[HN Gopher] Books of the world, stand up and be counted All 129,...
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Books of the world, stand up and be counted All 129,864,880 of you.
(2010)
Author : Bluestein
Score : 36 points
Date : 2024-08-09 16:51 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (booksearch.blogspot.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (booksearch.blogspot.com)
| wwilim wrote:
| A T-shirt that has an ISBN number assigned surely is a great
| conversation starter. I wonder where can I get my hands on one
| Bluestein wrote:
| Your comment puts me in mind of that t-shirt way back in the
| day, containing encryption source code. Fun times ...
| throw0101b wrote:
| Or decryption:
|
| * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeCSS_haiku
| paxys wrote:
| eBooks and self publishing weren't quite as big a thing in 2010.
| I wonder what result a similar count would produce today, when
| one can "write" a book, have it published and listed for sale,
| and even printed on demand, all in a matter of hours.
| Bluestein wrote:
| I would ballpark-estimate at least twice as many.-
|
| That said, as wisely said downthread, it depends on how one
| defines "published" - or, "book" even ...
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Bowker (the ISBN-issuing authority in the US) tracks issued
| ISBNs by publishing category. At last check a few years ago,
| this was on the order of 300k "traditional" books (that is,
| produced through an established publisher) and another 1--2
| million or so "nontraditional" books.
|
| Latest report I can find is from 2013, now only available as an
| archive:
|
| <https://web.archive.org/web/20150415233658/https://www.bowke..
| .>
|
| It's interesting to consider books published vs. total market.
| For the US, there is a reading population of about 300 million
| people (I'm presuming ~30m are either pre-reading age or
| nonliterate). For 300k books, that's 100 readers per book. The
| highly asymmetric long-tail dynamics of book publishing, with a
| small handful of titles selling 1m+ copies per year, and most
| having sales of far fewer (often largely library sales) becomes
| highly evident.
|
| The US Library of Congress also publishes new additions
| annually as part of the Librarian's Report to Congress:
|
| <https://www.loc.gov/static/portals/about/reports-and-
| budgets...> (PDF)
|
| FY2023 registrations were 441,526 (pp. 84--85).
| Bluestein wrote:
| > 30m are either pre-reading age or nonliterate
|
| That's an incredibly large number of illiterates. Am
| surprised ...
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| dredmorbius is _assuming_ it, not citing someone 's
| measurement.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| 30k low-literates is all but certainly an _underestimate_
| , see follow-up above.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| 300m / 300k largely just simplifies the maths. That's
| useful for very rough napkin calculations.
|
| Going beyond that: for starters you can exclude children to
| a certain age (say 5, 10, 15 years), based on limited
| literacy, and adults in later years with visual and
| cognitive deficiencies (glaucoma, macular degeneration,
| dementia, other cognitive conditions). Ten-and-unders alone
| are about 10% of the total population:
| <https://www.neilsberg.com/insights/united-states-
| population-...>.
|
| Then there's actual measured adult literacy rates which are
| ... far more sobering than you might think. At least _half_
| the U.S. adult population would struggle strongly with any
| modestly complex text, fiction or nonfiction:
|
| <https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2019/2019179/index.asp>
|
| I'd discussed that on an earlier thread here:
| <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29734386>.
| Bluestein wrote:
| I can no longer thank you for the through comment you
| point to there, so I do it here. Appreciated.-
|
| > At least half the U.S. adult population would struggle
| strongly with any modestly complex text, fiction or
| nonfiction
|
| How is that not become a severe, dire, national issue?
| dredmorbius wrote:
| My sense is that it's more of an "it is what it is"
| situation. That is, _if_ you 're operating in a domain
| which requires or presumes literacy, _then_ you 'll do
| better to have a realistic appraisal of what the reality
| is.
|
| Among other factors, the level seems to be relatively
| consistent over time, it corresponds to other similarly
| nuanced measures (the OECD computer literacy survey
| mentioned in my linked 2021 comment, Jean Piaget's work
| on intellectual attainment levels, presumably based on
| 1950s/1960s France), and other broad measures.
|
| The US has a strong sense of the actual literacy
| situation _because it actually tests for this_ , where
| many other countries apparently do not, or don't publish
| their findings. "Highly literate" is a pride and prestige
| factor for many countries, and rates of 95--99% literacy
| (often given) likely are based on very low minimum
| standards.
|
| I also suspect that there may be some negative
| consideration given the large immigrant / non-native-
| English speaking population in the US (where some of the
| latter is in fact native-born but in insular
| communities), where individuals may have literate
| capabilities in their _native_ language but not English.
| Given that the lowest rates of adult literary attainment
| are in southern border communities (most notably in the
| Big Bend region of Texas) this seems at least possible.
|
| If you are highly literate and technical you're all but
| certainly an outlier amongst the general population, and
| your own immediate experience and that of those you
| encounter most often is probably not a generalisable one.
|
| In the technical context I've called this the Tyranny of
| the Minimum Viable User, which addresses _both_ the fact
| that _widely-used_ computer interfaces _must_ be
| exceedingly basic (to avoid disenfranchising the vast
| majority of the population) _and_ that this means that
| proficient or expert users face challenges in trying to
| address their own complex needs on such systems unless
| there are ready means of extending the system
| capabilities to match their personal ability and needs.
| The tension here is absolutely innate and inevitable.
|
| Also, if you're trying to sell books, you're selling into
| roughly 10--20% of the population at best, most of the
| time. Which is why other forms of media (music, video,
| games) tend to be so much more popular, in all senses of
| that word.
| Bluestein wrote:
| > Tyranny of the Minimum Viable User,
|
| Nicely put.-
| addUrl wrote:
| Now, using modern technology, they can write 7 billion books.
| What is their value?
| Bluestein wrote:
| Sadly approaches zero, am afraid.-
|
| (At least for the slop ...)
|
| PS. We need an _AI book reviewer_ to tell the difference.-
| addUrl wrote:
| Unfortunately, this is true
| vundercind wrote:
| It's a damn good thing there's so much very, very good
| pre-"AI" media that one could be entertained and engaged and
| educated for three lifetimes with it. And that's just the
| best stuff!
| Bluestein wrote:
| Sigh. "Pre-slopocene" vs. "Slopocene" ...
| jl6 wrote:
| Of the 129,864,880 books, the article mentions 5, and I've read 4
| of those. What a little bubble us tech people inhabit.
| Bluestein wrote:
| What are the odds ...
| throw0101b wrote:
| There's actually a product(? service?) called "Books in Print"
| that lists all things currently being published:
|
| * https://www.bowker.com/books-in-print
| Isamu wrote:
| Books in Print used to be a book in print. Updated yearly, I
| used it at the library.
| HocusLocus wrote:
| Well ok. A shout-out to my own 9798990595101 and its ebook
| buddies 9798990595118 and 9798224433186. Some stats: Copies sold:
| 0. Royalties $0. Family and friends: noncommittal and confused.
| Personal feeling of accomplishment: priceless I guess. $0.99
| ebook promotions so far 2 months, 0 copies. Looking to extend the
| record for 2 more months with 0 more copies. On-demand technology
| is fun, but boring if there is no demand. Amazon "Best Sellers"
| rank: #6,757,387 in Books.
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