Caption: A book locating/lending phenomenon known as the "Dewey
Decimal System" - enabling users to get access to copyrighted text
material for free - has sent shockwaves through a panicked publishing
industry.
Drawing: A man identified as Publishers Spokesman Brent Aulett asking,
"Why would anyone pay for a book once it's accessible for
free?!" as, in the background, people search a card catalog, and
browse the stacks of a library.
Caption: The plan is as complex as it is diabolically clever. A
"library" buys books, users find them through Dewey's classification
system, and borrow them for free!
Drawing: A diagram of the interrelationships between a publishing
company, a book, a library, a card catalog, a user, a borrower's card, and
an easy chair.
Caption: The inventor of the system is Melvil Dewey, a plucky
149-year-old who's been dead for 69 years, so his business plan is unclear.
Drawing: A man, bespectacled, balding, and bearded.
Caption: But he's got readers giddily borrowing books, to be consumed
at leisure, and free of charge!
Drawing: Two people on a porch saying, "Screw Updike! I'm beating
the system!" and "Power to the people!"
Caption: Established writers like Tom Clancy have stopped producing
their output.
Drawing: A man on a lounger saying, "What's that you say?
Libraries? For free?! Denise, get me Ovitz! I'm packing it
in!" as he tosses his laptop computer into the pool.
Caption: Young writers have also given up. Brad McClatchen has ceased
work on his collection of poems entitled "Of an Oleander,
Recriminate."
Drawing: Young goateed man in front of a typewriter saying,
"Obviously, my dream of making millions through poetry is dust. I'm
calling my brother about that tire sales job."
Caption: Publishers of course are suing, but they are not optimistic.
Drawing: Brent Aullett pointing and saying, "Mark my words: this
"Dewey Decimal System" will be the death of literature!"
Caption: Next: Shower-Singing Threatens Music Industry!
Drawing: Suds-covered naked man singing, "I wanna know what love
is..." as people in suits gather outside the shower door.
Ruben Bolling, Tom the Dancing Bug 26 August 2000.
Tom the Dancing Bug can be found at http://www.tomthedancingbug.com/.
I don't know whether the drawing in the third panel is really of Melvil Dewey. However, considering that the birth and death information is accurate, I would suspect that it is.
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| Cartoon Bibliography | Changes last made on: 20 October 2000. |
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