In this month's issue of WIRED, Chris Suellentrop has a fantastic piece on Rentership and the inevitable benefits afforded to renters during times of great financial contraction and phenomenal technological expansion. As I read his article, I thought immediately of eBooks and the many #bib10 discussions we've recently had about the sharing of digital books. I also recalled many discussions about the future of our favorite independent bookstores and that selling books can't, in any successful long-term future, be the sole source of their revenue.
So it was rather delicious to read Suellentrop's final summation:
"For the rest of us, we’ll always own some things. There’s stuff we use all the time, like furniture and clothing, and objects with sentimental value (take your stinking paws off my Yoda figure with plastic snake). But the Internet is creating markets that enable us to own much less. The winner of the ebook sweepstakes will be the bookseller who becomes a bookrenter. I don’t want to own hundreds of books on a Kindle at $10 a pop. I want to Netflix them — pay for access to every book ever published. I’d rather be a renter in Borges’ library than the owner of my own."
I read this at 1am a few nights ago. Damned if I didn't dance a little jig while the rest of the house slept. I'm not crazy after all. Or if I am, at least I'm in very good company.
