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youtube.com - Musician and Best Buy employee, Keith Parsons, rocks his Best Buy holiday campaign audition.
27 Comments
- ihavebeenseen, on 05/22/2009, -1/+26Did the smaller version of the thumbnail look really dirty to anyone else?
- nickaster, on 05/21/2009, -1/+9Why are they charging at all? Are libraries not supposed to be free?
- SketchaMPM, on 05/22/2009, -0/+5Thank you, I was just about to say something about that. I really thought it was a woman bending over for a second there.
- Zombi, on 05/22/2009, -0/+3I don't think it's a bad thing that libraries want to play it safe. It only sounds like they want to keep Google in line and away from excessive prices.
- PyrosMagus, on 05/22/2009, -0/+2Yep, looked like my wife last night...
Cleaning the kitchen floor - Necoras, on 05/22/2009, -2/+4The original purpose of libraries was to provide access to books (and eventually other media) for people who could not afford it. With today's technology printing books is cheap and they no longer cost a substantial portion of one's income. Once put into a digital format, there are no longer distribution costs, and they are essentially free to deliver. However, the problem still remains that content providers must be paid.
Initially libraries provided access to communities that otherwise wouldn't read books. Those who liked the books would presumably buy other books written by those authors. However, every person that read a book at the library was another sale that the author did not receive. It was a necessary evil when a few hundred people might read a book at the library instead of buying the book. It got authors into circulation, and allowed people access to works they otherwise wouldn't have.
Today the story is very different. An author may write a book and then once its scanned ten thousand people may read it, paying nothing to the author, editor, publisher, etc. With the advent of the kindle and smart phones this is likely to become more common. For Google to offer books online without charging something to pay authors in return is stealing and bad for the literary community as a whole. Thus, a pricing scheme will be necessary to ensure that the authors are paid for their works. It will serve the same function libraries did initially, but hopefully with a bit more going to the authors. Google will be able to charge a quarter or a dollar or whatever for every 'rental' or 'purchase' however you see it in a digital world, and pass along the majority of that money to the author, after taking a bit of profit for themselves. Users will have access to books they wouldn't have had otherwise, authors get some circulation, everybody's happy.
Of course you'll still have pirates who will steal digital books, but they weren't going to pay anyways. - Elranzer, on 05/22/2009, -0/+2Digital distribution is fine and dandy for bringing down distribution costs, but no on wants to stare at their computer monitor (CRT and LCD alike) for hours of reading. Printed media is infinitely more comfortable and is why digital distribution will not kill it (along with the whole "digital divide" phenomenon, the fact that not everyone has a computer and Internet access).
- cheeze_ballz, on 05/22/2009, -0/+2yeah, i saw it. had to click on the story just to see what the heck it was!
- m3xican, on 05/22/2009, -0/+2I've a friend working in a pub
- inactive, on 05/22/2009, -2/+3Oh, so Google just steals your content and then offers you a say in how it's sold -- and you're supposed to be grateful.
- Myztry, on 05/22/2009, -0/+1The thing that is chosen to be overlook with the Internet is scale.
Libraries give tens of thousands of people exposure at substantial cost, while the Internet gives millions of people exposure at negligible cost.
As Elranzer points out, people do not what to read books off screens. I know many commercial entities desperately want it to be so for the purpose of costless effortless money making. But it is not so.
Books are going to be safe for a long time. Kindle like devices are not going to take over until they are as convenient, cheap and flexible as books. People do not read 374 books at a time. They do not need to carry more than one. Plain and simple.
Electronic 'books' are a niche market suited more to daily publications which is not even the realm of books. As for daily publication, why do you think they have been so much larger than books. They are best visually scanned which e-books fail to replicate.
Sorry Mr. $Ebook$ - your next big thing - it's not happening... - taward, on 05/22/2009, -0/+1Absolutely! I'm glad someone else said it. I was going o call a therapist...
- pw378, on 05/22/2009, -0/+1spam link.
- jmc1029, on 05/22/2009, -0/+1me too.... guess that shows where our minds were..... oh well, at least the false hope of nudidity might draw in a few more of "the great unwashed masses" who normally avoid titles that might lead to something intelligent.
Now comes the fun part.... trying to prove we are not one of the aforementioned.....heh..... what....I totally came for the title. - Myztry, on 05/23/2009, -0/+1@thangcuoi - Do you see people from Star Trek around you? I hope not, any more than you see anything else from science fiction or other types of fantasy movies.
- MWags, on 05/22/2009, -0/+1Knowledge and ideas should be free to bring together networks to inspire innovation of better products. As Google has proven, authors of ideas and knowledge can be supported by advertisers wanting connections to these networks who purchase their commodities.
- pw378, on 05/22/2009, -0/+1They aren't charging for access to the libraries or the books on the shelf in the library, they are charging a convenience fee for electronic versions...
Just like ATMs charge a fee for getting access to your own money, if you don't want to pay the fee, then walk to the bank, wait in line, and fill out a withdrawal slip and then walk back home. - enthreeoh, on 05/22/2009, -3/+3you think developing the tech to scan all those books was free?
- alienzx, on 06/09/2009, -0/+0http://digg.com/tech_news/The_Future_of_Google_Boo ...
- gregzav, on 05/22/2009, -2/+2I have a few friends who are actually scanning EVERY single book in the libraries, they get paid at least $10 an hour plus some sort of bonus if everything turns out perfect.
- thangcuoi, on 05/23/2009, -1/+1Thanks for the explanation. The article did not make it clear why Google is charging.
I have to disagree with the theory that ebook have no future. That is a very short sighted view. Look at how fast technology has improved in the last 10-20 years. Do you see people on Star Trek carry books around with them? The day will come when physical books will only be sold in limited quantity in physical form to collectors. That day could be 10-20 years from now. - ivanalbright, on 05/22/2009, -0/+0hmm...the only questionable thing here is that google is publishing online "orphan books" -- books whose right's owners cannot be found.
they aren't just buying up every book out there, scanning it, then putting it online. you and/or your publisher would have to agree to that first. - gregzav, on 05/28/2009, -0/+0for google
- Darthyoshiboy, on 05/22/2009, -2/+1Libraries are paid for by your tax dollars and late fees. They still have to buy the content that you get for "free" or have it donated. Google is making the content available to the libraries (which is likely not very cheap for Google), and the libraries can either pay for said content or contribute enough content to the project to get it at discounted rates (or free), it looks like a win all around to me. Google gets paid for their work, libraries get an opportunity to share their rarer books, they get access to untold amounts of previously unavailable content, and society at large gets a large amount of human knowledge digitized for preservation and exploitation.
- bow39, on 05/22/2009, -3/+1Yes can i have 2 big macs 2 large frys and a large coke plse
- baseman16, on 05/22/2009, -3/+1on the front page, that image looks like someone bending over with no pants on
- GodzillaFrag, on 05/22/2009, -2/+0I don't understand. I am dumb.
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