Schwarz
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Adam Purple / George Bliss
As little as a year or two ago, it was possible to be skeptical about the future of electronic publishing, but it's becoming increasingly clear that Kindles, iPads, and the like will soon be the dominant medium—if, indeed, they aren't already. As a novelist this bothers me not at all; though I prefer paper, I don't care how other people read, so long as they do. But novels and nonfiction aren't the only things that come in book form. Unless you're very dedicated, and very well-traveled, most of the art and photography you've seen has been on the printed page as well. Will these, too, gradually be replaced with e-books? I suspect not, and I certainly hope not, but to understand why, we need to indulge in a little metaphysics.I agree, mostly. with the increase of ebook popularity, printed art (as well as architecture and photography) books enjoy increased value added appreciation. a well printed art book is the next best thing to having a pricier printed edition or original artists work. catalogs too. its still a pleasurable and gratifying practice to own art books and keep them handy on your book shelf. and a great way to collect artists your interested in. its so convenient to pull out a book you want to share with some one or check a reference. just never loan them out as they tend to have a fairly poor return rate. i havent bought an electronic reader but i get their merits and i know avid readers who love them. still, the ebook or web browser art experience resides a full peg lower in value. there is of course the net art exception. lets not expect dead tree flip book gifs to replace an on screen gif experience and chris ashley is an html master to name a couple.
I don't know the exact circumstances of Sonic Youth's decision, so I'm not comfortable saying they did it wrong. But a lot of the things they were involved with as part of the mainstream were distasteful to me. And a lot of the things that happened as a direct result of their association with the mainstream music industry gave credibility to some of the nonsense notions that hover around the star-making machinery. A lot of that stuff was offensive to me and I saw it as a sellout and a corruption of a perfectly valid, well-oiled music scene. Sonic Youth chose to abandon it in order to become a modestly successful mainstream band-- as opposed to being a quite successful independent band that could have used their resources and influence to extend that end of the culture. They chose to join the mainstream culture and become a foot soldier for that culture's encroachment into my neck of the woods by acting as scouts. I thought it was crass and I thought it reflected poorly on them. I still consider them friends and their music has its own integrity, but that kind of behavior-- I can't say that I think it's not embarrassing for them. I think they should be embarrassed about it.