HEAD BLOG

A few nights ago I was reading a book to my son. This isn’t, in itself, unusual enough to write about but, after writing about how much I think the iPad will change the book buying market it did make me think more than usual about the process I was going through in reading the book.

Earlier that day I’d been discussing e-books with an author as we outlined plans to help him promote his first book. Creating eye-catching advertisements is a large part of what we do here at Head First and our experience in games has given us a pretty (I’ll resist saying unique) appropriate perspective in promoting certain types of products. As books increasingly vy for attention against games (which is intensifying in the face of the e-book) we all felt that our knowledge could be put to good use.

The upshot (after many preambles like that) is our discussion. We both agreed that e-books are here to stay but that print was where the real joy was.

As the wide format book opened in my hands that night I found myself enjoying its shape, weight and texture just as much as the marvellous writing. This, I thought, was what books were all about: the pleasure of the format and the joy of reading it outloud to someone too young to walk away. Every author desires a captive audience, every father no less so.

This, I felt, could never be lost. The amazing shapes (and sometimes sounds) built into the idea of a book are infinite. Wide books, tall books, flap books and pop-up books – all of these are part of teaching a child not so much to read but to feel; to engage in their tactile world. As enchanting as the words on the page are, as charming as the illustrations are, a book is so much more. How could an e-book ever threaten this?

They won’t. They will offer something different. As they mature, writers and artists will explore the format in the same way they have explored new printing process. New ideas will be born from the potential of e-books but the role of print will not disappear.

There are many migivings about the rise of digital books. Adjacent business models in games, music and even films offer glimpses of what could be around the corner and clues as to how to deal with the changes. Totalitarian regimes and corporate anti-trust cases should serve to remind us of the power and dangers of allowing a single entity to control a communication gateway and new threats will no doubt arise that must be dealt with from the perspective of what is beneficial to society rather than propitious for commerce.

We must never forget that a book isn’t solely the material from which it is made. The paper, the card, the vinyl or the silicon offers writers and artists a format to work in and explore but the ideas they invest in that format are altogether bigger.

The tipping point for the e-book is here. Despite the grumblings over multitasking, webcams and closed systems the launch of the iPad is already making waves.

Amazon, once the pioneer in this market and the company who brought book buying into our homes, has taken the knock as many pioneers can: by being too focussed on a single business model. Books were their stock-in-trade and, surprisingly perhaps given their successful   expansion into the wider world of online retail, books is where they chose to stay.

Now, against the backlit elegance of the iPad, Amazon’s Kindle looks as dusty and old fashioned as the books it sought to replace. The lessons it has learnt and the markets it opened are there for all to see; especially brighter, more visionary companies like Apple.

Apple have just forced Amazon to concede its persistent and historic advantage, price. By switching places, by adopting the pricing freedom which Amazon once used to undermine that of iTunes, Apple have ensured the co-operation of the major publishers whilst starting off (before they’ve really even started) on the right foot, namely a profitable and sustainable pricing model. Apple want no loss-leaders of the sort which have hamstrung the likes of Microsoft, Sony and Amazon. The future path of publishing will, it seems, be found by avoiding the potholes of other content digitisation.

The not-so-secret cheers at the first signs of Apple’s success can be heard from newspaper offices to games programmers because, much as we all love the idea of free it’s not so great when you have something you have to sell.

Had Amazon understood that getting their over-the-air delivery model right would lead to people wanting more from the technology then perhaps they wouldn’t have been so eager to adopt the digital ink format that has limited their selling power to books. Think small may be a great maxim for makers of chips but Pandora’s box of online shopping was opened a long time ago and our expectations exceed current capabilities (seriously, where is my jetpack?). We don’t so much see capability as we do potential. So reading books=great, but I’d like to watch video, look up references and buy presents for the kids too.

The iPad (and whatever personalised devices come after) aren’t so much about whether you can work on them (one editor told me she would only buy one once she could edit on it, and I’m sure there will be an App for that) but how can spend our leisure time on it.

And so we come back to the e-book as the notion of leisure time ends where it started, with a good book in front of the fire.

Digital books will pay dividends for the casual market, not because the screen is easier on the eye (it isn’t) or because they are cheaper (they aren’t), but because they are convenient. Much as I might prefer the sensual feel of paper flicking across my thumb and much as I want to scream and rebel at the idea of Apple being the gatekeeper of our leisure time, restricting and dictating the content to fit with a single person’s idea of “brand values”, I can’t help but notice that I’m changing. I’m demanding more from my books even as I read them. Engrossed as I was in Late Night On Twisted River (John Irving, 2009) I found myself pausing at moments and reaching for Wikipedia just to probe the border between reality and imagination. Irving is a master of blurring this border and whilst I was happy to be carried along with bears and prostitutes I couldn’t help but wonder more about the man behind the deaths of so many beautiful, innocent children.

In short, I wanted more, not less from the experience of reading.

David Hewson recently posted a number of photographs on his blog. He also tweeted about them. The photographs were of the places he had researched for his latest novel (The Blue Demon, available now at Amazon). On his blog he demonstrates how he took them and also why.

At the back of her books, Jodi Picoult devotes a few pages to the book club concept. She poses a list of questions people might want to consider when discussing her book.

Chicken House point would-be readers of their books to a specific passage using the bold statement “Read it! Try page…”. It’s an expansion on the old marketing trick of relating a unique selling point to salespeople by which they can enthuse about a product. The marked passage encourages readers firstly  to pick up the book and then open it. If the passage is picked properly then that provides the last link in the chain that has us hooked.

We want more, not less, from our books. With e-books (or books, as I believe we will one day call them) this won’t change.

The challenge will be in ensuring the tipping point doesn’t send us all downhill.