==================================================================== Stuck In Traffic "Current Events, Cultural Phenomena, True Stories" Issue #30 - February, 1999 Contents: My Meteor Watching Expedition: In which I discover that in order to enjoy a meteor shower, you have to lower your expectations. The Bookseller Wars: A long look at the conflict between the Small Independent Bookseller and the Big Chain Bookseller and what the Small Independent must do to survive the changes in the book selling market. Aiding Cubans: Why and how we should aid Cubans without compromising our principles. ==================================== True Story My Meteor Watching Expedition It's not every day that you get a chance to see a meteor shower. So Last November, as the earth was passing through the strongest meteor shower in about a 100 years, I decided I better take advantage of the opportunity. The Science Geek in me, which usually I manage to keep under control, got the best of me. I made plans with some similarly afflicted friends for the best night for viewing it. So early that morning, about 3:30AM as I recall, I dragged myself out of bed and pulled on all the warm clothes I could find. Middle November in the Carolinas can either be warm or cold. It's a fickle time of year weather-wise around here. But of course, since we were planning to go out, the weather turned out chilly. So I pulled on my long underwear, a couple of layers of T-shirts and sweatshirts and topped the whole thing off with my overcoat. By the time I was done, I looked like an Eskimo. I couldn't bend over because I had so many clothes on! Bleary eyed, I met my friends at their house and we all piled into their van. No one said much. Yes, we all wanted to do this. But no one was real happy about being up at such an ungodly hour. We headed out of town to try to get away from the city lights a little. Which meant it got darker and darker. And as we passed down lonelier and lonelier roads out in the country, sleep kept calling me. Thank goodness I wasn't the one driving. We drove the van to a Lake Jordan, which is just southwest of town a few miles, on the theory that since there wouldn't be any trees growing above the lake, there would be quite a bit of unobstructed view of the sky. We went down a road that leads to a boat ramp. It had a big grassy area that I suppose is used in the summertime for people to park their trailers as they take their boats out fishing and water skiing. There were other sky-watchers there already. As a matter of etiquette, one takes care not to shine any bright lights around other sky watchers. After sitting in the darkness for a few hours, your pupils open up as wide as they will go. So if someone suddenly shines a bright light into your eyes, it hurts! So the last hundred yards or so, we drove without the headlights on in the car. All of a sudden we were in nearly total darkness. We moved very slowly, mostly so we could still find our way down the road and into a parking spot without running into a tree or running over a pedestrian. Unsettling to say the least. But we managed to get parked without incident. We piled out of the van and quickly discovered that in our early morning stupor, we'd forgotten to bring any sort of lawn furniture. I some how managed in all my layers of clothes to bend down just enough to manage to sit on the ground. But after about 5 minutes the coldness from the ground had seeped through my jeans and long underwear and was turning my butt nice and frosty. This was not a good thing. Fortunately, my friends' van had just enough slope to it that you could lean back against it and watch the sky in sort of an odd falling backward position. None of us were into amateur astronomy enough to own any sort of telescope, so we didn't have anything to set up. But we had brought some binoculars which we quickly found out were totally useless. And I suspect a telescope would have been useless as well. Binoculars and telescopes are used to look at a single, known object that's very far away. So you only see an extremely minute portion of the sky at anyone time. But a meteor strike can happen anywhere in the sky at any time. So the trick to watching a meteor shower is to watch as much of the sky as possible all at once. You have to learn to _not_ focus on any particular star. While cursing the weather for being cold, we were simultaneously thankful that it was a clear night and we could see the stars clearly. I couldn't begin to tell you what stars we saw that night. I can't recognize constellations, except for maybe the Big Dipper. We had heard that the it was best to look to the south for viewing the meteor shower, so we pointed ourselves to what we hoped was a southerly direction. Even though we were out of town by several miles, there you could still see some glow in the sky from town. So maybe if we had gone further out, we would have seen more stars, but the sky was still pleasantly full of stars, even from our less than ideal vantage point. How does one describe a sky full of stars? The first thing that always strikes me is that there is no ceiling. I guess that sounds kind of strange. But you can just look up and tell that it goes on for ever. It's not like there's a black something up there with sprinklings of stars on it. It's black because there's nothing up there! The stars are up there, but they add to the sense of vast emptiness rather than filling it up. You really get the sense that you are standing on a rock flying through space when you're looking up at the stars. The stars themselves look very old and very cold. Every grade school kid knows that stars are hundreds of thousands of light-years away from us, but it doesn't sink in until you see those tiny bits of light up there. It's tough to imagine them being so far away. But every now and then an airplane would cross the sky and it would seem very close, like you could almost reach up and touch it. The contrast between the plane and the stars gave you a sense of just how far away they were. Meteor watching is an exercise in patience. You can't just flip a switch and make it happen. I remember watching a CNN new story the day before. At the time it was dark in Japan and they had a poor CNN reporter "on the scene" with a camera pointed to the sky, hoping to catch a glimpse of a meteor. But meteors just don't happen on demand, and a camera can only capture a tiny corner of the sky, so they didn't actually catch on one tape, as far as I know. So we were leaning back against the van, trying to take in as much of the vast empty space as possible and waited. And waited. And waited some more. It takes a while for your eves to get adjusted to the darkness. And for a while my eyes were playing tricks on me. I though that I could see the stars slowly shifting around. Not like they were moving across the sky as a result of the earth's turning. I thought I could see them changing in relation to each other. This is a very odd phenomena. I don't know if other people have experienced this or not. But I think there's something psychological about it. If you make an effort to go observe something, I think you have a deep rooted expectation to see some sort of change. Some sort of movement. Some sort of action over time. So I think my brain was trying to see something change when in fact there was nothing to see. But eventually I got settled down and lowered my expectations to the point where I wasn't imagining the stars rearranging themselves for my benefit. And as you sit out there staring into the nothingness, and as your eyes get more and more adjusted to the darkness, you start seeing very faint stars that you didn't see at first. Time passes very slowly there in the dark cold night. And then it happens. It's never in your direct line of sight. But if you are staring wide eyed enough you can catch a glimpse of a meteor streaking across the sky. The ones we saw all happened in less than a second. If you blinked your eye at the wrong time you could miss it. But if you're lucky you'll see a tiny streak of light. It's not like the big huge meteors you see in the movies, full of smoky fire and brilliance. These were just small lines of white light that drew themselves across the sky. One of the most surprising things I found while watching the meteor shower is that they are dead silent. After watching a few Space Opera movies and TV shows, you develop this expectation that space is a noisy place and that astronomical events are accompanied by booming rolls of thunder and the hiss of flames. But of course none of this is true. The streaks of light across the sky have no Hollywood produced sound effects whatsoever. They happen so quickly and silently that you might be tempted to think you imagined them. Especially since there is so much time between them. From our less than ideal vantage point, we saw only 5 or 6 meteor strikes all night. But the trick is to get used to the nothingness that's going on in the sky. Once you accept the static nature of the night sky, a meteor strike is an unmistakable marvel. ==================================== Cultural Phenomena The Bookseller Wars Just down the road from my home, there is a pleasant little bookstore called Wellington books. It's a nice place to browse for books. It's got that down-to-earth, personalized feel to it that can only come from lots of love and attention. It's got that atmosphere that can only come when the owners' of the store are there day in and day out. It's the kind of place where you can expect to get to know the store owner on a first name basis. It's going out of business. It's always sad to lose a good store. But it's even worse with Wellington books because, I have to admit, I helped contribute to its demise. While I enjoyed browsing at Wellington books, all too often I found myself at one of its national chain competitors. Now, I feel just terrible. The Bookseller Wars have been getting a lot of press attention over the past couple of years. Apparently the loss of the neighborhood bookstore is all too common an occurrence across the nation. Most journalists portray the trend as a battle to the death between the Small Independent bookseller "just around the corner" and the Big Chain bookseller with its national distribution system and a huge supermarket style store at the local mall. To judge by the trends, the majority of the book buying public shares my hypocrisy. We love the Small Independent booksellers, yet we're giving our business to their Big Chain competitors. I think it's important to look more closely at the act of buying books and speculate a bit on how book buying has changed over the years in order to understand this sad trend. The Evolution of Book Buying: Once upon a time, pretty much your only access to a book was through the library or through your local, independently owned bookstore. Not only did you go to the bookstore to purchase a book, you went to your local bookstore to find out about the book in the first place. You trusted the owner to know what books are available and to make recommendations about which book you will suit your needs or likes. The price wasn't a big issue. You were glad to have access to the book. Back then, a book was a somewhat rare and treasured thing. The Industrial Revolution changed this somewhat. The production costs for books fell dramatically, so books became cheaper. And not only were they cheaper, a wider variety of books could be published. Since the costs of publishing a book were lower, publishers could afford to take some risks with a book. Especially with the advent of the paperback, book buying became accessible to a much wider variety of people. And while "dime novels," started showing up on the racks at drug stores and news stands, the local book store was still the primary place to find out about most books and still the primary place that most people bought their books. Today, thanks to the advent of the Information Age, book sellers are no longer the guardians of information about books. We no longer rely on the local book seller to make recommendations about books to buy. We no longer rely on the book seller to tell us what's available. In the last few decades, there has been an explosion of mass media. Newspapers are more widespread than ever. Radio is everywhere. TV is everywhere. And while it's just getting going, the Net is quickly permeating our culture. Because of this explosion of media, advertising is everywhere. Marketing has become big business and books are now "marketed" in addition to being "published." The end result of this information explosion is that often we already know what book we want to buy before we ever darken the doorstep of a book store. In many cases, the process of choosing which book to buy has become divorced from the process of actually making the purchase. In cases where the buyer has already chosen which book to buy, his or her objective switches from choosing a book to maximizing convenience and minimizing cost. At some level, convenience is measured by proximity. The closer the bookstore is, the less time/effort it takes to get there to make the purchase. However, the other factor is the likelihood that the bookstore has in stock the book you want to purchase. One way to handle this is to call the bookstore and find out. Here, the small independent book seller has an advantage. Regardless of the reality, the perception is that you are more likely to get a caring, helpful person when you call the Small Independent around the corner. But that doesn't do much good if the book is not in stock. The owner of the Small Independent will gladly order the book for you, if you're willing to wait for a few days for it to come in. But the Big Chain store, by its nature, is going to carry far more books than the Small Independent and is therefore more likely to have it in stock. The Big Chain is also more likely to be able to sell you the book at a better price, since they deal in large volumes. Despite the fact that the Small Independent may be closer, and the SI may have more knowledgeable helpful people working there, we come to rely on the Big Chain over time because it's more likely to have the book right now and more likely to have it at a better price. Of course, we don't always know what book we want to buy before going to the book store. For many people, especially those of us lamenting the demise of the Small Independent book seller, shopping for books is a pleasant pastime. Browsing for books is an adventure. There's the thrill of finding an unexpected diamond in the rough when browsing through shelves of books. And not only is there the thrill of foraging through shelves and shelves of books, book stores along with coffee houses, have become the mix and mingle spots for the literati. This isn't a new observation in any way. The rise of the book store as a socializing venue has been well documented over the past few years. The Small Independents can hold their own against the Big Chains in this regard precisely because they can create a more intimate atmosphere. Due to the personalization of the store given to them by the owner, and because they are smaller, the Small Independents promote more interaction among customers. If I'm browsing through six 6 aisles of books in the science fiction section of a Big Chain, I'm much less likely to have an opportunity to speak to that cute lady browsing over in the equally large cookbook section. But if I'm in a Small Independent shop where one side of the shelf has their sci-fi section and the other side has their cookbooks section, well, that's the stuff that movies are made of.... Alas, booksellers don't get paid for the number of dates they arrange, they get paid by the number of books they sell. And there are many competing options for people who enjoy browsing for books. First, there is the Small Independent's arch nemesis, the Big Chain. Because the Big Chain, by its nature, carries as many different titles as possible, there is a perception among buyers that they are better for general browsing. There are also libraries. Since they are funded by tax payers, they can afford to let people read books for "free." It's very difficult for the owner of a small independent book store to compete with free public libraries. There is also the free-market answer to the tax payer funded library, the used book store. Used Book stores aren't limited to books currently in print like other stores, so they hold an even greater sense of adventure for the book buyer. I have spent large portions of my leisure time happily foraging through the piles of books at my favorite used book stores. For people who truly enjoy the happy pastime of browsing for books, the Used Book Store is the ultimate place to go. At a used book store, there's the chance that you will run across something exquisitely rare. Perhaps you won't find a book that's extremely valuable, but there's always the chance that you'll find something utterly unique, or long out of print from a bygone era. Also like libraries, you can afford to experiment with the books you read. Since the used bookstore will almost certainly buy back next week the same book they sell you today, and at a reasonable fraction of the price, the cost of trying out a book at a Used book store is very small. At the risk of stating the obvious, browsing for books is a solitary business. You don't need a shop keeper to help you. In fact, most of the time, we'd rather NOT have a book seller hovering over us, trying to be helpful when we are browsing. Book publishers know this. And instead of relying on the store owner or store clerk to sell their books, they rely on books selling themselves. This is the appearance of books have changed over the decades. Once upon a time, when books were rare treasures, they were produced as if they were rare treasures. Much effort went into producing a book on valuable paper, using high quality materials. The craftsmanship of producing the book was used to convey the luxury of being able to own a book. Books were designed to look good on the shelves of a home library. But today, books are manufactured as cheaply as possible, so that as many as possible can be produced and sold at a reasonable cost and risk. But more importantly, book publishers design books to sell themselves. The invest in eye catching covers. They invest in artwork for the cover. They invest in getting reviews of a book printed on the cover, which requires a fair amount of effort and prep work. Today, the cover of the book is a brochure, trying to catch your attention and sell itself to you. The cover of a book is a marketing investment, not a production cost. So even though the Small Independent book store on the corner is a perfectly good place to go browsing for books, libraries, used book stores, and the Big Chains are also vying for the browsing book buyer's attention. And even if the Small Independent bookstore manages to lure the browser into their store, the bookseller has been left out of the loop because books are designed to sell themselves as much as possible. Hope for the Small Independent Bookseller: So far, the picture doesn't bode well for the Small Independent bookseller. But I think there's hope for them yet, though it may require a somewhat radical change to our concept of the Small Independent bookstore. The trick is to take a very close look at what it is exactly that we get from them. The fundamental thing that a Small Independent bookseller does for us, and the thing that makes them unique, is that they help us select a book. Why do we want that personal connection with our bookseller? I think it's because we want to establish a sense of trust between us. We want the bookseller to carry books that we will want to read, based on their knowledge of us and our tastes, preferably our own personal tastes. We dream of walking into our local book store and having the owner rush over to us and say, "Hi! I'm so glad you came in. We just got this book in and I couldn't help but think it's one that you'll want to read." In the past we wanted this sort of relationship because that's the only way we ever found out about books. Today, it's just the opposite problem. There is so much information out there from so many different sources, we can't deal with it all. It's classic information overload. Therein lies the hope of salvation for the Small Independent bookseller. The Small Independent booksellers need to realize that they are primarily in the business of selecting good books for us to read. They are our advisors. The value that they bring to the table is just the same as it ever was. The Small Independents have had to do this for years and years because, by their nature, they do not have as much shelf space as the Big Chain stores. Therefore they _have_ to be more discriminating about what they stock the shelves with. They are in essence brokers between book publishers and book buyers. They have to know the good books from the bad, and they have to know you, the customer, in order to successfully broker a deal between the two of you. The Big Chains don't even try to do this. They throw everything they can on the shelves on the grounds that you'll buy anything. So the Small Independent booksellers need to recognize that they are fundamentally in the brokering business, not the selling business. This is a subtle, but very fundamental distinction and they need to adjust their business accordingly. There are varying ways they can adapt to this shift in their purpose. The Small Affiliate Solution : The primary advantage that the Big Chains will always have is that they have lower distribution costs, due primarily to their large volumes. The primary advantage that a Small Independent has is it's discriminating taste. It would be nice to see a symbiosis of the Big Chains and Small Independents. Small Independents should propose an affiliation with the Big Chains in order to tap into the Big Chains distribution channels. These "Small Affiliates" would continue to maintain a separate store front and business location. And they would continue to rely on their reputation of selectively choosing which books appear on their shelves. Customers can be assured that the owner is still serving that editorial gatekeeper function, matching up the right books with their clientele. The Big Chain benefits by further increasing its volumes, while the Small Affiliate from lower costs for books. There are some dangers to this approach and some challenges. Currently, the book buying public doesn't perceive the value of having someone else weed out the good books from the bad and stock only the good books. The general perception currently among book buyers is that more titles on the shelves the better. But even for people who are just browsing, there is perhaps an advantage going to a store that has pulled out the trash. Isn't there more appeal to browsing through the cream of the crop? There needs to be a directed marketing effort to convince the buying public of this fact. If people already believed this then the Small Independents wouldn't be in trouble like they are. By being affiliated with the Big Chain, the Small Affiliate can partly allay the book buyer's fears that they are missing out on possible books. By being affiliated with the Big Chain, the Small Affiliate is telling the public, "We have _access_ to just as many books as the Big Chain, but we have purposely chosen to stock only the best books available." Affiliation, however, is a double edged sword. The book buying public must never believe that the Small Affiliates have compromised their editorial integrity in order to increase the sales volume of a particular book. The key to their success is to stock the best books, not the most popular. In an affiliate relationship, there will be inevitable temptation by the big chain to use the Small Affiliate to push certain books on to the public. The Independent Reviewer Solution: In the extreme case, the Small Independent can focus exclusively on what makes him or unique, the ability to select and recommend books. Maintaining a store, keeping a payroll, keeping inventory is a tough, expensive job. The Big Chains can do it better. So why compete? It may be possible for the Small Independent to get out of the book _selling_ business all together and transform themselves into Independent Reviewers. The trick is not to add to the information overload that book buyers already feel, but to help book buyers avoid it. As with the Small Affiliate solution, you want to actually narrow the range of books that buyers choose from in a positive, valuable way. I can think of three possible approaches to making a living as an Independent reviewer. First you can follow the examples already set by other information intensive industries. You can start your own book review newsletter. In the financial industry, for example, there are thousands and thousands of ways you can invest your money. So there is a secondary industry devoted strictly to analyzing the markets and suggesting investments and sharing market insights with newsletter subscribers. This is a tough way to make a living, but some manage it. The problem is that in order to make a living this way, you generally have to charge a relatively high price for your newsletter. For industries where there is a high amount of money invested, this is possible. But books tend to follow more of a low cost commodity model. So it's unclear if enough people will be willing to subscribe to a newsletter to help them buy books which are a relatively low cost, risk free investment of money. On the other hand, no one wants to waste time buying and reading a book that's no good. And certainly there are examples of some success. There are many people who won't consider reading a book unless it's received a favorable review in the New York Times Review of Books, or some other similar publication. The other way an Independent Reviewer can try to make a living is through the Book Club approach. Typically, the Book Club operated by mail order. Periodically, you receive a list of books and descriptions, which are recommended. If you choose, you can buy one of their recommended books, via mail. As with the Small Independent bookseller, the Book Club is in the business of matching up targeted buyers with books that will appeal to them. Unfortunately, Book Clubs have a somewhat negative image these days, mostly due to their own making. People are afraid of getting snookered into a contract where they have to buy a bunch of junk books just to keep their commitments to the contract. But these negative feelings toward Book Clubs are not inherent in the idea, just how they've been marketed. Indeed, some book clubs are overcoming the negative image by focusing on making their money from the publishers and distributors, not the book buyers. They are also focusing on taking advantage of existing high quality, positive brands. Take, for example, Oprah Winfrey's book club. Oprah Winfrey has turned herself into a one woman brand, cornering the Average Woman of Good Taste market. You don't have to be any sort of paid member to be in Oprah's book club. But when you walk into one of the Big Chain's stores, there is a table containing all the books that Oprah Winfrey recommends. Since there is value in Oprah's recommendation, you can bet that she's getting some value out of it, either from the publishers or by the Big Chains, which benefit from the increased sales volumes. Likewise, there is now a recommended book list from National Public Radio and other established brands. Of course, book clubs like these are tricky. Some Independent Reviewers may target certain demographic groups, as Oprah has done. Some may rely on common ideology as NPR has done. Still others may focus on genre or subject matter. And if you don't already have a well established brand image, it's difficult to convince publishers and distributors that you are worth spending any money on. Finally, the Independent Reviewer can attempt to go into the book branding business. In essence becoming a professional reviewer, but instead of publishing reviews in other media and adding to the information overload, you literally go into the branding business. This is a fairly new, but emerging activity. Today, you can buy technical books which have been reviewed for technical accuracy by an independent review organization. You know that the book has been reviewed by them because the reviewer's logo is "branded" on the cover of the book. The book publisher pays the reviewer to review the book for technical accuracy because there is value in having the brand on your book cover. Today, book branding is done for specific purposes. Reviewing for accuracy, suitability for children, conformance to religious values, etc. But why not create review brand for how enjoyable a book is to read? Once upon a time, the publisher's imprint used to serve this purpose. And in some cases, they would set up specialty imprint logos so that it would appear that the publisher focused on one type of book. When you go to the science fiction and see the TOR publisher logo on a book, you pretty much know what sort of book you're going to get. And at the extremes, the logo becomes cliché. Everyone knows what a Harlequin Romance novel is going to be like, even if you've never read one. But for the most part, publishers are in the business of publishing so many titles, that you no longer get a sense of what sorts of books they publish. So there's an opportunity for the Independent Reviewer to step in and create a cross-publisher brand image that's valuable to the buying public, the distributors, and the publishers. But Will It Work? Will the Small Independent Bookseller be able to adapt to the changes in the book buying marketplace quickly enough to survive? Which of these transformations will work and which won't? It's too early to tell. But one thing's for sure, those that try to hold on to the nostalgic image of the Little Book Shop Around The Corner aren't going to survive. ==================================== Current Events Aiding Cubans The recent liberalization of the total blockade of Cuba was a small, almost inconsequential move which got far more press than it deserved. However, as small a step as it is, it is nonetheless a step in the correct direction. But changing American policy toward Cuba is always a tough challenge. Some people, most notably entrenched politicians who've been around long enough to remember the Cuban Missle Crisis, can't stomach the thought of showing any mercy toward Cuba. Some less idealistic and more cowardly simply can't stand the thought of admitting that the time has come for change. So Clinton, never one to take a bold stand unless the polling numbers showed overwhelming support, made only minor changes to the policy. But they were important ones. Under the new rules, there can now be the establishment of direct mail service to Cubans and people in the United States can now send money directly to their families who are still in Cuba. As 30 years of experience has shown us, total economic blockades hurt the people far more than they hurt the government. After 30 years, the Cuban people are starving and Castro is as entrenched as ever. In fact, the U.S. blockade of Cuba actually helps Castro enforce his communist regime on citizens who would otherwise oppose state control of their lives. In effect, Castro has been saying, "I'm in charge of the economy. You will work in the job I tell you to work in, you will earn the pay I say you should earn, and you will buy things only from the sate." And the United States has, in effect, been saying, "You can't buy anything from or sell anything to anyone outside of Cuba." The key to establishing a useful policy toward Cuba is to drive a wedge between Castro's communists and the people. Our policy should be that Americans can have any sort of relations with individual Cubans that they want to. They can visit Cuba, buy, sell, and trade with any Cuban citizen, but not the Cuban government. But Americans would do so at their own risk. We can't be responsible for protecting them while in Cuba. We should offer no official recognition of Castro's regime or acknowledge the legitimacy of Castro's form of government. This will allow the seeds of economic prosperity to be sown on Cuban soil for the first time in many decades and it will help feed the poor Cubans and may even put them on the road to the re-establishment of a vibrant middle class and put them in a position to bring about change. Starving people make poor revolutionaries. ===================================== About Stuck In Traffic Stuck In Traffic is a monthly magazine dedicated to evaluating current events, examining cultural phenomena, and sharing true stories. Why "Stuck In Traffic"? Because getting stuck in traffic is good for you. It's an opportunity to think, ponder, and reflect on all things, from the personal to the global. As Robert Pirsig wrote in _Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance_, "Let's consider a reevaluation of the situation in which we assume that the stuckness now occurring, the zero of consciousness, isn't the worst of all possible situations, but the best possible situation you could be in. After all, it's exactly this stuckness that Zen Buddhists go to so much trouble to induce...." Submissions: Submissions to Stuck In Traffic are always welcome. If you have something on your mind or a personal story you'd like to share, please do. You don't have to be a great writer to be published here, just sincere. Contact Information: All queries, submissions, subscription requests, comments, and hate-mail about Stuck In Traffic should be sent to Calvin Stacy Powers preferably via E-mail (powers@ibm.net) or by mail (2012 Talloway Drive, Cary, NC USA 27511). Copyright Notic: Stuck In Traffic is published and copyrighted by Calvin Stacy Powers who reserves all rights. 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