Print is Dead: Books in Our Digital Age

Paul La Monica, writing on the CNNMoney site last week had an article entitled “Disney tries to save the CD,” which was about Disney’s recent debut of a new compact disc format which they’re wishing upon a falling star will reverse the current downward trend of CD sales. As La Monica puts it, “The once mighty compact disc is slowly but surely on its way toward joining the cassette, 8-track and vinyl LP on top of the music format scrap heap.” And even those in the industry realize this; last year UK EMI chairman Alan Levy declared that “the CD is dead.” But now Disney’s trying to bring it back to life. How? By introducing yet another CD format. Named CDVU+ (“pronounced CD view plus,” not that I think consumers will really be asking for it), Disney’s Hollywood records is debuting the new disc on an upcoming CD from boy-band The Jonas Brothers. But what’s the difference between the CDVU+ and regular CDs? According to La Monica, “The CD will launch a digital magazine that features loads of exclusive content. Disney worked with Zinio, a company that helps magazine and book publishers deliver content online, to launch this service. The CDVU+ will also allow Jonas Brothers fans to check out videos and photos, get song lyrics and create posters.” What’s really silly about this is that fans of bands and music already have the capacity to “check out videos and photos, get song lyrics and create posters”; it’s called the Internet.

Of course, what Disney’s probably going to do is make a lot of the content made available on the CDVU+ exclusive, so you have to buy the disc to experience it, which is probably the dumbest thing they could do. Why lock a video or some song lyrics onto a proprietary format CD when you could put it on YouTube or your own website and have nearly anyone in the world discover your band (and brand)? In terms of new bands and music, people will probably buy CDVU+ discs if they like the band and that’s all that’s available to them. But in those cases, they won’t be choosing CDVU+ per se, they’ll be choosing the music itself. For instance, I plan on buying the new Flaming Lips concert movie At The Zoo - The Legendary Concert In Oklahoma City, which is being released in the new CD MVI format (which is kind of a cross between a CD and DVD). But the only reason I’m buying it is because I want the content. Faced with another choice in terms of something less expensive or that I was more technically comfortable with, I’d take it. So I think that the CDVU+ will be a short term novelty, not unlike the Dual Disc which is a CD on one side and a DVD on the other side, or the Super Audio CD (SACD) which is basically the same thing. Because the more formats and standards that exist the more complicated it’s going to be for consumers, who increasingly face of all of these choices with wariness. It reminds me of the line in a Charles Bukowski poem about Van Gogh, where he writes,”Van, whores don’t want ears, they want money.” The music business should — by now — realize that consumers don’t want new formats of CDs, they want music.