Barrett Garese

What is a book?

Lately I’ve been having a lot of interesting conversations with a lot of really interesting people. I’ve been fortunate to find myself in a true nexus of genius somehow, and the optimism is infectious. Lately my favorite conversations have started with the following:

What is a book?

I love asking this question, but I also use it to illustrate the unique period of media in which we find ourselves. On the surface it’s a pretty simple answer, but dig deeper and you find a truly fascinating array of answers.

We’ve reached an historic point in mass media: the point where we literally get to distill and examine the core elements that make up each individual medium and ask ourselves “which of these elements are important, and which only remain due to legacy or habit?” So when I ask “what is a book” what I’m really asking is “what are the core, central elements which are required for this project to be considered a book?”

Right now, you have a mental image of a book. If you’re anything like me, it’s a red hardcover, despite the fact that in my entire collection of books, I don’t actually own a single red hardcover book. If you’re even more like me, it’s about 2-3 inches thick and sort of floating in space (not space space, just in a vast nothingness) somewhere in the near distance.

So this is my mental image of a “book.” This is an interesting concept, because the first thing either one of us will admit is that books no longer need to be bound or include paper. We’re all very well versed in the ideas of electronic books, either as a simple PDF, or in conjunction with a Kindle (or Kindle-esque) device. So already, while the mental image of a “book” is still bound and dead-tree based, regardless of one’s preferences in tangible versus digital, most people will immediately admit that a “book” no longer needs to be a physical paper object.

This is an example of a legacy aspect of what we understand to be a “book” as a communication and entertainment medium. For hundreds of years it has been this way, bound to paper and pages and doubtlessly unchanging; and thus it is cemented in our minds as such. So when we move forward and iterate new media within the same or similar areas, the transition does not immediately go to a new form, but rather it retains certain aspects of this “book” along the way as intermediary steps.

Let’s take Amazon’s Kindle as an example: Essentially, it is simply an electronic device upon which to view written content, but in practice, certain concessions were made to legacy elements to help the end user feel more comfortable with the transition:

The device is the size of a paperback novel
Books retain the concept of “pages” to be turned.
Books have “covers” and “Chapters.”

Each of these legacy aspects was intentionally retained to ease the end-user transition into a new media format which mimics an old media format. What’s more interesting though, are the legacy aspects that were accidentally retained out of nothing more than habit, or because “that’s how we’ve always done it and we don’t know any differently.”

To explain, let’s go a little further into the idea of “what is a book?” when the native book viewing device isn’t paper-based, but electronic. Immediately, the pages fall away as simply a matter of physical necessity, but that’s an easy one. Let’s jump straight into the fun ones, because once you start thinking a little less linearly, things like “static text and images” become a question of legacy.

What do I mean by that? It’s simple: text and images are static in books because that’s how they’re physically printed. When the same content is viewed in a digital format, those physical requirements cease to be a factor. So the experience of “reading” can be profoundly expanded upon. Even the experience of “interaction” between the “reader,” the “author” and the “material.” By simply discarding the idea that a book must include static text and images, you’re opening up your “book” experience to a whole new level of creativity and storytelling.

Now let’s get a little more heady: how important is similarity of content? Better said: since we’re already working with an electronic device, if that device is imbued with a certain amount of location awareness (say, for instance, the iPad) can it adapt itself so that your experience reading it in Los Angeles will differ from your friend’s experience reading it in New York? Can certain aspects or plotlines or sidenotes only be experienced with some physical or locational user-triggered aspect coming into play?

Now we’re really asking “what is a book” because what we’re now describing – while still a text-based story with a centralized plotline as dictated by a singular author’s voice and vision – only barely resembles our earlier mental image of a “book.” Our “book” has additional elements of locational awareness, contextual or geolocational adaptation, and interactivity that begin to seriously differentiate it from its dead-tree brethren. Does it still qualify itself as a book? Does it require a new word for a new media format?

And we’re only scratching the surface at this point, as we’re only talking in terms of devices that are a year or two old. So we’re still, to a certain degree, dealing in legacy. Both the Kindle and the iPad aren’t revolutionary devices, but much more evolutionary. They both simply expanded upon already existing devices to make them better and more user friendly so they’re still in the transitional intermediary category of devices. What will be the “book” for Augmented Reality-capable glasses or contact lenses? What will be the “book” for whatever new device is being thought up in a lab behind security so thick it embarrasses most banks?

What is a “book” now, because the answer is changing every day. Is a “book” sold through Amazon or iBooks going to be more or less appealing than a “Book” sold as a standalone iPad or Android tablet application? What capabilities will make the “booklication” more appealing and justify the higher or lower pricepoint of either option? What interactivity will come to define this generation of authors creating unique works to differentiate their storytelling from that of their elders? And most importantly, what will this do the humble “book” which we still picture in our minds – bound to paper and eternally static in all its printed glory?

These are all questions that we’re lucky we get to ask, as the opportunity to do so doesn’t come along very often. As is often said, we’re witnessing the death of traditional business models; but more importantly we’re also witnessing a renaissance of creativity that only comes with such rule – and business model – breaking changes. For the first time in centuries, we get to ask ourselves “what is a book.” More importantly, for the first time in hundreds of years we get to influence the answer.

If you haven’t already guessed, “book” can easily be replaced by any number of other words like “record” and “movie” and “tv show.” In all cases, the core question being asked isn’t “Can you please describe this medium to me as it currently stands?” but rather “What are the core elements required for this media format to retain its essence, and which can we immediately discard as vestiges of nothing more than legacy and habit?” The next 50 years of entertainment will be defined by hundreds of experimental answers – some successful, some less so. In every case, it will come from the willingness to ask a simple question.

So what will come to mind in 50 years when someone says “picture a book in your head”? What will pop immediately to mind, crystal clear in its exacting familial nature?

What will be the touchstone for a population of readers young and old?

What is a book?

What will be a book?

I don’t know; let’s go make the answer.