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[Rose]

OBS SPEAKS OUT: THE DEATH OF THE BOOKSTORE?

An OBS Speaks Out brought to you by OBS contributor Rose.

“Are brick-and-mortar bookstores doomed? People have been predicting the downfall of physical bookstores for quite some time, but with many stores vanishing and shelf selections getting much worse, the warnings have gotten more dire lately.”

Those were the first words written in this article from io9.com titled ‘Bookstores Are Dead (If You Want Them To Be)’.  It pained me to hear how so many bookstores will be closing and I thought about how life would be if bookstores ceased to exist entirely. It disturbed me and perturbed me.

I wouldn’t know what to do if all the bookstores closed up shop. My favorite past time is entering a bookstore and proceeding to get lost for hours in the aisles of print. What past time? I still do it today.  Book browsing is such a tactile experience. The cover art, the heft of the book, glimpsing at the blurb on the back cover and then ruffling through the innards to capture snippets of conversation or read a passage about a far away land, all the while deciding whether it’s worth purchasing. Bookstores are like libraries to me, except of course all books are new and once you check em out, you can’t check em back in.

Read more here...
http://openbooksociety.com/article/speaks-out-the-death-of-the-bookstore-01-15-10/

[dawn]

I love bookstores. I love the smell, the vibe, the whole atmosphere.
BUT I don't go to them very often. I purchase most stuff online.

[elizabeth]

I love going to bookstores! I go there more than I should probably. The people who work at the one near me know me by name lol.

[Emily-June]

The people who work at the one near me know me by name lol.

this is just great


i love bookstores and i don't know what to do with my rare freetime if they would close ... i love to get lost between bookshelfes while discovering new books and covers - and doing some cross-reading in books i'm interested in to be sure to finally buy them - or to not buy them because the german translation is horrible
but i have to confess that the most books i buy at least i buy online ... but that's only because the most bookstores here don't have all the english books i want - mostly they only have one book of a series and if i want something i want ALL of it

[ifellhard]

I love going to bookstores and just walking around checking things out.  I confess that I get most of my books online, but I still get a fair share at Borders and Barnes & Noble.  It would be tragic if the bookstores ceased to exist.  They're wise to diversify their products to include music, gifts, and coffee shops to keep people coming into the stores!

[Karolina_Avalon]

I keep on thinking about this article whenever I'm walking to and from work and smiling- because the amount of people I see walking along with their faces buried in books (and trying not to walk under cars) , instead of listening to audiobooks or whatever (which would be far safer, let's be honest), suggests that we don't have to worry, and the book store is as alive as it ever was!

[Angie]

Book stores are amazing. They have endless possibilities. I just want to read everything I see even though i know that's impossible.

I love that they've included coffee shops in bookstores. I want to just sip and read all day. 
I will say that I buy everything I sit and read. It honestly bothers me a bit when people get a stack of magazines and sit and read them all cover to cover then get up and leave without buying a thing. It's not a library....

[Hutchxx]

Gosh, this always makes me sad! I will say I do every now again get my books from Amazon but there is never ever anything like going in to a huge book shop and picking out millions of books you want to read! :) x