intd 105 essay #2

7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

1/12

Boselli 1

John Boselli

Dr. Cooper

Interdepartmental 105

1 March 2012

Alibris and Thousand Dollar Wordsfdhfhsdfhsdfhdshfsh

Founded in 1997 by former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Labor Martin Manley,

online book retailer Alibris, according to its own featured history page, acts as business

liaison between more than ten thousand independent vendors and their clientele,

cataloguing more than seventy million books across sixty-five countries into a tangible

knowledge home delivery service. At its most basic, all that is necessary to engage

Alibris is the use of a search bar, yet in the landscape about that unassuming vacancy the

construction and arrangement are careful; the meditative color palette, the simple menus,

and even the elegant-yet-handy sidebars the website features bear the comfort of a

secondhand bookstore, but in a simulated fashion that nearly sterilizes the experience. In

this way, the experience ofAlibris page is at once antiquarian and humbly intellectual,

and these strains are made uncomfortably at odds with one another.

Alibris: Used Books, Used Textbooks, Rare & Out-of-Print Books, reads the

page title at the home screen. A tripartite wash of beige, golden orange, and powder blue

Formatted: Line spacing: Double

Formatted: Centered, Line spacinDouble

7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

2/12

Boselli 2

dominates the space. The former, ofbrowns warmth and whites coolness, of piety and

simplicity covers the background, canvas-like. The pale, disparate-yet-unassuming blue

directs the eye to the filter options, hypertext, and aforementioned sidebars; while the

more dramatic warm yellow tones are relatively dramatic coloring of the seller ratings

and thatparamount Add to Cart button: the end-all of the Alibris experience. These

hues are the visual muzak of the page, subconsciously effective and unnoticeable until

sought after:


7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

3/12

Boselli 3

The Alibris.com homepage.

A typical results page for a book search.

However inspired by archetypal vintage, hole-in-the-wall, and Shakespeare and

Company-style bookshops Alibris geography may be, its virtual form bears but a passing

resemblance to the packed shelves rhymeless and nonsensical in their stocking pattern so

indicative of a secondhand vendor. Perhaps the inability to represent the book smell of

decomposing lignin may be the most upsetting violation. When the expected landscape is

jettisoned due to total incongruity with the Internet medium, the thrill of the find is gone;

the search bar yields a response if it is told what to find.

Serendipitous experience, at its best, is limited to suggestions the site presents to

us. Any aroused awe at their presentation is dashed when one considers that the site has

algorithimically gathered these matches from previous selections; ones literary

predilections are echoed stronger as his site history accumulates and extends. True, one

who looks for these qualities online is misguided. The Age of Information has practically

levelled the population of Alibris terra firma counterparts, largely eliminating that final

7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

4/12

Boselli 4

romantic, Parisian semblance of the twentieth century old-fashionedness. Another

consequence of this loss is that it merges two markets: those in pursuit of knowledge and

those wishing to commodify it.

The (diminished) experience of buying a used or vintage book is now confined

predominately to the apeing, diorama-like Sales Annexes in Barnes and Noble stores

nationwide, standing in all its diminishment. Consequentially, the presumably earnest,

passionate former patrons funneled into the realm competitive rare book trade. Despite

appearing last in that page title (Alibris:Used & Rare Books), these investors

contribute great revenue to the the company, ifits search parameters are any indication.

Perhaps Alibris knows its chief demographic well. We may filter books by edition,

condition, year of publication, collectibility, binding type, status as signed or unsigned,

and with jacket or without, aside from the classical criteriaon of price, condition, and

seller rating:

.

The range of Alibris search criteria.

Formatted: Font: Times New Rom

Formatted: No Spacing, Add spabetween paragraphs of the same Line spacing: Double

Formatted: Font: Italic, Do not chspelling or grammar

7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

5/12

Boselli 5

Operating on the dichotomy of books as economic and spiritual/mental stores of

value,

Handling its stock as both literature and as stores of value, Alibris now sees more returns

from the self-interest of- former antiquarians than from ofthe latterseekerspursuers of

self-intellectual betterment. As mentioned above. Quite menacingly, the retailer, in a

matter that may only be described as menacing, has the self-aggrandizers and self-

improvers are tossed both partiestossed onto the trading floor of thewhere their stock to

be bought or traded, the accomplishments of others, lay equally accessible to both.

Essentially, where open outcry meets earnestnesssincerity.

While this may sound far-fetched, consider the implications a signed, rare, first

edition of a book may have for men of these poles. He who seeks personal

aggrandizement in the selling of authorial memorabilia will most likely be interested in

purchasing the volume, with no qualms to the potential cheapening of the contained

experience, quite probably not opening once its covers. Conversely, he who seeks

closeness to the works period of composition, to the writer whose material he has

learned well into himself, as a reverent who holds text as relic, shall desire to purchase it

as well. Alike only in action, these men have thus become one anothers adversary, even

if their competition is less economic than it is ideological.

, diametrically opposed in intent. Under the Rare Books tab of the website, twee

platitudes are used as column labels. , e.g., First edition books evoke fond memories,

and Author-signed books are truly unique treasures. best convey their overhanded

attempts at pandering to bibliophiles. Furthermore, the section is absolutely riddled with


Formatted: Font: Times New Rompt






pt







Formatted: Font: 12 pt




7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

6/12

Boselli 6

articles on the trappings of dealing in tired tomes, namely repair, restoration, and

condition grading. Alibris is consciously aware of the steady drift into obsolescence

modeled by the broad Used Books portion of its sites self-description, and has

established guardedwell its Rare & Out-of-Print cornerstone with sustainability

initiatives;s, as well, for the aforementioned guides shall gather disheartened intellectuals

into the stock-cum-book exchange, increasing competition and generating revenue for

Alibris, all for the purchase of a hard-to-find work of literature.

The twee platitudes of Rare Books.

What is most disconcerting, however, is that even this online market is fading,

albeit at a much slower rate than secondhand shops about the world. However, always

dedicated to counteraction and preventative measures, Alibris begun to prepare itself for

the ascendant age of the eBook, already possessing a dedicated tab for them. Better yet,

the retailer was a charter member of Googles own eBook service, founded in 2010. In

this way, the devices of the sites design are constant, while the stock is not. Alibris will

not abdicate its role as middleman, especially in light of its growing out of Interloc,





ptFormatted: No Spacing, Add spabetween paragraphs of the same


Formatted: Font:

Formatted: Font:

Formatted: Font:

Formatted: Font:

Formatted: Font:

Formatted: Font:

Formatted: Font:

7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

7/12

Boselli 7

another online company whose very name is born of interlocutor speaker between.

As improved tablet and e-reader models simply pour from their outsourced centers of

production, with annotation functions and exceedingly large memories, eBooks will

become literatures emblematic medium for newer generations, further driving print

media into obsolescence. After all, code cannot be vintage; the production of new

literature will be one-dimensional.

Note Googles presence.

These eBooks, for worse, are the final frontier, as there is simply no going beyond

them, beyond the text itself. We are given, through this technology, the bones of a text.

There is no historical reminder of their existence, such as a simple dust jacket, cloth-

bound boards, or even paper. These muscles, as it were, are utterly peripheral.

Paradoxically, however, are literatures most vital, wonderful, godliness-suffused pieces:

the poetic structures for the God inside.



7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

8/12

Boselli 8


7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

9/12

Boselli 9

John Boselli

Dr. Cooper

Interdepartmental 105

1 March 2012

Essay Blocking:

1) Careful description w/ critical analysis-Color is predominantly beige, with blue and orange accents for emphasis

+Warmth of brown and the coolness of white

+Modern return to low-fashion colors

-Beige is like the martini of color.quiet but toxic. New

York Club organizer Erich Conrad in a 1997 Esquire article

+Associated with piety and simplicity

Formatted: Centered, Line spacinDouble, No bullets or numbering

7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

10/12

Boselli 10

+Accents

-Pale, tranquil blue directs eye to various editions along the

left sidebar of the screen

-Gold orange on the Add to Cart button

2) Characterize environment and ecology-Connects independent book retailers

+Middleman

-Search filters

+Filter by edition leads parameters

-Condition, publication year, first edition, autographed, jacket

3) Metaphors structuring our understanding of the space

-Duality of the commodification of knowledge

+At once a bookstore and store of value market

-Introduces obvious element of economic self-interest

+A means by which to self-aggrandize through the

accomplishments of others, thus cheapening the

experience to a degree

-Search and purchase suggestions track behaviors

+Under Rare Books tabs

-Twee platitudes as subject heads, e.g. First edition books

evoke fond memories and Author-signed books are truly

unique treasures

-Articles at the bottom of the page designed to introduce the

7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

11/12

Boselli 11

enterprise of bookselling to the relative amateurs who employ

the site for its more obvious purposes

4) Why do we travel there?

-To purchase knowledge and have it delivered to us

5) How does it re-conceptualize a familiar space?-Any dive, hole-in-the-wall vintage and rare book store

+Or even the Sales Annex of Barnes and Noble

-Which in a way is a upscale conversion of their relatively

humbler inspiration

+Retains the characteristic discount prices

6) Does is it introduce an emergent one?

-Alibris

+Founded 1997 by Former U.S. Secretary of Labor David Manley

-Grew out of Interloc, a company founded by antiquarian

booksellers

+Interloc-utor = go-between

-Offers more than 70 million books from a network of over

10,000 booksellers in 65 countries

+Charter member of Google eBooks service in 2010

+Sells music, videos, video games, but header atop the Internet

window reads, Alibris: Used Books, Used Textbooks,

Rare & Out-of-Print Books

Formatted: Centered, Indent: LefLine spacing: Double


7/30/2019 Intd 105 Essay #2

12/12

Boselli 12

-Definite focus on literature above other sold media

This topic presupposes that, phenomenologically, we have learned to experience

information technologies as a space: we go online for increasingly immersive games,

social interactions, virtual tours, shopping trips, and innumerable other pleasures. Your

task here is to combine careful description of some particular online space with your own

critical analysis. How would you characterize its environment and ecology? What sort

of embedded metaphors structure our understanding of this space? Why do we travel

there? The best essays will go beyond plot summary and help readers to think of online

experience differentlywhether by reconceptualizng a familiar space or introducing an

emergent oneand to think of online experience in relation to the non-virtual realm.

Screenshots and other graphics are welcome, perhaps even necessary.

Formatted: Centered, Indent: LefLine spacing: Double

intd 105 essay #2

Documents