Taking Hits

http://denver.yourhub.com/Parker/Stories/Books/Books-review/Story~395524.aspx

This guy is holding a contest to corrrectly predict when comments to his post hit 10,000. (See today's story at top!

It reads more like someone relishing the end of an era. I think he was/is just trying to start some controversy. There is some truth there but I think he is taking everything to extremes.

Relishing is a good word; he's put a lot on his plate. I found his column on a search, and it sounds like 10,00 comments, for him, is significant. Kindle is definitely being talked about and linked to the larger "print books dying" debate.

His biggest and most pointless argument for not collecting books is the financial "worthlessness" of the collection. He's assuming that, monetary value increase is the sole reason for collecting physical books.

I'd like to live in a world where "monetary value" was an oxymoron! How far back would I have to go?

I remember hearing this almost twenty years ago when I was in 1st grade. That laptops would replace books, and yet here we are. I'll believe when I see it. The problem as always is that money drives everything, and nothing is free especially to schools or the poor. Books will carry on for that very reason. replacement cost is too costly, and kids break stuff.

Hey, TV didn't replace movies in theaters, as predicted. I see this as augmenting, not replacing. Where it SHOULD out and out replace is textbooks, for all of the obvious reasons.

No, TV did not replace movie theaters but I'll bet DVD and/or downloading movies will eventually impact the physical theater.

TV's did not replace movie theaters. This is considerably true, but before 1960 almost every large and mediium city had a walking distance movie theater in most every neighborhood. I remember meeting someone in the 1960's in Philadelphia who was taking toll of abandoned neighborhood theaters in that city. By 1969 there were only some 4 or 5 left out of over 50 that existed in the early 1950's. We're talking about theaters which showed first run or near first run regular movies at regular prices, not XXX, not bargain houses, not art theaters. This is easily traceable in U.S. Censuses taken every 5 years of Retail Trade and service industries, but living where I do now, I don't have easy access to this data.

Not to mention drive-ins. Do you think their disappearance is more a social or cultural issue?

Reminds me of a must read sitting on my shelf: Bowling Alone. His thinking is that all kinds of community behavior is going bye-bye. No bowling leagues; no big Elks or Odd Fellows groups. I haven't read it, but think I should.

I would have said that the disappearance of drive-ins was an economic issue, but that reflects my cultural bias, as my college degree is in economics. I try to stay away from economic determinism, but I'm not always successful. In the north drive-ins wre fun to go to, but only in the warmer half of the year: who really wants to sit in your car with all of your family when its 14 degrees outside. In the south, going to an air-conditioned theater in the summer seems more fun than sitting in a car when it's 97 degrees outside, and maybe more inside the car. Also after the 1950's, family sizes began to decline as the birth rate declined, so far fewer families had large number of kids to entertain cheaply.

#11

People also don't ride buses together or car-pool together to go to work. Men no longer do barber shops as a community center. Fewer people go to church, also more a slip on the male side.

If you back to a time before supermarkets, people used to go into a store with shelves piled up to the ceiling and needed to discourse with the shopkeeeper to get canned goods off a high shelf, or things that were purposely kept behind the counter. This gave a sense of community, but made the prices of food much higher than nowadays. I remember when we moved to the New Bedford area in 1960 (I was 15), and we came across one of the last type of this kind of store located at Lunds Corner, and the store was marked "The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company". This store was so out of date that they had never upgraded their sign to "A&P".

I could reminisce all day, but LT is a good example of a new form of community center.

I agree with fluke. The big stat from Bowling alone is that more people are bowling, but less people are in leagues. Which is a shame, another example is the increase in college graduates/students, and yet a decline in organization participation.

My parents are shocked that students don't speak out more often, but when you're alone, who's gonna back you?

Of course, reading is about the most solitary cultural pursuit. It seems like the current popularity of book clubs has stemmed from a desire to make it more a shared one. I read an interesting take on the Kindle, that we wouldn't be able to satisfy our curiosity as to what we observed someone else reading.

vpfluke - I am right there with you on remembering a time when things felt more like a community. I live in a small (500 households) community developed for "nice" mobile homes. Each lot is owned by the homeowner and most are double or triple wide mobiles so they look very house like. There is a good sized community center building with a playfield, tennis court, swimming pool, and a large lot for storage of RVs. I think we have a fair number of snow birds living here in the summer time.

All this to say when the park was started in the 1970s they could get 200+ people for a potluck supper, now we are lucky if we can get 25-30. Our community center has three pool tables and even those seldom bring people in.

I wish I knew the answer. I know there are single older people sitting at home watching TV. I can't help but think they could be healthier if they were more involved in community.

OK, I don't know how this relates to the kindle. Just needed to dump, thanks for reading.