In a recent interview with The Washington Post, Microsoft chief exec. Steve Ballmer claimed, among other things, that within the next 10 years there will be “no media consumption left… that is not delivered over an IP network. There will be no newspapers, no magazines that are delivered in paper form.” When I saw this I cringed a little bit. If the history of media has taught us anything it is that new media never replace old media entirely. I know there has been some hype over the development of e-books and e-paper (Amazon Kindle, Readius, etc.), but will this really replace paper-based print media? I don’t know about you all, but there’s something about the texture of a paperback book that I love. Being able to take it anywhere, cram it in a backpack, or the sense of accomplishment I get after flipping that last page. Maybe I’m old fashioned, but there’s also something about being able to quickly scan the headlines of a newspaper to find the information I want, rather than scanning tediously through column after column on a digital device. This may be my reluctance to change showing through – indeed, digital devices will come with their own advantages and disadvantages just like old media (I hate refolding a newspaper because I can never seem to get it right… it usually ends up all distraight and out of order).
What do you all think? Will information delivered over “IP networks” come to entirely displace paper-based print media?
