The Importance of Print Media in the Digital Age

Sometimes when people visit my bookstore they walk in with an amazed look on their faces and ask, “What is this place?” Sadly, this illustrates that they have never visited a bookstore in their lives, or that it has been a really long time. When this happens it gives people the impression that reading print media is a thing of the past, but the fact that my bookstore is in its ninth year of operation, and that many independent bookstores have opened in recent years, tells another story. Print media is alive and well and more books are published every year than ever before. There are some things that print media does that digital just cannot emulate, and this won’t change anytime soon.

The Smell of Books

Many people who first enter the store hold their heads up and take in a deep breath, inevitably followed by saying, “I love the smell of books!” That’s book people talk. The wonderful smell of old books comes from the acids in the ink and paper slowly eating away at the paper. It is a comforting smell and it brings back fond memories of characters and situations in the books that the reader has loved and continues to love. Old friends. This sensation cannot be reproduced through a tablet, or reading on screen. Reading is a physical, sensory activity, and the smell of books, the feel of the pages, and the weight of the book in your hand are all part of the experience.

Books Cannot be Altered

In this “post-truth” era of disinformation it can be difficult to decipher which information is reliable and which is not. Digital media can be altered at any time, or simply disappear from the web. Add the new flood of AI/LLM generative media and we cannot even be sure that a human being is behind the information. This is simply not the case with print books. Once the ink has hit the page it is there to stay and can be revisited at anytime without the concern that the information has been altered. In this way it locks the information in place and is permanently available to anyone who has access to the book.

Passed Along to Friends

One of the many joys of reading is that we can pass along a book we have loved to a friend after reading it. And we all know that loaned books are actually gifts. “You’ve got to read this!” is a phrase that you are sure to hear from any avid reader. This experience of sharing the books we love just isn’t the same with digital media. We can share links, or even pass on a PDF or epub, but they are likely to get lost in the clutter of digital detritus that plagues all of our devices. Whereas a book will occupy our nightstands and bookshelves, to be picked up when the time is right, and can never be lost in device crashes, changing of devices, and never relies on access to power. The physical artifact is here to stay, and no matter how long your TBR it will be there when you are ready for it.

Retention

While digital books and audiobooks can all be wonderful forms of reading, and reading is wonderful no matter how you do it, we do not retain the information in the same way. Countless customers have relayed this experience while visiting the bookstore. How many times have you searched for a quote that you wanted to share with a friend and thought to yourself, “It was on the bottom left hand side of the page, somewhere around three quarters of the way through the book.” We retain a spatial memory of books, a physical memory of the location of information. Unfortunately this isn’t as easy to do with a digital file and effects the way we recall what we have read.

Community Spaces

Bookstores have always been a place to meet up with friends, for community events, and a place to freely discuss our passions, fears, politics, and dissent. They are places that value and encourage free speech and exchange of ideas. Revolutions have even begun inside of bookshops. Bookstores hold author events, signings, and generally bring people together in positive ways. This is something that big online retailers cannot and will not do. Online retailers are there for profit only, whereas bookstores are there for the love of reading and print, and want to bring communities together around our shared passions. Having your tablet autographed just isn’t the same as your favorite book retaining the memory of when you had the chance to meet the author, and have them sign your book.

Posterity and the Future of Information

How many of your devices have died on you before you remembered to back up your hard drive? Now fast forward a thousand years and try to make sense of how to access the information on your device. Digital media requires power, operating systems, and an understanding of how the device works. Print media has none of these concerns and as long as the language can be deciphered the book can still be read, its information unchanged through the ages. Now consider a bilingual edition of a book and you have discovered a Rosetta stone. How much information will be lost to time as planned obsolescence, and age itself, remove people from the time we live in? Because books physically exist they are here to stay. Libraries may burn, information will be lost, but if we are to preserve our present - having a physical representation of what we knew, how we felt, and our history, and who we are, is essential.

Author’s Biography

Jean-Paul L. Garnier is the owner of Space Cowboy Books, producer of Simultaneous Times Podcast (2023 Laureate Award Winner, BSFA Finalist), and editor of the SFPA's Star*Line Magazine. He is also the deputy editor-in-chief of Worlds of IF magazine & the soon to be relaunched Galaxy magazine. He has written many books of poetry and science fiction. https://spacecowboybooks.com/