompted a combined response by many media scholars, including Yochai Benkler, Douglas Rushkoff, and Clay Shirky. (Students of the MCDM: If you are not already familiar with these names, you will be soon.)

I agree with both Benkler and Lanier to some extent. I think there is intrinsic value in peer-produced Web content. However, the free and abundant distribution of such content may be at the cost of specialized, authoritative works. Today university presses are struggling, printed monographs (scholarly writing on specialized subjects) are in decline, and long-established newspapers are searching for ways to survive. Yet, some argue that peer-produced content is not a cause but a solution to these problems.

Perhaps it is not a question of choosing one or the other. Both, collectively and individually produced content, will continue to thrive on the Web, adding to the Internet’s value in disseminating information.

Laila Kazmi is a freelance writer and a graduate student in the MCDM program.

Image source: Wikipedia

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Darnton is a former Princeton University professor, the current director of the Harvard University Library, and a respected historian. As such, he is admittedly an “old-fashioned, ultra-bookish” (p. 40) scholar with a love for rare book rooms. However, as is evident from his essay collection, written over several years, the historian’s love for books has not blinded him to the onset of the digital media revolution. He makes his case for the “printed word” (p. vii) while appreciating the value of wide accessibility of digitized books via the Internet.

These are trying times for the world of book publishing. Even as I write this review, a battle over e-book pricing is taking place between two corporate giants. The largest online retailer of books, Amazon.com, has at least temporarily stopped selling books by Macmillan, one of the largest publishers of English language books. St. Martin’s Press; Picador; Farrar, Straus and Giroux; and Scientific American are all divisions of Macmillan. The effect of this conflict on books, readers and authors remains to be seen. But it underscores the current debate over the future of paper books vs. e-books.

The father of media studies, Marshall McLuhan, described all media as “extensions of man that cause deep and lasting changes in him and transform his environment” (“The Playboy Interview; Marshall McLuhan,” March 1969). Perhaps no other medium of communication fits this description better than the printed book. As Darnton puts it:

Consider the book … it has proven to be a marvelous machine — great for packaging information, convenient to thumb through, comfortable to curl up with, superb for storage, and remarkably resistant to damage. It does not need to be upgraded or downloaded, accessed or booted, plugged into circuits or extracted from webs. Its design makes it a delight to the eye. Its shape makes it a pleasure to hold in the hand. And its handiness has made it the basic tool of learning for thousands of years, even when it had to be unrolled to be read … long before Alexander the Great founded the library of Alexandria in 332 BC. (p. 68)

Aside from the emotional and historical values attached to the book, Darnton offers many logical arguments to underscore the importance of paper books and why they are likely not going away anytime soon. For example, he explains that there are about 543 million volumes in the American research libraries; Google’s initial goal is set at digitizing 15 million. Even if Google manages to digitize 90 percent of the books in the entire US, the 10 percent that are missed may contain information of value for many. And what of the books published in the rest of the world?

In another chapter, Darnton describes a past frenzy to save the libraries from a “spectacular space cries” (pp. 115-25). Apparently, during the period of roughly 1950 to the 1980s, some of the largest libraries in America replaced millions of books and old newspapers with microfilm. The result was a great loss because as it turned out microfilm did not last long. It developed many defects and became illegible (p. 112).

Perhaps the greatest value of the e-book is not in replacing the printed book, but in extending its power to spread knowledge.

Darnton acknowledges McLuhan’s theories, the Memex (an electro-mechanical desk that was meant to contain libraries of books on microfilm), and the libraries’ past frenzy to replace books with microfilm. Add the Internet and the e-book readers of today, and the question becomes one that we have been pondering for over 70 years: Is technology about to replace the book? Before we learn the answer, the medium of ink on paper may well outlast many more technological innovations. Its message continues to shape our world.

The Case for Books: Past, Present, and Future
By Robert Darnton, 220pp.
PublicAffairs, New York, 2009

Laila Kazmi is a freelance writer and a graduate student in the MCDM program.

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