Birkets and the End of the Book Sven Birkerts wrote the book, The Gutenberg Elegies. Birkerts is often seen as a Luddite whose views on technology seem irrational and under examined. Birkerts discusses the loss of individuality in the technological culture. He fears that with interconnectedness we may lose our ability to create and philosophize. Birkets fears that computers will bring the end of literature, because the word on the screen is not the same as the word on the page. The word on the screen is not permanent, and who owns the word on the screen? He indicates concerns about authorship and copyright issues. According to Birkets, the computer is breaking down the writing process. Since technology makes it so simple to make changes to a document, those changes are not well thought out, important changes. As a traditionalist and anti-utopian, Birkets also fears the end of libraries and "real books."