Recently I watched the film “V for Vendetta.” The movie is set in an authoritarian future, and dangerous books
and artwork have long ago been eliminated from people’s lives. But V, the hero who
is resisting the authoritarians, has an underground home filled with books and
art that he has “rescued” from the censors’ vaults. Seeing the books piled high
in one of the rooms, I was reminded of the importance of hard copies.
When information is digital,
access to it can be taken away very easily. For example, if you own an
e-reader, you don’t really own the books on it. The Kindle
Store user agreement makes that very clear: “Kindle Content is licensed,
not sold, to you by the Content Provider.” Amazon can remove a book from your device at any time.
Ironically, the premier example
of this so far are some George Orwell books. The person who uploaded them for
sale on Amazon did not own the copyright. When Amazon realized the error in
2009, those books just disappeared from the Kindles of the people who thought
they’d purchased the books. And there was no notice or explanation from Amazon.
Maybe this seems insignificant
now, but if at some future point we have an authoritarian government, any books
that that government disliked could be disappeared at the stroke of a button.
It’s not so easy to collect and burn every book.
I like reading on my Kindle; I
like the convenience of looking up words and making notes onscreen. It’s nice
being able to pack just one small device that holds multiple books when I
travel. It’s nice not having to dust more books on my bookshelves. Yet understanding
the importance of hard copies makes me resolve to keep buying physical books.
This Mark
Fiore cartoon illustrates the importance of another object that is
being made obsolete by our new devices: printed maps. Who needs to worry about
carrying maps when you can just use your GPS or pull up the map on your phone?
But devices and Internet connections fail, and if you’re out in the wilderness
that failure can be fatal.
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