Looking just now for John Le Carre's age, I stumbled on this site, a most interesting and useful resource.
Here's a perfect example of disruptive technology. The author of the book of author pseudonyms featured below on amazon has been doing this for decades: Hawk produced his first edition in 1990. The third edition came out in 1999, priced at $125.
Why would anyone bother buying it when all the info is free online, accessible from anywhere in the world without dragging along some giant reference book that's already 6 years out of date?
I'm reminded of the reverse phone directory I used to buy every year for $50 or so, until reverse look-up online made it obsolete, and Google's look-up feature made even the reverse look-up sites redundant.
Another business destroyed by the Internet would be the nationwide phone directories on CDs, which I bought annually for $200. I still get their brochures, but why they're still in business is baffling to me.
Article comments
1 - Anita Campbell
Hi BookofJoe,
I don't know about the pseudonym book, since I've never had reason to look one up.
But as to reverse and other phone directories, there are several reasons the CD makers would still be in business. (Oh, and they still make microfiche, too!)
First, libraries buy the CDs and microfiche.
Second, certain kinds of businesses use phone directories to look up numbers in bulk and create large databases with the numbers for all sorts of purposes (telemarketing, non-profit fundraising, prospecting lists). An Internet site where you have to look up numbers onesy-twosy doesn't cut it.
Third, the phone directories on the Internet vary in quality. They don't all pull up the correct answer all of the time. The CD versions are much more comprehensive and accurate.
I'll grant you that certain types of content have been "devalued" because of the Internet. News, consumer content, basic factual information, and light advice and how-to's are just some of the content that users have come to expect for free on the Internet.
But, most of the time, I find that if I want in-depth, reliably-up-to-date, high-quality BUSINESS content, I have to purchase it. The business content providers have seen their businesses grow because the Internet actually increases demand. Due to the ease of accessing and searching for information on the Internet, it makes us want more, more, more content.