City Comforts, the blog

Before anyone starts crowing

Country Medal Count
28	USA
24	Germany
18	Norway
15	Canada
13	Russia
10	Korea
10	Austria
10	France
8	Switzerland
8	China
	As of 9:46 p.m. Wednesday Feb 24

Let's not get carried away. Based on per capita reckoning Norway is way in front: 

1 medal for every 266,666 Norwegians 

versus 

1 medal for every 11 million Americans. 

So stuff that nationalist silliness -- we are not leading so let's be quiet. That's a huge discrepancy and I think I'll throw in that there is an obvious and clear advantage to social programs like Norway offering universal health care, the value of fitness and urban walkability. 

And I am not really joking.

Correct about eminent domain, but more about opportunism than ideology

Eminent Domain as Central Planning

Eminent-domain abuse, dangerous though it is, is a symptom of a deeper problem: government officials' belief that central planning is superior to free-market competition.

Otherwise good article about some abuses of eminent domain in NYC. But I think Nicole Gelinas give most government officials far too much credit: they rarely have any sort of central guiding principles beyond desire to stay in office and use whatever deal can be done (within color of law) to give succor to campaign contributors. Not wrong-headed principle but career expediency and opportunism.

Is that relevant? Well I think it is because as a quasi-liberal-libertarian there is a role for government activism such as scrupulously honest courts and system of law, solid currency and accurate weights & measures. So to make an ideology out of a personality flaw frames the game unfairly. Yes eminent domain is misused -- significantly -- but that has nothing to do with ideology as there are always crooks.

Is is the grid? Or something else?

Human Transit: the power and pleasure of grids.

Very good post.

My own view -- and I am curious to know if you agree or not -- is whether  the grid must be literally so: must "the grid" be perfectly rectangular? Is it composed of 90 degree angles? etc etc.

My own thought is that 

• yes "the grid" is essential

but 

• it can (and maybe probably should) be the grid broken every now and then for "surprise."

More importantly, I think that the concept of "gridness" should also be understood more as "continuity" than as boxes.

Of course the grid is more practical and easier to design/build and works just fine in terms of property transfer etc etc -- we have wonderful cities with just grids so why gild the lily?

But I think that it is important both politically and intellectually-correct to  allow the "eccentric grid" which can allow surprise etc etc. And after all, from a transportation POV, what we care about is not rectangles and 90 degree corners but multiple paths.

The grid functions to allow redundant routes and the rectilinearity is just a means, though a very simple one and simplicity is usually good.

Or do I miss something? Your perspective?

Pedestrian Mall Redux

Second Thoughts by Gordon Price

On second thought, is that a good idea? I mean, bringing transit back to Granville Street? 

My first thought — when I was on City Council, deciding on a process for the redesign of the mall — was yup. In fact, I moved a motion that insisted there could be no loss of transit efficiency, whatever the design. Many downtown business-people wanted a return of car traffic; others suggested a pedestrian-only zone. What you see now is the compromise.

How about just trying it?
Do an experiment.
Establish criteria beforehand so that a considered judgment is possible.

Yes there is disruption in several respects but it seems to me that so many aspects of walkable urbanism benefit from trying stuff which are fairly debatable; and if doesn’t work, reverse course.

"City Comforts" and "Low-Tech" is quite congruent

Doing It Low-Tech

And of course really simple things like buying more buses and hiring more drivers to provide more frequent service would also help. To get really wild and ambitious you can employ technology like paint to create bus lanes and police officers to enforce the bus lanes if you want to really go big, bus-wise. But honestly the littlelest things -- visual display of arrival times, better bus shelters, more frequent service == can do a ton to make bus-riding a better way to get around. This would hardly revolutionize American life, but ineter-city high-speed rail isn't going to change people's daily lives either. And while intercity rail is going to be primarily used by fairly prosperous business travelers, better buses would make it a lot easier for economically struggle families.

An unusual remark

Making Light: The "agency model" as I understand it.

I know I'm late to the party, but I wanted to give a chronic lurker's point of view. I liked the article. I found it well-written and informative. I was even going to post a comment (unusual for me), but before I did, I read through the comments to make sure my opinion hadn't already been stated. Now I'm afraid to say anything about the article. I enjoyed reading Ben's theories on a brave new publishing model. Sure, I don't know if they would work, and I don't agree with everything he said, but so what? It was a different point of view and it made me think. I like that. Then EVERYONE attacked him. His credentials, his experience, his ability to express himself, and even his motivations for posting were brought into question. Basically, what I got from the slams directed at him are these points: - If you are not a member of the publishing community, you shouldn't post a different point of view. - Pie-in-the-sky theories are not allowed, no matter how much fun it is to imagine them. - You have to be an expert on a subject before stating your opinion. - You have to be willing to quit your job, prove your theory, and come back with documentation. - Teresa Nielsen Hayden is not a very nice person. Throughout it all, he was consistently polite and self-deprecating. What you all made fun of as a "flounce" out of the conversation I saw as frustration at being treated like a piece of dirt. This is why I'm a chronic lurker.

An obvious headline

City Employees Decry Proposed Job Cuts

Need the headline? 

CITY EMPLOYEES DECRY PROPOSED JOB CUTS Farmers decry proposed crop supports Doctors decry proposed tort laws Teachers decry proposed levy failures Auto makers decry proposed fuel requirements Salmon fishermen decry proposed fishing restrictions. Developers decry proposed land restrictions. Neighbors decry proposed development. Ox decry proposed goring. So?

Real publishers might survive

Making Light: The "agency model" as I understand it.

Conversely, "self-publishing" may actually INCREASE the importance of "publishers" i.e. publishers = gatekeeping/editorial. With a flood of self-publish titles by unknowns, name brand publishers may increase the value of the Famous Well-known Publisher Seal of Approval. You scan a title on low impact development and you find 300 titles. A few maybe from (examples) Harvard University Press, a few from Random House and a whole bunch from John Does. Guess who you'll check out first? Btw, I am not saying that is good or bad -- just likely human nature. Of course the broad reach from John Doe's book could also surface to the top -- but some name brand marketing group (that is primarily what a publisher does -- marketing) might well invite John Doe to its rostrum.

More about ebooks and publishing

I think that the "agency model" itself --- Making Light: The "agency model" as I understand it --- has gone long away but there is an ongoing stimulating discussion and I've put in my own two cts.

PNH writes: "I wonder about that "extra content" stuff too. But I also think that normal books, without "extra" bells and whistles, will continue to have a robust audience. When I want to read a novel, I want to read a novel, not get distracted by the moral equivalent of DVD extras." 

That could go for non-fiction as well. Embedded video, links, 'out-takes' (versions of photos), real-time revised editing might be useful. 

But if I think I understand his very good point, such 'extra content' might have a centrifugal tendency especially for non-fiction. The writer attempts to create a narrative or thesis, but the reader gets distracted by glamorous "extra content" and eventually loses the writer's point. That could well happen. No one knows and we'll just see what happens as imagination and new technology gets together. 

Though I think it has been repeated at length, one thing I do doubt is that "a book is a book," that the way publishing has been done in the past and recent now is the proper and appropriate way to do things and that publishers and editors should just know better and others should shut up. I have a suspicion that it won't work out like that. 

If nothing else, I suspect that major publishers are going to get demolished in size because whole divisions of people will get fired -- less of buying printing and arranging for warehouses and keeping track of orders shipped and books pulped. It's a massive institutional change.  Maybe one of the reasons which publishers are so slow to adapt the ebook is because the internal politics are at war: editors and marketers versus print buyers and shippers and bookstore salesmen and so forth. Some staff  may be worried, but others are terrified and know that their whole function may barely exist and so the publishing companies are, I surmise, as an organization undergoing enormous internal stress how to downsize.

Amazon will not be the only "place" to buy ebooks e.g. Google and Bowker's Books-in-Print

The "agency model" as I understand it

Some people dislike Amazon and there is considerab;e recent discussion about Amazon and Macmillan and pricing etc etc as almost if that's the ball game.

My conjecture is that Amazon as an enterprise is very vulnerable and there will be at least two big ebook sellers, Google and Books-in-Print.  Paper books (hard and soft) will virtually disappear for whole classes of books and it's not just bricks-and-mortar book stores but Amazon too which has its own bricks-and-mortar vulnerability i.e. warehouses.  

Amazon is afraid of getting squashed. It knows that it cannot maintain any sort of commanding market share of ebooks once the market starts, which I believe will mark the introduction of the iPad. 

While it is not efficient for one publisher to find customers, it seems to me that there are at least two more existing databases which can sidestep Amazon: Google and Bowker's Books-in-Print. 

Both can provide access to publishers or direct downloading of ebooks. Bing, too. Others as well. Amazon knows that it has to expand its mail order business into many many other products because its own market share of books will decline. (I think they will do do well with other physical products and ebooks as well, too..) Therefore I believe that the intense discussions about Amazon as the big ebook giant will shortly be a thing of the past. That's my theory.

Why couldn't (as an example of a famous person) couldn't Paul Krugman be a 'publisher?'

A post at Making Light stimulated my thinking:

Just a surmise.

What I think is genuinely valuable about publishers is that they are gate-keepers if they do a fair and responsible job. Could be lots of different new publishers.

And gate-keepers have just gotten a whole lot cheaper when ebook publishing eliminates substantial capital costs of printing and warehousing, which of course are far greater than pre-production of editorial and design.

Why wouldn't there be a new imprint -- just an example -- like "Krugman & Company Books" with 20-30 titles per year specializing in economics, politics but ebooks only etc etc (Maybe there is a POD for libraries.)

Professor K. has enormous prestige and his opinion about the quality of a book carries weight. (And let's assume that he does have good practical 'readability' smarts.) He teams up with people -- or they go to him -- who know management, ebook design and how to market (Krugman certainly will help get his first 20 titles reviewed) -- and presto! you now have a new publisher.

Maybe Krugman is not a good example as a person, (though why not?) But you get the drift. Maybe a Dan Savage Sex Book imprint? etc etc

The gate-keeping function should still be important -- but it no longer needs printers and warehousing and far less cash.

.

It is thrilling to observe a moment in cultural history

The Amazon, Apple, Macmillan Kerfuffle

May I suggest that Kindle v. iPad is small potatoes. There will be another half-dozen ebook readers in the next year. The market will shake out. Some folks will not like back-lit screens and will prefer e-Ink. Others may want a richer web experience with the iPad. 

All will have prices plummet as content providers offer discounts for subscriptions. There may be "stacks" of subscriptions — maybe even to the point where individuals obtain rebates when you buy a device.

What he says about ebooks etc etc

The Amazon, Apple, Macmillan Kerfuffle

“Book” prices will plummet.
The “book” will become totally re-defined.
Apple will make huge profits.
Jobs = Gutenberg, in long run.
Amazon will face enormous price competition.
Publishers (qua editors and gate keepers) and authors will do just fine.
New role for expert taste-makers as “publishers”
Printers and book stores are toast.
Don’t worry about ebook “monopoly” issues and DRM over more than 2 year period

But really, too soon to say. And I should add that I am quite modest and cautious in my predictions.