The Future of Books

I predict that the future of books is going to significantly change by generation.  Books are a form of media, and the standard of media consumption is changing dramatically by generation.  While I don't believe that books in print form are going anywhere soon (roughly the next 50 years), it is evident that each coming generation is less and less attached to the printed consumption of media.  Even toddlers nowadays are fixated on brightly colored and interactive ipad displays.  If this is their nurtured standard of media consumption from such a young age, I believe print will quickly become obsolete.  The toddlers of present still have parents and current systems in place that still value print.  But I believe the slow phase-out of print has already begun.
Motion, with video and auditory sensory stimulation, is going to take precedence with the coming generations.  It is a much more automatic and easy form of communication.  While this may seem tragic to intellectuals both present and past, there is a growing literary group who believes written language communication will be totally non-existent in the future.  I believe that the e-book is just a stepping stone in this direction.  I believe the ebook will be equivalent to the cassette-tape—only relevant for a short period of time.  When getting into future projections of technology by current notable experts, the consumption of knowledge is predicted to dramatically advance and improve through the emergence of bio-technology.
In the near future, the book offers a very particular experience both physically and intellectually.  The turning of physical pages and objectification of knowledge in physical form is something many humans have grown very attached to as a pleasurable experience.  Intellectually, the actual reading and comprehension of plain text requires much more work on the part of the brain—a sort of meeting in the middle—to fully grasp the author's message, which will be the downfall of the book for future generations.
I believe that books are here to stay for at least our lifetimes—though not for long after.  While they may achieve some sort of nostalgic revival as the vinyl record is encountering now, at least after one hundred years, other quicker mediums of communication will replace them and reduce them to a thing of the past.