Book review #1: Cult of the Amateur
The Cult of the Amateur: How Today’s Internet Is Killing Our Culture
So, I started listening to this book and really grew to hate it but that only fueled my desire to write a detailed review. I’ll try to get back to this at some point and really take it to task. For now let me say that I really didn’t like it. I liked the later parts of the book where the author actually started to deal with what should be done and thought some of his action items made sense even without the real thesis of his book having merit.
A few of the things I disliked about his views were:
* Equating piracy and video streamling services like Netflix with having the same evil impact on existing business models
* Expecting me to care about existing business models (why do I care that movie theaters had to decrease their prices in response to increased home consumption?)
* Listening to the author sound so exasperated that DVD sales declined for the first time this year and that people, when given the choice, would rather purchase the songs they like for 99 cents each instead of an entire albumn for $14.
* Hearing how Tivo (and if I had my way, ReplayTV) have ruined TV networks
Does he not understand that I would rather never go to a store if I didn’t have to? I don’t want to support old businesses because they’re already in business. It is too familiar to the Atlas Shrugged section where people are told that no new books should be written to give older, unpopular books a chance and then the people are told they will be required to purchase the same number of books they bought the year before.
I don’t care that online classified sites are beating out physical newspapers. I really don’t. If I can place an ad in real-time and people can start responding immediately tehn how great is that? If I then sell the thing that day I can remove the ad and stop the calls… again with the happiness. And if newspapers need leadtime and have a limited reach and no way to stop the impressions once the item is sold then they just won’t compete.
I just kept thinking of speach by Danny Devito in Other People’s Money:
“And you know the surest way to go broke? Keep getting an increasing share of a shrinking market. Down the tubes. Slow but sure. You know, at one time there must’ve been dozens of companies making buggy whips. And I’ll bet the last company around was the one that made the best goddamn buggy whip you ever saw. Now how would you have liked to have been a stockholder in that company?”
As I listened to this book being read I just kept thinking to myself, “I wonder how much this guy would have hated the printing press and berated Gutenberg.” No, I don’t think the author is completely anti-technology but I have to assume people decried the masses having the ability to spread the written word or to copy other people’s works back then too. I’m sure the monks thought it was horrible that anyone could copy the Bible without the pain of scribing every word… but I bet they loved it too. I wonder what they’d think of being able to Google passages from the Bible from my cell phone. 
I want the same improvements with most areas of my day to day life:
* email - why write letters for day to day correspondence except for fun? Crank it out and send it off and by the time I get to work I may have a response. Maybe I’ll ever get it on the blackberry on the drive in. 
* buying music - I can hear a new song on MTV (should they opt to play music ever) and then login and purchase from iTunes and then listen as I take my shower.
* watching my TV - both with shows on demand and with content form around the world, I want it now if it exists.
* taking my TV- yes, I love my slingbox and having it hooked to a DVR removes the limitations of time and place to keep current.
I do understand this is all change and that some people will benefit and others will lose. I wonder about people back home and how they will face the transition to a digital world. I knwo there will always be a non-digital world to work and produce in but I for one am excited by the improvements technology makes available.
October 1st, 2007 at 9:09 AM
I prefer online shopping, too…easier to price shop, etc. Haven’t been to a movie theater in ages…MUCH more comfy to Netflix at home.