REVOLUTION

THE

WILL BE
Feel Digital
the Books, Magazines,
Newspapers, Pets
Future and Boyfriends
will all be obsolete
Turning the page in the FUTURE...
on paper texts?

God Save the

book
Readers & Books
Duke it Out
Letter From the Editor
Who will mourn the “death” of the book? if it ever occurs...
All graphics, cartoons, and stories by Jillian S. Wood unless
otherwise stated. See below for artstic credits.
Mail: jillswood@gmail.com
Tweet: twitter.com/jillswood
Web: communicaciando.wordpress.com
I hope this publication isn’t too insular. It felt a bit
strange to be writing an online magazine solely based on the
debate surrounding digital vs print texts. There are pros and
cons for both, and while I am an avid “old school” book lover,
I’m also a fan of blogging and web technology.
I must preface the reading of this magazine by stat-
ing that I have never used a Kindle and/or other digital read-
ers (mostly because I don’t have $300-400 lying around), but
I’ve begun to do a lot more online reading since beginning
university. My observations and feelings are based off of this
experience.
It’s difficult to trust online publishing, especially
after growing up with the dominance of physical books. Was
something really written when it says it was? Was it posted
late? Are the sources credible? The convenience and pos-
sibilities for digital readers seem incredible, but still need to
be developed and improved to match the permanence and
sanctity of physical, paper publications.
Although we may be in a “great time of change” I
ask when has the world ever not been in a time of upheav-
al? There’s no need to panic and covet your books or start
subscribing to your favourite magazines online (unless you
actually want them to survive). Explore, learn, and be open,
but remember to be critical of jumping on the expensive
gadget bandwagon.
-Jillian Wood
The Revolution is...Editor-in-Chief
This Month...
The Loss of HaPtics in a
Digital World ...4
Moving from print to digital pbulications will definitely decrease the number of papercuts we receive.
However, is there more lost than we know when we give up page turning in favour of scrollbars?

The Rhetoric of Death in

...6 the age of digitization
Can technologies ever really die? A look at the past, present and future surrounding the rhetoric of
“death” in terms of media and technological change.

mortal combat
The book faces off against the digtial reader for supremacy over the way we absorb texts. If only
one can come out on top, we declare a battle to the death!
...8

Artistic Credits
Manwevarda @ Deviantart - Ninja Weapons Brushes Fonts:
http://Manwe-Varda.deviantart.com/art/Ninja-Weap-
ons-57797066 O-zone -http://www.getfreefonts.info/free_font.ozone.html
Nyan Nyan @ Deviantart - Old Book Brushes Karate - http://www.urbanfonts.com/fonts/Karate.htm
http://nyan-nyan.deviantart.com/art/Book-Brushes-42229815
masterplan --www.dafont.com/masterplan.font
Centric Studios - Print Shop Brushes 1
http://www.centricpropaganda.com/ LCDMono -www.dafont.com/lcd-lcd-mono.font

There’s something inexplicably delightful about crack-
ing the spine of an old book. To handle the yellowed pages, to
smell the old paper and bindings, to hold it in your hands as you
lie down for an extended trip to another world (As long as its not
a Dickens novel, those things can get heavy).
So what happens when you move a text from its glossy
pages to the glowing screen? There’s something to be said
about losing the physical aspect of a text.
Retention, especially in the use of digital texts for edu-
cational purposes, is a huge concern in terms of a possible
move to a paperless society. Anne Mangen argues in Hypertext
Fiction Reading: Haptics and Immersion that deep immersion in
a digital text is nearly impossible, compared to its print counter
part, because of the intangibility of texts on a screen, and how
this affects our multi-sensory reading experience. Digital texts
cannot be literally touched, even with a mouse, unlike print
texts, which are tangible, and therefore have different sensory-
motor affordances than a digital text.
Humans are psychologically hard wired to attempt to
re-stimulate our attention, when it is exhausted, by clicking a
link to change the screen. This scanning and browsing makes
“
the “reading experience one of sensory-motor (and primarily
haptic) interaction with the technological features of digitalized
texts” (such as page turning). This need to touch the mouse and
...Students actually had a difficult time
reading digital texts ... they were not able
to focus on the memories, experiences
and emotions the text evoked as they
read.
The L
in
keyboard demands a kind of multitasking that causes readers
not to be able focus, because of the possibility of what may lay
beyond the “page” one is viewing. This urge explains why a
computer may be a poor reading device compared to a book,
which is static and provides no option of auto-stimulating an
attentional response. This makes digital texts irreconcilable with
the “deep, immersive state” that we experience when reading
something we find riveting, according to Mangen.
Mangen’s sentiments are echoed in a study by Evans
and Po on the anxieties of university students in adopting hyper-
text fiction. It was found that students actually had a difficult
time reading digital texts aesthetically, meaning they were not
able to focus on the memories, experiences and emotions the
text evoked as they read. According to Evans and Po, digital
texts do not have the authorial control or a sense of closure
which makes reading rewarding. Without these guides, Evans
and Po hypothesize that reading becomes a less passive activ-
ity, and students have to piece together their responses in a
meaningful framework without the same cues as a print text.
This collaborative meaning making with digital narra-
tives was unsettling to students, and Evans and Po suggest that
digital texts may require new types of decoding skills. Students
also found that reading from a computer uncomfortable com-
pared to a book, which meant it was difficult to associate the
reading with a leisure activity.
For most of us, whose first book was a paper picture
book, it is difficult to imagine a world where young readers won’t
recall or use such archaic tools. Perhaps our children will be
”
the first to get “Everybody Poops” on a digital reader, and it
won’t feel strange at all.
Loss of haptics
a digital world

I've Got a Feeling...

“ Perhaps our
children will be
the first to get
Everybody Poops

”
on a digital reader
The Rhetoric
of “Death”
in the age of digitization
This rhetoric of death always
crops up following the development o
new technologies. “Newspapers are
dead.” “Jouranlism is a dying industry.”
Are things changing? Yes. Does that
always mean that something has to die?
No.
Elizabeth Eisenstein explores
the idea that reactions to changes in our
media, such as declaring that the book
is dead, are historically embedded in
the past, in her article titled The End of
the Book? some Perspectives on Media
Change. The specific technology does
not matter. The sentiments that change
is excessively bad or good have always
persisted.
She specifically looks at reac-
tions to the new age of journalism. Two
separate accounts that she studies from
the early 1700’s proclaimed that the cen-
tury of the journal had dawned. However,
journalists were originally discussed in
disdainful terms, as the term “journalist”
encompassed both respectable editors
and “disreputable scandalmongers who
traded in gossip and blackmail.” Journals
were thought to be designed for readers
too lazy to read books, and writing for a
newspaper was considered a sad trade.
Later, some saw the merit in the
pursuits of journalism and thought that
it had public benefit. When the newspa-
per’s popularity grew, it was disparaged
as having a perverse power over the
public’s thoughts. Jacques Pierre Brissot
attributed newspapers with enabling the
American Revolution. Louis Blanc wrote
that books are suited to quieter times,
and that “the age of books is dead; the
age of the journal is at hand.” Eisenstein
points out that these sentiments are
strange considering that the same people
who wrote books tended to be journalists,
and that both professions have always
co-existed. She discusses how neither
the original criticism or praise for journal-
ism were entirely accurate in the future of
novels and newspapers. Similarly those
who write for print (journalists included)
now find themselves writing online texts,
whether it is articles, blogs, or even
simple emails.
 Prolific sentiments like these stem from Documents - the Changing Aesthetics of Texts in
the idea that, as Victoria Carrington suggests in Late Print Culture, we are very attached to paper
her article, The Uncanny, Digital Texts and Literacy, because it is often used in ceremonies. Think of a
something that was once a part of everyday life, like graduation diploma. Would you want a digital copy
physical publications, now seems uncanny because sent to you instead? How
of their transference online. Dominant discourses of about a yearbook? These
literature are now undermined by the ability to easily, embodiment experiences are
and cheaply, create and participate in the production cherished because of the
of writing. personal touch, or physicality
This doesn’t mean that newspapers are of documents and what they
dead and blogs are thriving, but that the meaning mean as a part of our life.
of magazines and newspapers changes. They Admittedly, people are
need to be more niche, have online or simulating aesthetic experi-
interactive components for their readers, ence online, or combin-
and add to the overall democratization ing real world and online
of the media that is occurring. They are experiences, through such
no longer the sole viewpoint, but one things as “signing” online
of many, and need to recognize and petitions and exchanging
adapt to this development. business cards digitally.
However, without “big name” However, I still don’t think
publications, it’s hard to understand were completely ready to
who is reading and how big the audi- give up our parchment for
ence is. There’s also the problem digital copies that can be
of “preaching to the choir.” Nobody printed out when needed.
is going to follow a blog full of There is knowledge and
opinions and news they don’t care something special to be
about or agree with. (After all, who gleaned from original
is reading an online digital maga- books in terms of the
zine about the possible death of reading experience they
print except those interested in online digital elicit.
publications?) However, since most large weeklies Older genera-
and general interest magazines have died out, blogs tions fear for Gen Y and
need to take up convention of catering to a targeted Millenals, who use online texts more than paper
audience as opposed to a general one. ones and talk in lolspeak. However, I fear for the
Can I possibly fathom a paperless future older generations, unable to challenge traditional
where publications are killed off by their online coun- discourses of literacy and participate in an online
terparts? No, not yet. smorgasbord of free speech.
As B. Danet points out in Books, Letters,

The Books is Dead / Long live the book

 ...Battle Royale
You love to read. You love to read a lot. You love to read a lot of books. Your years of loyalty to books and publications makes
it hard to just give up the paper, but the lure of a digital reader beckons you into the 21st century.

mortal
If only one can come out on top, what do you choose?
UD MAGNIBH EX

combat!
“
convenience
More book titles that are easily downloadable on
a Kindle. However, not all rights can be obtained
for online books. That requires going to a store,
or ordering online and waiting for the physical
copy to get to you. Using Amazon’s network,
downloading a book is easy and fast. Just hope
that your copy of 1984 doesn’t disappear be-
cause of copyright issues.

price
Digital readers, depending on the brand will set
you back a couple hundred dollars. Most books
are free at a library if you are willing to wait or
are cheaper in soft cover. However a lot of clas-
sics and books without copyright are available
for free on your readers.

green front
Books are easier to recycle but can perish. Its unlikely a Kindle will disintegrate (although don’t get either wet) but digital waste and
battery power to make it an environmental drainer. Drop a kindle and it could be over. Drop a book and you can most likely pick it
back up again with little to no damage.

ease of reading
One can struggle with the scrolling buttons, tiny screen and the zoom feature. It’s also harder to fall asleep after staring at a
screen. Using you eyes and hands to focus is a lot more simple. It is incredibly unnatural for the human eye to read from a screen,
and extended amount of time scanning screens can possibly lead to dry eyes and headaches.

use as a weapon
Unless you throw a plugged in digital reader into a bathtub, that baby isn’t heavy enough to do serious damage. Grab a copy of
War and Peace or Gone with the Wind.