Seeing the light?

I don’t know if it’s just because I’m looking out for stories like this, but man, it’s all about the indies these days. In the mainstream media, I mean. Cos they’ve always been out there, but having The Age write about these subcultures and alternatives means they are becoming REAL alternatives. (Gah, patronising. I just mean, if the mainstream media is paying attention, the underground might be about to see some light. Or maybe it’s the other way round. Heh.)

As usual, I have no time to go into this in more depth, but here’s the articles anyway:

http://www.theage.com.au/news/web/youtube-chases-the-indies/2008/06/20/1213770885370.html

http://www.theage.com.au/news/biztech/tv-print-urged-to-embrace-digital/2008/06/20/1213770882115.html

http://www.theage.com.au/news/music/labelled-with-love/2008/06/19/1213770781342.html

One of these days I’m going to have time to get my news from somewhere other than The Age, too.

A dinosaur that might survive?

My lunchtime trawling of The Age online has come up trumps again. This article was in yesterday’s Technology section. It’s a somewhat histrionic report on the US government’s proposed ‘Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement’, that was exposed on Wikileaks a few days ago.

While the Agreement certainly goes far beyond what a sane person would consider reasonable boundaries, and I am no fan of mega-corps milking the creative juices out of artists who feel they have no choice but to work within the current distribution frameworks, I’m still left feeling that somehow the book industry is different. We barely turn a profit, for a start. (Trust me, my wages come out of that profit, and there are PLENTY of people running juices bars bringing home much larger paychecks than mine.) Also, the technology required to make a really beautiful book just isn’t available to individuals. (Except perhaps the Hungry Girls. They’ve done a pretty good job.) And while there is plenty of really great writing out there, especially in the burgeoning blogosphere, it seems unlikely that the online fiction industry will take off in the same way as, say, iTunes.

Part of this is purely commercial. It’s easy for a songwriter to stick a tune or two on their MySpace page for free and include a link somewhere to either buy the rest of the album, or find out where you can see them play, paying them an entrance fee. Sure, they may never hit the big time, but chances are, they’ll do ok. A writer, on the other hand, can hardly post a 3-minute chapter of their novel online and hope it grabs you enough to fork out for the whole 50 000 words. It’s just not the same. A book is a whole, and while purists may argue the same about the lost art of the complete album, there has always been a place in the music industry for stand-alone hits. It’s just not that easy to hypertext a story. (It can be done, but this is a very specific genre.)

I’ve been turning over this question of what the future holds for the publishing industry all semester, and although I’ve always felt that it was just somehow ‘different’ to those other art forms rapidly adapting to the digital era, I never could put my finger on why. But I think, despite all the clammering noise about the ‘way of the future’, the book is somehow both a thing of the past, and something that will never get old. The business models and the bookstores have evolved enormously, and some of the advances being made in the production process are pretty incredible. But the thing at the heart of the industry, the fibre of publishing – the STORY – has barely changed at all. And so long as we yearn to read our stories, long and linear, I think we’ll be just fine.

Ah, the sentimental peace that comes with finishing a semester’s work. Time to curl up with cup of tea and a book…

To WoW or not to WoW.

It’s been a long time between drinks here and I was beginning to think I’d have to spend my weekend trawling my brain/the internet looking for pertinent things to post about, but reading this article at lunch time today on The Age solved that problem.

I don’t really have strong feelings about WoW either way. I can see the attraction, and I know how easily things like that become obsessions, but I don’t really feel like I’m missing out because I’m not part of that world. The important things about it (i.e. cultural references a la Star Wars) will filter down to me eventually, and if other people want to while away their days (and/or nights) playing this game, I don’t see how it’s any worse than a whole range of other leisure activities.

Toohey makes some interesting points about his particular psyche and the reasons he has avoided WoW. I particularly liked his illicit drug-taking analogy:

But then I think of what the game would cost me. I think of how easily it could suck my life away. Hence my suspicion that my choice will turn out to be the proper choice, much like my ignorance about what it feels like to snort cocaine.

But the best thing about this article, at least for me, was the introduction of the Toyota WoW ad! It’s a slightly dodgy version, recorded by a handicam off someone’s TV, but you get the gist:

If conventions, machinima and South Park weren’t enough to herald the dawn of mainstream geek culture, then the cash Toyota put up to screen this during the Super Bowl sure is.

Welcome, geeks. It’s nice to have you back.

Is the sky really falling?

I’ve been thinking some more about the whole ‘end of the world as we know it’ scenario, and what that might mean for me, specifically.

I think it’s pretty clear that the music industry is in for a really big shake-up. Or at the very least a long, slow decline. Given that with a little bit of talent, one person can make an entire album using standard software like GarageBand, and distribute it through any number of alternative means (see Sandra’s post), the old model doesn’t look like at all like one that’s going to last.

There’s signs that TV might not be all that far behind. Digital cameras are cheap as, and YouTube, while perhaps not the ideal forum, is at least a way to make your work publicly available. The part where you have to pay people (i.e. actors who aren’t your friends) for they work they do still means that the standard model has some life in it, but as Tessa was saying the other day, it might not be for long.

I’m more interested in the publishing industry. eBooks and readers have been around for eaons, and periodically there’s huge panic about the sky falling and real printed books disappearing from view FOREVER. But it doesn’t ever seem to actually happen. While there are definite seismic shifts going on in the world of academic journals (See apophenia’s blog for an idea of how explosive this issue can be), trade books (i.e. the standard range in your local Borders, A&R, whatever) seem to be roaring along. Book sales increase exponentially each year. A lot of what gets bought is pretty ordinary, sure, but at least it’s being published. (There’s a whole world of argument about the declining state of literary fiction, poetry, etc, etc, and I guess eventually these sorts of books might end up relegated to the world of print-on-demand, but that’s another post.)

I should probably try and get some figures for sales of Kindles and the like (which you can read more about here) but as far as I can tell, I still have a job making real books. Electronic versions of a lot of those real books go into Google Book Search, NetLibrary, and various other ebook retailers, but the paltry income they generate is barely worth the effort. (Luckily, once they’ve made it to publication, it’s hardly any effort at all.)

So really, what’s going on? Is it just because I know more about this particular process that I think there’s more to it? Will it be possible in the future to skip the parts that include editors, proofreaders, typesetters, text designers, etc, and be a maverick self-publisher with (gasp!) good quality work that doesn’t reek of loony fringe? (There is one book that I know of that’s pretty much succeeded in all this. It’s pretty small, and it’s a cookbook, but the Hungry Girls have done a great job.) Or is simply too hard to get good quality stuff out there without the help of all those other people?

The crazy weather that’s going on outside (a cyclone in the city? seriously? maybe the sky really is falling!) is wreaking havoc with the power here, so I might just post this now and add more later, but it’s a start…

Look what they’ve done to my song, Ma!

Ok, so it’s not exactly high-brow, but while we’re on the topic of corporate involvement in entertainment, check out the awful results of Dr Pepper’s attempt to get hip with the kids.

This is the original ‘Chocolate Rain’ song, a minor YouTube hit by the unsigned (and very deep-voiced) Tay Zonday. (You don’t need to listen for more than a minute or two, because it kind of goes around in circles. Catchy, no?)

And here is the abominable Dr Pepper-funded version.

So not hip.