In Praise of the Low-Tech Book
An Essay by Robert Guzman
Without a question a codex, more commonly known as a book, is low-tech, very
low-tech. It has been around for nearly 2000 years now and it has changed very little in
terms of appearance and format....
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In Praise of the Low-Tech Book
An Essay by Robert Guzman
Without a question a codex, more commonly known as a book, is low-tech, very
low-tech. It has been around for nearly 2000 years now and it has changed very little in
terms of appearance and format. Sheets of paper, usually rectangular, are sewn or
bonded together between two hard covers.
Perhaps the only significant change was when Guttenberg found the way to
mass produce books with his fantastic machine, the press with movable characters.
Guttenberg made books that were cheap to produce in large numbers. Other
than that major change nearly half a millennium ago the book’s basic format and nature
has evolved very little over the centuries.
When one compares the paper book with the newer, high-tech mediums it seems
so dated, so old fashioned. Now we have the Internet with all its power and versatility.
We can download literally dozens of books into a pen-drive that has memory
capabilities that are measured in gigabytes. These tiny
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