Incidentally I "like" the comments of other posters on this and the other thread. For some reason my "like" button isn't working. I hear it's the same for some other posters.
slimboyfat
JoinedPosts by slimboyfat
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7
Reading technology as a driver of religious change among JWs
by slimboyfat ini wonder if jws are currently undergoing a more significant transformation than generally appreciated.
and i wonder if the drivers for that change are a combination of legal, economic, and technological factors.
legal challenges changed jws stance of whether they are a "religion" with "ministers", in the 1950s, and stopped them charging for the literature in the 1990s.
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7
Reading technology as a driver of religious change among JWs
by slimboyfat ini wonder if jws are currently undergoing a more significant transformation than generally appreciated.
and i wonder if the drivers for that change are a combination of legal, economic, and technological factors.
legal challenges changed jws stance of whether they are a "religion" with "ministers", in the 1950s, and stopped them charging for the literature in the 1990s.
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slimboyfat
shepherdless I agree a lot with what you say but I explain where I possibly differ on this thread:
https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5134538567057408/books-dying-out-this-reason-wt-turning-tablets
Specifically:
Watchtower had an advantage over other fundamentalist Christians in that it had a highly successful business model based on its publishing business.
Totally agree.
Technology has destroyed that business, and now Watchtower now depends solely on donations from its own adherents.
No, technology didn't destroy their business. Their decision to drop charges for the literature in 1990 destroyed their business. It was an unforced error. There is no particular reason why they couldn't still be making good profits from book and magazine publishing to this day. They'd have to pay taxes perhaps, but they'd still be making a profit.
Technology didn't destroy their business, their own stubbornness and refusal to pay taxes destroyed their publishing empire.
Rather, technology has allowed the WT to move out of publishing and into tablets and downloads in an attempt to save their financial situation, as a result of their publishing business already having failed.
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Books are not dying out and this is not the reason for the WT turning to tablets
by slimboyfat inthere's a popular misconception that books in general are in terminal decline, that this is the reason the wt organisation has turned to tablets instead of print, and this in turn has created a financial crisis for the organisation which traditionally relied upon publishing books for income.
this is wrong on a number of levels.
firstly physical books are not in terminal decline, they are as popular as ever with consumers.
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slimboyfat
Good question. (When did they stop charging for the literature?)
I think they stopped charging in the US and other western countries pretty hot on the heels of the Swaggart case, probably in 1990 or 1991. A special letter was read to congregation about the change.
However JWs in many developing countries continued to charge for the literature for a number of years! I think it was the late 1990s before the motto "you've received free, give free" was rolled out to those in poor countries who most needed it!
I'd like to see corroboration of these points but I'm pretty sure this is accurate.
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Books are not dying out and this is not the reason for the WT turning to tablets
by slimboyfat inthere's a popular misconception that books in general are in terminal decline, that this is the reason the wt organisation has turned to tablets instead of print, and this in turn has created a financial crisis for the organisation which traditionally relied upon publishing books for income.
this is wrong on a number of levels.
firstly physical books are not in terminal decline, they are as popular as ever with consumers.
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slimboyfat
There's a popular misconception that books in general are in terminal decline, that this is the reason the WT organisation has turned to tablets instead of print, and this in turn has created a financial crisis for the organisation which traditionally relied upon publishing books for income.
This is wrong on a number of levels. Firstly physical books are not in terminal decline, they are as popular as ever with consumers. Secondly the reason the WT in particular is replacing physical books with downloads is because they can't make a profit from books any more. The reason the WT can no longer make a profit from publishing books and magazines is because they were forced by law in the US in 1990 to stop charging a cover price for their literature or else be liable to pay tax.
The WT's loss of income from book publishing therefore pre-dates the advent of ebooks and tablets by a number of years. The WT was already making a loss from the books it was publishing by the mid-1990s hence the attempts to cut costs by producing cheap paperbacks, cutting back on calendars, magazines, large volumes and so on. From a position of making a very healthy profit from book publishing for most of its 100 plus year history, the WT started to make losses from the 1990s onwards.
The organisation had significant financial reserves which enabled it to withstand lower income for a considerable period following 1990. Plus of course they expected Armageddon by the end of the 1914 generation, don't forget. Instead the financial crash of 2008 arrived and the reduced income of the organisation started to bite hard. Other losses from investments during the crash compounded the problem. Not to mention abuse lawsuits, aging bethelites and health and care costs and whatever else. So they decided to sell some of their considerable property assets to increase cash flow. This helped, but only for a few years, and it dawned of the WT leaders that eventually they would need to address the situation, as Lett described it, where "we have more money going out than we have coming in brothers!" This is when mass bethel layoffs began and branches started to close. The situation had rapidly worsened and taken the GB unawares. The response was somewhat chaotic as branches were closed abruptly and other cutbacks in haphazard fashion.
It is also the period (roughly 2014, or so?) when the WT did an abrupt 180 degree turn, from somewhat discouraging use of tablets in the meetings, to strongly encouraging their use by all the brothers. Virtually overnight the situation changed from tablets being the preserve of a few brothers who were derided as "show off" technophiles, and materialistic, to the situation where every pensioner publisher and pious pioneer in the KH was encouraged to purchase a tablet in order to avail themselves of the spiritual provisions.
Therefore the WT's move into tablets and away from printed material was not a result of broader societal trends. It was rather necessitated by their lack of profit from book publishing (since the 1990s) being compounded by their cash flow problems following the 2008 financial crash. Publishing printed material of any quality or quantity is simply a luxury the WT can no longer afford. The arrival of tablets and ebook technology has to some extent saved the WT from a sticky financial situation. However their financial problems appear to run deep and this measure, combined with branch closures and bethel layoffs, may only afford a reprieve rather than a reversal of fortunes.
Maybe some people are sceptical of my claim that books in general remain as popular as ever and that tablets and ebooks are not replacing books among non-JWs. Indeed the idea that books are in terminal decline remains a popular misconception even among the general public. Why do people think this? Some reasons include:
1. The replacement of physical books by tablets and ebooks has been confidently predicted for around a decade now.
2. Bookshops have closed down everywhere and there are hardly any left so this must show that books are dying out.
3. Newspapers are drastically declining in popularity and it's assumed books are the same.
4. New technology has rendered DVDs and CDs largely obsolete and it's assumed the same applies to books.
This is wrong because:
1. While it's long been predicted that ebooks will replace physical books, recent figures show ebook sales are down and physical books are up. In terms of value, physical book sales have never been higher. Ebooks now look more like a fad and/or a niche interest than a wholesale disruption of the book market.
2. It's true that many bookshops have closed down. The reason for this is that people are buying their books online not at local bookshops. And they are buying tons of books online.
3. The reason newspapers are in decline is because the Internet provides instantaneous news these days. This is a challenge for newspapers in particular, not for printed media in general. Most (or all) books and magazines contain information with a much longer shelf life than a daily newspaper. So they are simply not as vulnerable to decline in the face of the Internet as newspapers are. It's the immediacy of news that makes newspapers vulnerable to online alternatives rather than the printed page being out of date.
4. It's true that DVDs and CDs and various other media technology have become pretty obsolete. But there are advantages to the physical book that still make it an attractive option compared with alternatives, and in ways that simply don't apply to other forms of media. Plus it's worth remembering that books have been around 2000 years whereas DVDs and what else have only been around a few decades at most.
Book sales around the globe are booming.
The WT is getting out of publishing because they can't charge for their literature any more, and because they are in financial difficulty, not because books and magazines in general are becoming obsolete.
None of the above is to claim, incidentally, that books won't eventually become obsolete or be replaced by alternatives. That may happen! Who can predict the future? The point is that it hasn't happened yet, not by a long stretch. And it's wrong to use the "decline of books" as a false premise to explain the WT's current rapid exit from book and magazine publishing. The real reason for this move is that book and magazine publishing isn't making the WT a profit any longer, and in straightened financial circumstances printing books and magazines of quality and quantity has become a luxury the WT simply cannot afford.
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Watchtower teaches that Jesus dying on the stake is no longer certain
by Listener inthe watchtower has held for many years that jesus died on a stake and held strongly to this teaching.
w 1951 3/15 the above agrees with the new world translation of the christian greek scriptures in its appendix, page 769, in saying that the instrument upon which jesus was nailed was a stake without a crossbeam, and not the religiously represented “cross”; and that the greek word used for that instrument in ancient time meant a “stake” and not the conventional religious cross.
they are no longer certain on this point.
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slimboyfat
Yes it is an argument they use, and I guess it makes some sense. They point to Roman executions that involved hundreds of people and say it wouldn't have been practical to make crossbeams for all those people. Mmm, now that I restate it I'm not sure it does make much sense. If I have remembered it correctly.
It's worth noting that one of the revisions of the 2013 NWT was dropping the wacky "impale" rendering whose sole function was to avoid the word crucify. Which was slightly amusing considering the lengths some apologists had gone to defend "impale" and the WT left them high and dry.
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Watchtower teaches that Jesus dying on the stake is no longer certain
by Listener inthe watchtower has held for many years that jesus died on a stake and held strongly to this teaching.
w 1951 3/15 the above agrees with the new world translation of the christian greek scriptures in its appendix, page 769, in saying that the instrument upon which jesus was nailed was a stake without a crossbeam, and not the religiously represented “cross”; and that the greek word used for that instrument in ancient time meant a “stake” and not the conventional religious cross.
they are no longer certain on this point.
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slimboyfat
I think they previously conceded it might be a cross shape but said ultimately it doesn't matter.
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Observation of Sam Heard at Regional Convention in Dayton, OH
by LevelThePlayingField inheard gave 3 talks at the convention.
one thing i noticed rather quickly was how stuck he was to his notes.
he rarely looked up.
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slimboyfat
Well he is getting old.
Back in the day he could wax lyrical extemporaneously on how women are not as smart as men and what can turn people gay.
There are YouTube videos.
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Pastor Russell letters?
by vienne inmost of those who read my comments and posts here know i'm not a witness but a historian who writes about them.
as my writing partner and i near completion of volume 2 of separate identity, we need scans of any letters, post cards or what have you written by russell, any of his associates or any pre-1916 adherent - no matter how insignificant they may appear.. can you helps with this?
we also need clear scans of watch tower convention programs from that era.. i appreciate any help that comes my way.. rachael.
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slimboyfat
I hope you find what you are looking for.
You know, about ten years or so ago I saw the most amazing thing on eBay. It was a homemade Bible Student quiz/board game dating from before the First World War. Perhaps it had no direct connection to Russell himself, but it would have been a fascinating insight into early Bible Student ideas and social history. I have been kicking myself for not buying it ever since.
Homemade Bible quizzes and board games have been quite popular among JW generally. I'd like to get my hands on anything of that sort, but this was a very early example.
Would that sort of ephemera also be useful? I wonder if others come across that sort of thing.
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Reading technology as a driver of religious change among JWs
by slimboyfat ini wonder if jws are currently undergoing a more significant transformation than generally appreciated.
and i wonder if the drivers for that change are a combination of legal, economic, and technological factors.
legal challenges changed jws stance of whether they are a "religion" with "ministers", in the 1950s, and stopped them charging for the literature in the 1990s.
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slimboyfat
I wonder if JWs are currently undergoing a more significant transformation than generally appreciated. And I wonder if the drivers for that change are a combination of legal, economic, and technological factors.
Legal challenges changed JWs stance of whether they are a "religion" with "ministers", in the 1950s, and stopped them charging for the literature in the 1990s. Economic challenges have produced all sorts of cutbacks in literature and branch facilities in recent years. These drivers of change are much discussed.
But I want to focus on the impact of changing reading technology.
Changing reading technology has long been analysed as an important factor in the development of early Christianity. Some have argued, for example, that books of the New Testament such as Luke, Acts and John are roughly the size of text that will comfortably fit on an average length scroll. So the technology of the time may have dictated the length of some NT writings.
Christians adopted the Codex format very early and soon a number of long texts could be combined within a single Codex. This may have affected the formation of the canon as the four gospels, letter collections and so on could easily be brought together as larger units.
Use of the Codex also served the function of distinguishing Christian texts from Jewish texts which continued to be transmitted on scrolls. Codices were also cheaper, easier to produce and transport. Some were made as rough private copies and others had a more professional finish. All this impacted the character and growth of early Christianity with social and economic implications.
The history and course of early Christianity is closely bound up with the reading technology it employed.
The same is true with modern day JWs/Bible Students in a number of significant respects. Therefore the recent move away from printed books and emphasis on tablets and ebooks may be highly significant and suggestive of further developments.
The Bible Students took advantage of the favourable climate for religious magazine publishing the late nineteenth century. In fact they excelled as perhaps no other. They have also taken advantage of book technology in the promotion of their beliefs in Africa and elsewhere.
When the organisation is viewed primarily as a publishing company then its claims of exclusivity at various stages of development are elucidated. For example many of the earliest disputes between Russell and his aqaintainces were essentially disagreements about who had rightful ownership of subscription lists, and editorial structure. Problems intimately tied to the religious publishing industry.
Later when successor Rutherford expelled members such as William Schnell and Olin Moyle, often disagreements about book publishing and sales were at the root. For example a careful reading of "Thirty Years a Watchtower Slave" suggests that Schnell attempted to establish a book selling company that rivalled (in a small way) the Watchtower, and this lay at the heart of the disjuncture.
Many of the exclusive claims of the Watchtower, even the doctrine of the "faithful slave" itself can be read simply as attempts to convince consumers of their published material not to give business to rival vendors.
In more recent times the organisation has strongly discouraged JWs from researching and publishing their own material on Bible topics. Stoops (an American company that sells books and stationary and other items useful to JWs) and other fringe JW businesses have been tolerated if they don't infringe on the central area of competence of the WT producing religious material.
Even when encouraging JWs to learn foreign languages to preach, the organisation has been wary about brothers promoting outside language learning aids and sought to fill the niche to some extent itself.
But if JWs are moving out of print publishing, doesn't this perhaps change... everything? Not overnight and not consciously, but in fundamental and enduring ways,
I guess, most fundamentally of all, if the Watchtower organisation no longer relies for its very survival upon consumers of their material exclusively purchasing their print material, might this alter their exclusivist claims? If other people selling religious books is no longer a threat to their core activity, might that change their rhetoric and approach long term. And I really mean long term, because old habits die hard and attitudes are deeply ingrained. But as new generations of leaders come and go, and there is no longer any organisational necessity to forbid outside publishing, might the prohibitions relax? The exclusivist claims recede?
This is only one area in which changing reading technology may affect the structure and outlook of the organisation. It may also impact the sense of community and history, as physical libraries are downscaled or decommissioned. No longer will future JWs pick up old study books full of underlining and annotation. JW books won't be found in outside libraries and thrift stores.
Long JW books used to be 400 pages upwards, and classic "small" books were 192 pages. The lengths (as for early Christians) was dictated by technology. This time the set up of the printing presses plus the general expectation of how long a "book" should be. As the WT moves away from physical publishing, the length of its "books", their format, character, and function may develop in subtle but significant new ways. Books that were once objects to be bought, stored, cherished and adored, are now downloaded, used and cross referenced for a limited time. This may change not only the physicality, but the actual content,
Two things I notice about recent depictions of reading technology in the WT literature: 1) Kingdom Halls are depicted as full of brothers and sisters using tablets rather than physical magazines and books and 2) pictures of the new system still depict believers using traditional book format rather than new technology. I don't know whether this says more about the idealised, almost primitive conception of paradise, or the eagerness for brothers to adopt new technology in the present system.
Compare the brother using a tablet in the KH on page 25 with books in the new system on page 13.
https://download-a.akamaihd.net/files/media_magazines/31/w_E_201704.pdf
In any case I reckon the change in reading technology and practice among JWs currently taking place is highly significant and may have long lansting and deep ramifications. The early Christian adoption of the Codex or book format had vast historical ramifications. And as a technology it endured for nearly 2000 years. The significance of moves away from published physical books among JWs must be viewed in that sort of context. We are only scratching the surface at the moment,
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Where were the present GB members in 1975 and their ages the
by Lostandfound in42years have passed since the great 1975 expectation delivered nothing.
blame for the expectations laid at feet of the faithful, 'it's your fault , you believed us so you are responsible for the let down'.
i have asked this previously and repeat the point, where were the current members of the governing body, 43 years ago.
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slimboyfat
Gerrit Loesch has been anointed since the 1970s. I'm sure some of the others partook that far back too.
Sure in the video where Splane expalined the overlapping generation the example he used was Fred Franz overlapping with, who? Those anointed before 1992 when Franz died.
Antony Morris wasn't long back from Vietnam in 1975. In fact I don't think he was even a JW when the "Freedom of the Sons of God" book was published.