I bought a box of cheerios, came with a book inside. I think the situation is ironic. We are "introducing" paper books for kids ?????
I bought this paper book for $2.00 only. (The Timetables of History) Third edition for the history of 4500 BC to the 1990's. "A Horizontal Linkage of People and Events" 724 pages. "By Bernard Grum, based upon Werner Stein's Kulturfahrplan." In the library of my town they selling many paper books for really cheap. Hmm? But this book is really helps me to understand time, and what happened in the world in time. But it look like in the the developed countries, paper books is not important for the future.
Paper books will be around a long time at public libraries. What will not be around long, is the convenience of having a brick and mortar bookstore on every corner for people to treat as a public library while making their actual purchases from Amazon.
In general, companies don't lower prices to benefit consumers. They lower them to attack competition. Once the competition is vanquished, they raise prices. This is a feature of capitalism that is initially beneficial to consumers. Ultimately consumers suffer from higher prices as competitors are driven out of the market. Capitalists detest free markets and competition. The proper role of government is to protect free markets from capitalists.
Don't bet on it. "Like many observers, McLemee is enraged by the NYPLâs proposal to remove 3 million books from seven levels of century-old stacks beneath the magisterial Rose Reading Room, and he demanded to know why âa collection of three million volumes gathered over more than a century is being treated as a distraction, rather than as the institutionâs entire claim to cultural significance.â http://www.thenation.com/article/167454/battle-over-new-york-public-library-continued --------------------- Public libraries need to make room for computers so the less fortunate can access internet porn.
Unless man evolves to be quite different emotionally than he is today, it will never be true that one, in general, can get a better education online. Online education, in its current state, should be seen as better than no education for those who can not afford a first rate education.
I like the convenience of browsing in a real life bookstore, but not enough to pay their overhead. Recently I found a textbook I liked at the bookstore. It was 55 bucks. I got out my smart phone and ordered it off amazon for .01 plus shipping right there in the bookstore. Amazon reviews are a more efficient way for me to find a quality book on a given subject than browsing in real life. I don't believe in protecting a business just because it has a tradition and some people really like it. If it is good enough to keep around people will pay the premium. If not, it will go away. I like the fact that I can order certain nutritional supplements in bulk powder for 1-10% of the cost that I would pay if I bought them in pill form and sold as a supplement. (IE 10 years worth of piracetam for 50 bucks or 50 grams of caffeine for $10 to make my own energy drinks) I would be pretty pissed if the supplement or pharmaceutical companies lobbied to end that. Let the free markets do their thing. Edit: IMO I don't think real books are going away. I and I am sure many people would rather read a real book than an electronic one. I have enough electronic stuff going on in my life I want to keep my books on paper. What I do think will end is the bookstore. Unless those expensive coffee bars are enough to keep the bookstore going. And the one I go to it might. There is a line 10 people deep everytime i go there for $4.00 coffee drinks. Maybe that is the future: sell books at a loss and make a killing on those overpriced drinks.