: 16 —- “on Skore News — Wednesday, December 13, 2000

vingroom

Pixels in search of an interface

From previous page

a real book does. You cannot

spatially interact with it. You
cannot see how much of it you
“have already read_by “eye-
«> balling” the distance between
your bookinark and the begin-
ning or end. You can’t review
a page bv remembering its spa-

tial distance from where you
are. You can view only one .
page at a time. It’s 2 flat, nwo-
dimensional activity. This is
revoludonary, Uh-huh.

While you can enjoy the
convenience of empty book-
shelves, neither will you have a
physical memento of the items
you’ve read, unless you go out

EAB RIL AD AEP IY FA 2 eR

and buy a real copy, thereby
defeating the purpose.
Electronic books under-
mine permanency, which can
be a good thing, if we're talk-
ing about annually issued
manuats and giant technical
tomes. But what of keepable
books? The electronic marke-
teers must think that beeks are

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by December 23, 2000

not important enough to be
tangible, to be coveted. To the
techno-weenies, books are just
a bunch of pixels in search of
an interface.

Why are the e-pushers con-
vinced that in a world where
many people now spend most
working hours in front of a
screen they would come home
and choose to read a virtual
book on a screen? We are
physical creatures in physical
badies interacting with a phys-
ical world, It’s nat tikely our
future will ever include a
choice to go entirely virtual or
there’s no point being human.

The e-pushers, not satisfied

with reducing our physical

All BERNINA =]

world to pixilated virtuality,
like to tout the “interactivity”
factor. They think we want to
hear our books ialk and play

‘sound effects and “period

music” while we’re reading.
They want us to “interact”
with the product, as if reading
itself is not an interaction, an

act of translating text into our
imagination.

‘Techno-weenies love inter-
activity that changes the prod-"
uct, too, Why? Because it
undermines authority. For
what is a book, whether fiction
ox nonfiction, but an authority
on some private world or idea
that declares its own truth? :

An author asks you to sur-

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render to his or her authority,
Techno-weenies think we don’t

" tike this. They want interactive

news, courses, TV, and now
books. They think it's neat if
you can meddle in the product
and change characters or end-
ings or comment on ideas.

But they’re wrong. We go
to books expressly for their
authority and as a refuge. By
reading we take refuge in
someone else’s vision or ideas... ©

And, yes, some people sill .
choose to “interact” with tan-~
gibie objects in the physical : :
world, :

Remember, techiio-wee-.

_ nies, virtual means NOT:

E of a kiss raises.