Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Change or die!

Publisher's Weekly reports on one more conference in which publishes wring there hands and wonder what will become of the industry. As e-books sweep more and more of the market, what will traditional editors and print professionals fit in? Not to mention bookstores, which seem the most endangered species of all. There is no agreement on what will come next, how many printed copies of books will be produced or preserved, but everyone is worried. Are librarians worried enough? Perhaps not--especially children's librarians who go happily along planning story hours and choosing picture books. I think it's time to acknowledge that even doting grandparents will eventually surrender to the Kindle and iPad (many are among the early adopters of these handy technological aides to comfortable reading for aging eyes) and future grandkids may be raised on picture books on screens. Librarians had better not be the last people on earth to cling to printed books as the only worthy format. Yes, there are many advantages offered by print on paper, especially for long-lasting books that will survive through many technological shifts. But let's face it--most children's books are as ephemeral as adult bestsellers. Perhaps they are best downloaded electronically, given to as many children as want to read them, and then vanish into thin air (well, maybe one archival copy per library system). When you look at schedules for library conferences for children's librarians, you often seen the same old program titles that have been offered year after year. But the world is changing. Isn't it time that we push our professional organizations into the kind of future probing that the publishing industry is doing? It's time to stop listening to self-congratulatory speeches by yesterday's authors and start paying attention to tomorrow's children.

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