Books-The Oldest of New Media?

For my third blog I was asked to download a story from a website called www.onthemedia.org. On the Media is a weekly hour long radio program produced by WNYC, public radio in New York.We were asked to choose a story that related to new media in some way or another. I selected a story from the "Media Biz" link in the left hand column. It was titled "One for the Books". It was hosted by Bob Garfield and Brooke Gladstone. They begin by talking about the theme of their show from week to week. Bob says that there main theme for the show seems to be" New Media is thriving, old media is dying."They talk about how old media and new media are slowly merging together. The show I chose was first aired last fall which they said was "devoted to the oldest of old media, books."Where, how and in what form people will be buying books is a question that is up in the air. They state that 60% of all books are not bought in book stores but are purchased at airports, checkout counters,walmart,costco,and toys r us.11% are purchased from amazon.com and the rest are bought at book stores but mostly big chains. They also state that The Membership of the American Booksellers Club Association which serves inderpendent book stores has dropped 5000 books to 1700 in the last decade. They say that in this day and age publishers have to put muscle behind books that can sell themselves. One interesting fact that I did not know is that corperate chains like Barnes and Nobels and Borders reserve there "real estate" for the highest rollers. The books on the front tables aren't there by popular demand they are there because they were paid by the publisher for a certain kind of distrobution called co-op(product placement). They talk about when you go to buy a book from a independent book seller your taken care of by that book seller which is comforting because they know there material and books. In the last 4 years the only segments of the book industry that have increased or maintained market share have been online and independent stores. They also talk about a machine that can publish books on the spot. As long as the book is digitized any book can be available at any store at any time. Some say the problem is too many books. How are you supposed to publisize and market all those books?...The next topic they discuss is how much impact Opreah has on book lovers. Since she has her own book club she reviews and recomends books often. For example, one book that Opreah suggested sold almost 1 million copies. They stress that Opreah really does have a impact on book consumers. Another topic they discuss is google library. Google library users will be able to browser full text of public domain material but only get a few sentences into books still covered by copyright. Some publishers are not in favor of this idea because they feel they should have the right to earn a profit when people read there material but in fact it's quite the oppisite. Google library is providing a tool that will help the publisher make books more relevant than they are today. The truth is, a sample of the text helps drive sells. 200,000 books are published a year. 2,000 authors make there quota and are known while 198,000 need to try something else.How do you feel about all of this?..Books too old for this world full of new media?