Scott's Brain Meat: December 2009

Monday, December 28, 2009

Avatar Review: Is "Not Bad" Good Enough?

Just posted a new film review over at the MovieSucktastic blog. Why don't you go on over and take a look. You know you want to.

Avatar Review: Is "Not Bad" Good Enough?

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Sunday, December 13, 2009

Publishers Scramble to Horde e-Book Profits

Sony <span class= Librie eBook Reader" style="border:none;display:block" width="180" height="240">Image by Josh Bancroft via Flickr

The old-school publishing companies have been waging an ongoing battle on multiple fronts these days, all of them with different aspects of the same mortal enemy: the dreaded e-Book.

And they thought self-publishing was becoming a pain in the ass.

There has been a lot of news regarding powerful brick-and-mortar publishers and their constant struggle to catch up with and wrestle into submission the ever-increasing market for electronically formatted books. What didn't seem like a serious threat to them in the past has suddenly become a serious threat to the status quo (much like self-publishing), and the race is now on to head this new threat to the kingdom off at the pass.

Much of the news regarding these recent attempts has covered what appear to be different aspects of the battling formats. You have major publishers like Simon & Schuster announcing a set time delay between hardcover releases and their e-Book versions. Then there are the publishing companies that are desperately attempting to convince authors (and the families of deceased authors) that older publishing rights contracts imply their ownership of electronic versions of books even though they were written before e-Books existed. Beyond these major issues, smaller individual battles rage on with specific agents and authors. And let us not forget the constant wrangling with Amazon's Kindle and Barnes & Nobles' Nook over content and accessibility.

As disparate as these fights might seem, however, they all boil down to one solitary bottom line; the bottom line. You know, money.

It has been a harsh time for publishers. Revenues have dropped drastically for all forms of publishing, from magazines and newspapers to textbooks and literature. The global economic recession has seriously reduced disposable incomes, making printed materials more of a luxury item these days. The rising costs of published materials hasn't made this any easier. When a thirty-two page comic book costs as much as most of us remember paying for a two-hundred page paperback novel, casual reading just doesn't seem so casual anymore.

Then there's the new technology. We're in the Information Age, after all, when information of all kinds is readily obtainable in multiple electronic formats, only a mouse-click away. Reading for research or recreation can be done from wherever you are sitting right now. We've reached a moment in time where people can browse vast collections of documents and written works on

their phone while on a bus. Even going through a tunnel. Now that's impressive.

But this isn't about free information, no matter what some publishers might say. Some might take up the music industry's torch by claiming that sharing of materials online hurts the industry, but that argument never holds water when they still manage to bring in billions of dollars in revenue. Besides, you don't hear any complaints about used bookstores stealing food from the mouths of publishing industry families. And libraries have been giving it away for free for years.

So what's the argument then? For the most part, it comes down to the publishing industry's unwillingness to change their pay model to represent the new technology. We saw the same thing with the massive writer's and actor's strikes a few years back. Now it is time for book publishers to step up and take the heat.

When publishing and selling a book, most of the major costs involve the physical creation and transportation of the actual book. You have to print vast quantities (that's a lot of ink and paper and glue), store them (prime real estate), and ship them (books are heavy). What is left, administrative costs and creative artist compensation, is purely negotiable.

The problem is that when it comes to the new e-Books, even though elimination of the physical costs have left the purely negotiable part of the equation as the bulk of the cost, publishers still aren't negotiating. Many out-of-print books are now being made available in e-Book form, but at prices close or equal to original print-book cover prices. New releases might be offered at more respectable $9.99 price ranges, but after that the costs can almost double for older and not-in-demand (see: non-celebrity authors) titles. Any used bookstore owner will tell you that this pricing model is ass-backwards.

This adherence to the old rules also has authors and agents bothered as well. Author's royalties are remaining at roughly the same percentage for e-Books, despite the considerable lack of publishing overhead. For the e-Books selling at the old prices, this equals a massive increase in profits for the publisher, and the author left with same amount of scraps. Now take that new release selling for $9.99 instead of the $27 (!!!) hardcover price. The author's percentage is down to nearly a third of what it would have been, while the publisher's reduced overhead still has their profit margin comfortably close to what it was before.

As publishers desperately try to rewrite old contracts and keep new releases off of Kindle and Nook eReaders, it can be easy to assume that these are the actions of an industry struggling to survive in a new age. But this one book you definitely can't judge by its cover, as the truth is far simpler. They are greedy. Like the music industry and film industry before them, they are trying to reap the benefits and rewards of a new age of digital entertainment without giving the artists involved with these creative properties their fair share.

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Saturday, December 12, 2009

Santa Clause Does Not Equal Economic Recovery

Wow! So inventories and sales didn't drop as much as we expected! And China is exporting more toxic lead-painted toys then anticipated to our crowded bargain-basement department stores! On top of that, people are apparently buying more flat screen televisions and iPods during the biggest consumer shopping season of the year, ignoring crushing debts and skyrocketing food and utility costs in a desperate attempt to enjoy the holiday season. The economy MUST be doing better!

What is wrong with us? There is something seriously wrong with us; as a country, as a people, as a whole.

Home foreclosures continue to climb, reaching record-breaking numbers one year after another. Many (if not most of these) are do due bankrupting medical bills piling up and destroying families and homes, most of which ironically are medically insured. There are millions of people without medical insurance to deny their coverage for them. The number of children going hungry in what used to be the greatest industrial nation on Earth is growing at an alarming rate. And throughout all of this, our government continues to spin its wheels blindly, either unwilling or unable to pass any meaningful legislation to solve, curb, or even address these problem.

But forget all of that. Target's "$5 Appliance Sale" was a smashing success! Things must be getting better! Snuggies for everyone!

There is something seriously, horrendously, tragically wrong with us.

Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Friday, December 4, 2009

Don't Panic

On the road yesterday, I was listening to the soundtrack from the film adaptation of Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and it got me to thinking.

Awhile ago, while wasting the precious minutes of my life on Twitter or Facebook or some such thing, I was asked which fictional character I most identified myself with. Not taking nearly as much time to think about it than I would like to admit, I replied that I most identified with Arthur Dent from the Hitchhiker's series. It was an honest answer, and I quickly forgot about it and moved on to the next time-wasting social networking endeavor.

My answer to that question popped back into my head while listening to the film's soundtrack. It started to raise more questions in my mind? Why did I identify with Arthur Dent on a personal level? What was it about this decidedly unremarkable character thrust into amazingly remarkable situations that made me relate to him? For that matter, why was Douglas' Addams' Hitchhiker's series so popular in the first place? What was the appeal, to them and to me? It had to be more than just the humor, didn't it?

I gave it some thought.

Obviously, I can't speak for the millions of other Douglas Adams fans. But I think that what is most enduring and captivating about Arthur Dent's plight is that he bespeaks a universal truth; that most of us feel trapped in a world devoid of any real sense or logic. As much as we might try to build our little realities around us where everything makes sense and has a reason, the randomness and irrationalities of the rest of the world always manages to come crashing into our breakfast nook when we least expect it. Whether you find yourself watching the news, navigating a tax return form, or trying to get a permit to build a fence on your own property, it can be easy to find yourself overwhelmed by exactly how oblivious and illogical the real world can really be.

The Hitchhiker series embraces this troubled world view and elevates it to the next level. Most science fiction stories tend paint a tantalizing picture of a cosmos filled with technological marvels, sprawling utopias, and an almost endless number of mind-bogglingly intelligent races more than willing to tell the human race how stupid it is as a whole. A wondrous galaxy filled with answers, solutions, and simplified existences.

But is it only wishful thinking to assume that other the species potentially living among the endless stars might have a better grasp of common sense than we do? What makes us think that a technologically advanced species light-years ahead of us both mentally and emotionally wouldn't also manage to complicate their lives as thoroughly as we seem to? Would thousands of additional centuries of evolution actually erase the existence of bureaucratic red tape?

Douglas Adams was fond of claiming that he got the idea for the show while backpacking through Europe. One night while staring up at the stars, he would say that he idly wondered what it would be like to Hitchhike not just across a continent, but across the cosmos. While this story would change from time to time, it occurs to me that his original thought while gazing at the night time stars must have actually been "What if the rest of the universe is as screwed up as we are."

Its a good question, the horrifying answer to which became Arthur Dent's reluctant and seemingly never ending quest. Sometimes, it can be easy to feel as if you are trapped in that same bizarre reality, with no true escape of hope of sanity in sight.

So I guess that's why I identify with Arthur Dent. Because feeling like you are the only sane person in the galaxy is rarely a satisfying experience.