THESE FORUMS NOW CLOSED (read only)
Fun Stuff => CLIKC => Topic started by: Scandanavian War Machine on 28 Jan 2011, 10:40
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it's the best thing i've ever owned
i was an e-reader detractor too, until i actually got one
i mean, i was reading Anna Karenina on my lunch break, decided that I hated these aristocratic assholes and that I didn't want to read about them anymore for the time being, so I turned on my free 3G wireless internet and bought Hyperion, right there in the parking lot of my favorite sandwich shop. It was downloaded in less than a minute and I was good to go.
it's seriously the best. And it has Scrabble! SCRABBLE :psyduck:
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It really is hard to explain why e-readers are amazing unless you've used one in your own personal time.
But they are.
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Ryan adores his Nook Color. We're probably going to attempt rooting it this weekend, and then he will drool on it and it will have to be toweled down daily.
They're just so handy though! I am a voracious reader and my home library was starting to get unwieldy. I still buy some books, especially ones that I know I will want to lend to friends, but I can put thousands on the Nook and still carry it in my purse. The Kindle is easier on the eyes, but I wouldn't give up the Nook because of all the options it has. I love being able to put multiple bookmarks in on multiple books - we can each be reading a book on there and not worry about losing the page - and I especially love having a dictionary and Wikipedia handy.
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The original Nook is pretty darn awesome as well.
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If we want to continue this we should probably just start another thread. No need to drag this one off topic when it's pretty fruitful as is.
<Paul>There you are, then</Paul>
It really is hard to explain why e-readers are amazing unless you've used one in your own personal time.
But they are.
I'll just say though, that I have used them on my own time, understand the issue of convenience (Very well, in fact; my only regret about my bookshelves and the books on them is how difficult it makes it for me to move!), but am absolutely certain that they just aren't for me.
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I love my Kindle.
The Kindle or any other e-ink readers are awesome.
I really tried liking the Nook Color / iPad, but it's just not built for reading -- the light they emit detract from the experience and strain my eyes.
I'd honestly prefer a book, but when you have the option of not buying another book ever again . . well . . . yea . .
Don't give me shit about not going to the library; the books there are filthy!
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that's all well and good but on the other hand death to e-readers (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGmRKSds9OY)
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I love books but I can't afford to buy all of them. On the other hand I can't afford to buy an e-reader really. Someone convince me that the economics of it are worth it?
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guys fuck the haters lets welcome the kindle as long as i get to keep my vinyl collection
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It depends what you're looking for I think. The Nook Color was worth it to us because it functions as a tablet computer. I wouldn't find the Kindle as worthwhile though because it only functions as an e-reader and doesn't handle any higher functions really.
If you figure ~$10 per book, that's 25-30 books to equal a Nook or 15-20 to equal a Kindle. We don't buy most (okay, any) of our e-books so we basically just had to pay for the actual machine and that's it. If you still plan on buying your books though, you're going to be looking at $6-$10 for the e-reader versions on top of paying for the e-reader itself.
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I love books but I can't afford to buy all of them. On the other hand I can't afford to buy an e-reader really. Someone convince me that the economics of it are worth it?
www.gutenberg.org
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also: why i would never buy a kindle (http://mashable.com/2009/07/17/amazon-kindle-1984/)
i plan to get an ebook reader eventually. without wireless connectivity.
i'm thinking of waiting till the color ones (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dS-bRJ4BG4) come out and picking up a b&w unit for cheap.
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You can buy the wifi version of the Kindle and turn the wifi off.
Alternatively, you can just refrain from buying books FROM Amazon.
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that's all well and good but on the other hand death to e-readers (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGmRKSds9OY)
I don't get it. Are you mad because a company tried to sell their product based on it's relative advantages over competitors? HOW DARE THEY
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no like i'm a massive Book Defender so the girl's smarmy "i paid more for these sunglasses" crack is like, well, i'm reading a graham greene book right now that i spent six bucks on and i can read it in most light conditions
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Well, the thread isn't really "death to books" so I don't really think book defending is terribly necessary.
Between the e-books, I love our kindle, but I was quite disappointed by Amazon's insistence on propitiatory file format. In hindsight the Nook is what I would have gone with. Of course you'd have to be within the US to order from the Barnes & Noble store. With the non Kindle offering you can do anything at all e-pub and there are tons of blogs online that offer up free stuff, the gutenberg project that was mentioned earlier and various online e-book stores online that sell DRM free content.
If you're looking for something within the public domain cost of the book is practically a non issue. Even within the Amazon store or Barnes & Noble store, you can find free and $1 - $3 options that have al the proper e-book formatting, and on occasion actually have more content than the "real" publisher's offerings. Or of course as mentioned before get a free option from online and copy it right over.
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also: why i would never buy a kindle (http://mashable.com/2009/07/17/amazon-kindle-1984/)
amazon changed their terms and conditions after that incident, and they can no longer do that.
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Well, the thread isn't really "death to books" so I don't really think book defending is terribly necessary.
i don't actually have a problem with e-readers, just that commercial + its associated attitudes.
i'm definitely in joseph's camp where like i can see their purpose (especially in terms of like people who are regularly mobile or in small apartments or whatever) but they definitely aren't for me
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I actually spent less on regular books than I do on e-books - but that's only because I went to things like http://www.bookthing.org/ (http://www.bookthing.org/) where I get all the free books I want. I'm not into new books for the most part.
But, just like you can get "free" music, you can get "free" books. Plus, as others have said, there are tons of options for free to cheap books.
I really love my original Nook. It was only $150, I have awesome covers for it, and it's a lot smaller than a lot of the books I'd been reading when I bought it - like A Song of Ice and Fire. Gigantic, heavy things they were.
I wouldn't even consider getting a color Nook or anything like that. As much as I like the software, I'd rather have the e-ink technology.
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Mother told me she bought me a kindle today, it's going to be shipping to my house soonish. As a student, I look at my bookshelves with a sense of terror, sometime soon I will have to move and with it moves tons and tons of books. I don't think I can deal with that anymore and so having something that weighs almost nothing and takes up no space is a perfect solution.
For those who have one, what are some awesome things that I need/should know about this little device?
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Between the e-books, I love our kindle, but I was quite disappointed by Amazon's insistence on propitiatory file format.
http://calibre-ebook.com/
Calibre converts any format (nearly) to any other format. There's also a simple script you can find via google that will strip any Amazon bought books from their DRM.
Convert whatever you want to MOBI format and you're good to go (for your Kindle).
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Ha! I should have known something like this was out there. Still doesn't fix my irritation with Amazon's decision, but still great. Thanks!
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As both an avid reader and writer, the growing popularity of e-readers fills me with a sinking sort of trepidation.
It's not so much that reading itself, to me, feels like it's being threatened, persay, because of these devices. It's that the essence of a book goes far beyond its content, beyond just the simple reading of the text. When you hold a book in hand, it's an experience, an ownership of a THING. Every book has its own unique characteristics, feeling, print, smell. And that book, regardless of the progress of technology or the state of whatever new computers comes out, stands as a testament to not just the reader, but to the future readers.
I have in my possession a very, very old children's book. It belonged to my grandmother as a child, who passed it along to my mother, who was kind enough to pass it along to me. All in all, there's about a hundred years worth of history in this book, yet I can open it and peruse its pages to read it to my son. This can be accomplished as easy today as it was back then.
And it makes me wonder- what of, sixty years down the road, when this book will still be readable? Even today, the likes of Warren Adler are discussing going "e-book only", abandoning the classic print altogether.
What will happen to the cherished memories, the fond passing of a book from generation to generation? What of when Amazon eventually ceases to exist, and the batteries on these readers have died?
I feel like a cherished art form is slipping away, simply for the sake of modernity...
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I think one of the great advantages of e-readers is that you can make every book a large print book and for visually impaired readers that is a wonderful thing.
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As both an avid reader and writer, the growing popularity of e-readers fills me with a sinking sort of trepidation.
This type of thing has been said because of just about every "modern" change. People that copied books by hand said this about printing presses, for example.
Just because your child (should you have one) won't necessarily have the same experience as you did with books doesn't mean they won't still very much enjoy them. The printed word will likely never disappear, it will just become less and less used. Some purists will use it for as long as they can hold out.
I have hundreds of books of my shelves, and I love them. I love the smell of a really old sci-fi novel that cost 25 cents to purchase when it was new. Going into a book store is one of my favorite things to do, especially if it sells old books.
But I also love the plastic-y smell of my Nook, in its real leather case. I like the feel of holding it and I love having at least 500 books ready to read on the spot.
There's also a simple script you can find via google that will strip any Amazon bought books from their DRM.
Just do remember that this is illegal. Not saying you shouldn't do it, just be aware. Also, Calibre will never convert anything with DRM, so you will have to strip it first. Personally, I like my Nook a lot more in this regard - so much already comes out in epub format, I have little that needs to be done to read what I want. I can also get books from the library which is pretty awesome.
I do love Calbre though. It helped me organize my non-B&N books (which are stored differently on the Nook than those bought from the store) so I can find what I want easily.
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I have spent countless hours debating the value of a physical book versus a digital copy of the text. I have a literature degree and I took a number of classes which dealt with publishing practices, the history of print, the rise of digital and other relatedly things. I have read essays on the topic, attended guest lectures, listened to other students argue in classrooms and watched executives for publishers and digital companies argue with experts on literature and typography. And I have found that the argument against e-readers are mostly people stretching to find things that are wrong with them because they like the way books smell.
I don't think there is anything wrong with liking the way a book smells or any other aspect of its physical form, and there are things that physical books do better than digital copies, but there are also things digital copies do better and there is room in the market for both. Digital copies are not a replacement for leather bound collector's editions of your favorite book. They are a replacement for paperbacks. I have paperbacks which my father read in college and the majority of them are already worn and brittle so arguments about lifespan are really moot. They were not made to last, they were made to be inexpensive and portable.
My biggest problem with arguments for books as objects is that it seems to accept as fact the idea that when I buy a book I am buying an object and not ideas. This was not always so, it was successfully argued by publishers 200 years ago, and led to our current intellectual property laws, but I don't accept it as fact. When I buy a book I am buying it for the intangible ideas it contains. Arguments which centered on there being nothing there, or the experience of reading being diminished without a physical book trouble me because they seem to buy into this. It ideas and the words that form them which make us fall in love with a book, and those words and ideas still exist on an e-reader.
The rise of digital technology may scare those who love physical books, but it needn't, for one thing I think that it will do good things for the future of physical books. Print on demand technologies mean that a book need never go "out of print" enabling you to find a copy when you want one. I think that as more people get e-readers the market for nice physical copies will actually increase, and the offerings for this segment will also increase.
The cherished memories of passing a book from one generation to the next may slip away, but as I said I think nice editions of books will still exist. If passing a physical book along does stop, well that tradition had a start, people still loved each other, and shared their knowledge and experiences before there were printed books, and they will continue to do so after.
As far as obsolescence, that is a real challenge for digital formats, but it is one that people are tackling. People back up their copies, as linked above there are format converters and "the cloud" means that even if I lose *my* copy a copy will still exist and I will be able to find it.
I don't think that we are casting books aside for digital copies simply for the sake of "modernity," e-readers do a lot of things better. They make a text inexpensive, portable, searchable and allow me to look up new words as I read. These are things that print can't compete with, and so like manuscripts gave way to print, print is giving way to digital.
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It really is hard to explain why e-readers are amazing unless you've used one
On a related note, it is really hard to convey to people just how awesome e-ink screens are. Unlike most computer screens that shoot out light, e-ink screens actually rearrange grains of pigment in the screen. awesome
Or how e-ink screens don't need power to maintain their appearance. When I opened my sister-in-law's Kindle, the instructions on the screen weren't a sticker attached over the screen, it was literally the screen. E-ink screens don't need power to maintain their appearance, so at the factory they just display the instructions and then ship it like that.
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It's apparently very difficult for people to understand this. I'm on a Nook discussion board thingy and there are always questions of "where's the backlight?"
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Between the e-books, I love our kindle, but I was quite disappointed by Amazon's insistence on propitiatory file format.
They eventually wised up:
http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2009/11/kindle-2-finally-gets-native-pdf-support-screen-rotation.ars
Until just now though I didn't realize the original Kindle didn't support PDF, that is fucked up.
It ideas and the words that form them which make us fall in love with a book, and those words and ideas still exist on an e-reader.
Silly! The value of books isn't the ideas and words within, its how good they look lined up on the bookshelf in your den. Nothing classes up a place quite like a bunch of musty old books.
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Oh that is good news. We have the DX and despite it having PDF support, it's pretty dogshit at the moment. The update sounds like that should improve quite a bit though.
It still unfortunately leaves Amazon as one of the only e-readers not using an open source format though. Obviously not a real problem since I got directed to the file format converter but still irritating.
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This type of thing has been said because of just about every "modern" change. People that copied books by hand said this about printing presses, for example.
This is a specious and altogether fallacious argument. The printing press enabled automated book production. It did not, as e-readers are, simply replace the printed format.
Just because your child (should you have one) won't necessarily have the same experience as you did with books doesn't mean they won't still very much enjoy them.
Thank you for not reading my post at all, just skimming over it and then picking out whatever you could. I sincerely doubt that, no matter how well made an e-reader is, that it OR the format upon which its books have been written will still be around in a hundred, or even fifty years.
This, and the other walls of text hastily written in defense of the e-reader, have unfortunately missed the point. They say that the printed word will not "disappear" when in reality it's already occurring- as was mentioned before, authors such as Warren Adler have already begun the transition to "digital only" formatting, forgoing the printed book altogether.
I suppose it was too much to expect anything from digitalophiles here to actually appreciate the advantages books have to offer beyond "their smell". After all, in a hundred years, when every ebook on the market has been forgotten and the only records of our current lives will be the fragmented remnants viewable on some holodeck somewhere, NOBODY would ever want to preserve anything we've written today! No, sir, put those books in the fire of time with LPs and the Nickelodeon. After all, today's books can't satisfy our desire for instant search gratification or be censored to remove "bad" words (ala Huckleberry Finn) at the push of a button.
Ugh.
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This type of thing has been said because of just about every "modern" change. People that copied books by hand said this about printing presses, for example.
This is a specious and altogether fallacious argument. The printing press enabled automated book production. It did not, as e-readers are, simply replace the printed format.
lol yep that's all e-readers do
Speaking of which, I think Kindle has a software development kit so I was thinking of borrowing one and developing "choose your own adventure" books on it. It really seems like the perfect platform for that sort of thing. No "flip to page X if you choose Y," just press the button. And I could put in a back button for when you want to go back and try a different decision.
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You know, you're being a massive dick.
Also you missed a lot of the point of Papersatan's point about it not totally replacing print. Re-read it and stop assuming no one here loves books.
Also Huck Finn is a terrible example since it's in the public Domain. If any printer decided to remove the racial slurs they could. Any other printer then could release it with them included or just not remove them in the first place.
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You know, you're being a massive dick. Also you missed a lot of the point of Papersatan's point about it not totally replacing print. Re-read it and stop assuming no one here loves books.
Insulting me and repointing out a point already dismissed doesn't somehow make the point valid. As was already pointed out, large numbers of authors have already begun the transition to digital-only, in effect and fact "replacing" the printed book.
Again, calling me names doesn't make your point valid. In fact, it proves my point exactly.
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Nor does trying to prove your point by calling anyone here digitalophiles and crying "OH WOE IS ME."
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E-Readers: An Average Writer's Lament
And one that will soon be forgotten, I imagine. My kind will fade to the mists of time, relegated to the dustbin of history.
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e-readers... simply replace the printed format.
I guess you missed by little jab so I'll be more explicit: is this seriously what you think?
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Man, I ain't feel like arguing on the internet too much so I'm just gonna go ad hominem.
As a future librarian, lover of old and rare books, someone who is inevitably going to have bookshelves for walls in his house, and an owner of a Kindle:
You're a stark raving moron, dude.
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More baseless insults!
Why am I not surprised?
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Man, you realize that insults weren't thrown around until you insulted several people essentially saying that anyone who disagrees with you is a digitalophile who can't possibly understand right?
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You could try disproving all the insults by disagreeing in a less douchey manner.
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More baseless insults!
Nah, the insults are based on your posts.
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You could try disproving all the insults by disagreeing in a less douchey manner.
Tried it.
Got my entire post reduced down to "the argument against e-readers are mostly people stretching to find things that are wrong with them because they like the way books smell", followed by more BASELESS insults by people with penis melons as their avatars and walls of text. Even now, you'll notice, at this very moment.
What's the point in composing a well thought out argument only to have it reduced to arguments about smells and insults by penis-melons?
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More baseless insults!
Nah, the insults are based on your posts.
hee hee
EDIT:
What is a penis-melon?
EDIT2: oh wait you mean stephen
people with penis melons as their avatars
EDIT3: Come to think of it, his name is pretty awesome in the context of this discussion.
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It is a penis-melon wearing a santa hat goddamnit get it right.
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Bottom line, if you condescend to people on this forum, you will get called out on it. You're not going to get a gold star and some street cred for restraint on this particular forum just because you implied someone is an idiot rather than actually typed it out.
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I believe Stephen is the penis-melon in question.
AnAverageWriter, I'm intrigued as to what you mean by "your kind". Do you mean people who like books? People who like reading? People who misunderstand the purpose of a discussion? You are fully entitled to have your own opinion. You are allowed to express that opinion. It's even allowed to be opposing to everyone else's! This isn't Congress, you're not trying to sway people's opinions in order to change the way things turn out. E readers exist regardless of whether you like them or not. If you don't like them, don't buy one - that way you'll be doing your bit to ensure books don't die out.
I really love books, I love seeing them lined up on my shelf, I love waking up to find one next to my pillow, I love the feel of the pages and the different covers and having a physical representation of how much I have read. But sadly I can't afford to buy every book I want to read, and I don't have the opportunity to get them all from the library. An e-reader would allow me to read as much as I wanted but I guarantee that I would go out and buy physical copies of books I really loved.
I take your point about passing along books, because I'm looking forwards to doing that too. I've got a special collectors' edition copy of the complete works of Beatrix Potter I intend to hand on, for a start. But really for me it's the content of the book which matters and that is much more likely to be preserved by e-readers. An important thing to consider is the fact that publishers just stop printing books if they aren't being sold very well, whereas a digital copy can be replicated if there's demand for it.
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I believe Stephen is the penis-melon in question.
AnAverageWriter, I'm intrigued as to what you mean by "your kind".
I was referring in that instance to the individual who took my entire post and insinuated that it was nothing but an old-fashioned, quaint, outdated longing for book smells. I do have a concern for the future of print. I've seen authors abandon it firsthand- which was why I mentioned Warren Adler.
I'm sure I'll get mocked for this post too.
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Since you are so sure e-readers don't have any positive points themselves I wonder if you've considered this: e-readers enable people to read more often. Both in the access sense (note SWM's post at the top of the thread; he didn't have to plan out his reading ahead of time) and in the sense of being more convenient to carry around (I know plenty of people who read books a Kindle on their train ride that they aren't about to start carrying around.) Starting from an assumption that more people reading is a good thing (and if you disagree with that then, um, I'm not sure what to say) then e-readers do have the positive characteristic of causing more reading to happen.
I point this out not to discard the positive aspects of books (indeed, every person who's posted in this thread appears to love books, not sure where you got the idea that we don't) but rather because you don't seem to see any positives to e-readers.
Also, you keep mentioning authors who are abandoning print books; what exactly is the reason you think they are making this decision?
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Also, now that we have a new page, gonna go ahead and elucidate why you're wrong, despite your eventual continued insistence that you're not.
See, Kat's point about the printing press that you dismissed without debate is actually completely on the money, not because there were luddites among the monasteries, but because those luddites were, in a way, correct. The advent of the press allowed for the spread of literacy and ideas and art, BUT, it began a process that would finally end in the 19th century with large scale mass production of books. The process, of course, was the death of the book itself as an art form, something you claim the e-reader will do. Unfortunately, it's already gone. It can't be made any more dead.
In fact, with the advent of the e-reader, it might be able to have new life breathed into it. Now in order to sell a physical book, that book has to be worth buying. It's not something you have to buy just to read the words inside and, thus, it no longer merely has to be functional, it now also has to be beautiful. It has to be worthy of its contents.
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Since you are so sure e-readers don't have any positive points themselves
I never said that.
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Sure you did. I quoted it twice already; here it is again because you keep missing/ignoring my quotes:
The printing press enabled automated book production. It did not, as e-readers are, simply replace the printed format.
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Sure you did. I quoted it twice already; here it is again because you keep missing/ignoring my quotes.
I think you've misread, or I may not have been clear enough. I was referring to the replacement of printed book text. I wasn't addressing additional "features" at that point, I was talking about supplanting, not just supplementing. The printing press supplemented book printing. Many people believe that e-readers (including their features) supplant the printed book.
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I believe Stephen is the penis-melon in question.
AnAverageWriter, I'm intrigued as to what you mean by "your kind".
I was referring in that instance to the individual who took my entire post and insinuated that it was nothing but an old-fashioned, quaint, outdated longing for book smells. I do have a concern for the future of print. I've seen authors abandon it firsthand- which was why I mentioned Warren Adler.
I'm sure I'll get mocked for this post too.
Now see, that is a proper response and yay. Now I'll stop being childish as well.
If you took the one sarcastic comment in that response and applied it to the whole response, then maybe you actually should re-read it and not take it so personally rather than dismiss any and all points made.
If you actually think that print will totally die out, that's fine. However, there is a point to be made about there being a continuing market for print. As Barmymoo said, if print dies out 100% it'll because there was no market whatsoever for it. If they want a physical version to sell, and if they perceive there to be a market for it, and they very likely will, it will have to be improved upon from what the modern day offering is. That is not hard to improve upon to be perfectly honest. There will continue to be a market, at least for a good long while, for people who do want the physical object. For example, my leather bound Centennial Collection of Robert E. Howard's Conan stories. Of course I bought it, I love books! I love Robert Howard and I found it quite worth it to purchase the CE so that I can add it to my book shelf and enjoy the physical product along with the written works.
The fact is, if a publisher finds a market for it, it's going to be made. Same as the Vinyl resurgence and every other "outdated" technology that has survived.
Edit: Basically Ozy said most of what I was attempting as well as a bit of a history lesson to go along with it.
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This is no longer about e-readers, and should not have reached this level. Shame on you all.
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Now this thread is about the appropriateness of moderating the tangents a thread takes, even those that still fall under the subject of the thread, regardless of tenor.
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I was relieved when the thread was locked; I had stuff to get done this afternoon. Now I have to waste more time on the internet, darnit.
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Paul, this is a pretty dogshit thing to do without any warning.
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The ultimate goal is to have every single post split off into it's own locked thread.
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I would have liked the chance to defend my position, which was misrepresented in the rebuttals. Also to expand on the discussion of the history of the print book, which I think was also misrepresented.
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Sorry folks! I'll try to get it more right in future. I guess I shouldn't have let the fact that someone is leaving the board as a result of that rather shitty tiff influence me.
I've stuck the thread back together, so carry on as if I hadn't interfered.
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someone is leaving the board as a result of that rather shitty tiff
oo oo gossip
:evil:
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If it'll help I'll start a new account so I won't have such a high post count anymore.
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This, and the other walls of text hastily written in defense of the e-reader, have unfortunately missed the point. They say that the printed word will not "disappear" when in reality it's already occurring- as was mentioned before, authors such as Warren Adler have already begun the transition to "digital only" formatting, forgoing the printed book altogether.
I suppose it was too much to expect anything from digitalophiles here to actually appreciate the advantages books have to offer beyond "their smell". After all, in a hundred years, when every ebook on the market has been forgotten and the only records of our current lives will be the fragmented remnants viewable on some holodeck somewhere, NOBODY would ever want to preserve anything we've written today! No, sir, put those books in the fire of time with LPs and the Nickelodeon. After all, today's books can't satisfy our desire for instant search gratification or be censored to remove "bad" words (ala Huckleberry Finn) at the push of a button.
I confess my post was long, because I have a lot to say about the issue. I hope that you actually read past the first paragraph though because I did address the questions you raised about obsolescence which is a real concern for digital formats. Many of the problems keeping file formats up to date arise from copyright issues, and that is a challenge society is still working on. Either way a grad student spending days in a library trying to download an obsolete file format is really no different that one spending those same days trying to discern the script on a decaying piece of parchment. We lose cultural works all the time, it is inevitable. Every year some Grad student writes a theses on the lost works of "X" that they found in a musty pile in the back of some private library.
As far as the advantages of print, I didn't say the only advantage printed books have is their smell. It is however frequently brought up as a reason e-readers are not good. I prefaced that statement with my history of discussing this issue because I was trying to show that it is brought up by many"defenders" of printed books, regardless of the setting or profession of the person. I agreed that printed books have advantages. You have mentioned one author who is going digital only, there are also authors who refuse, and ones whose works cannot be translated to an electronic format. For example Mark Z. Danielewski's work "Only revolutions" which makes continuous use of its physical form and would therefor be difficult/impossible to translate to an e-reader.
I agree with Jens that there is a parallel between vinyl culture and print culture and that is why I predicted that a market will emerge for quality printed editions of books as a market has emerged for vinyl.
Also the assertion that the printing press just sped up the production of books and didn't change and replace them is wrong. When was the last time you held a book that was written by a scribe on parchment? One with out page numbers, or a table of contents, or an author? The printing press completely changed what a book looked like, what it was made from, what was written in it and who owned them. The printing press made books smaller, cheaper, and faster to produce this opened up the medium allowing entire new genres to emerge and eventually made room for the profession of "author." The "print revolution" is often cited and though I have read arguments that no such thing existed, one cannot deny that without the printing press we would not have the book culture we have today.
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I think you've misread, or I may not have been clear enough. I was referring to the replacement of printed book text. I wasn't addressing additional "features" at that point, I was talking about supplanting, not just supplementing. The printing press supplemented book printing. Many people believe that e-readers (including their features) supplant the printed book.
I'm not sure what you mean by "features" other than "things that I don't care about." The distinction you make between supplanting and supplementing is just a matter of perspective. The people who fought printing presses sure didn't see them as supplementing the books they already had. Similarly, just because you don't see e-readers as supplementing books in their current form doesn't mean other people (eg. many of us) also don't see them as supplementing.
I mean, you're absolutely correct that many people see e-readers as supplanting printed books, but that is the same as the situation kat raised which you were responding to, when some people viewed printing presses as supplanting hand-written books while others viewed them as supplementing books.
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Yes, there have always been Problems (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eIFoz-Tjf8).
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I should admit straight up that I've only ever read reviews of e-readers, I've never held one myself, but based on that: I can't help feeling that the fact that all the e-readers I've read about seem to go out of their way to replicate the feeling of reading an actual book (giving the images the superficial appearance of paper, providing papery swooshy sounds as you turn the pages) is a big giveaway. Sure, e-readers may be convenient, but I think books have such a long-standing cultural legacy that they'll continue to hold our emotional investment for some time to come.
In more practical terms, books for me win out for several important reasons: A book will never crash. A book will never run out of battery life. A book doesn't have a start-up time and it doesn't need to be loaded. You'll never come across compatability issues with a book. You can drop a book or cram a book in your bag or spill food on your book and it's still going to be okay. When you're sick of a book you can sell it or give it away, and when you see a book you like you can borrow it from a friend without having to pay any money or sign any terms of use agreements. Basically the book is a brilliant and robust piece of technology and even if you can only carry one or two around at a time, I think its advantages are going to give it the edge for a while. The best thing about e-readers that I can think of is they present the opportunity for long out-of-print books to become readily available to anyone who wants to read them, without the prohibitive cost of printing them or storing them.
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i've sort of skimmed through this whole thread and i think this may have been said before, but i just want to reiterate - most of the people (including me) who own and use e-readers aren't saying "down with all print media! digitalize everything ever!" personally i just see e-readers as something super convenient and easy to carry around when it is less practical to carry a stack of books. i am a very fast reader and as a kid my standard practice for family trips would be to go to the library and check out a stack of books for the car ride/plane ride/train ride/what have you. i have literally taken a stack of 16 books with me on vacation before. e-readers don't have to be a replacement for real actual physical books! they are just a cool thing that take up less space and provide perhaps a wider/quicker range of access.
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You'll never come across compatability issues with a book.
I can't always fit tall books in my bookcase. Does that count?
i have literally taken a stack of 16 books with me on vacation before.
nerd
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I would argue that format changes in books are just slower, and they don't require the mediation of a piece of technology, but have you ever tried to read a book printed in the 1700's? The long "s", the funny 'c' that looks like a capital "E" the repetition of the last word on a page on the top of the next one. These take a lot of practice to ignore and be able to just read like you would a modern edition.
If you are not familiar here (http://books.google.com/books?id=6NEkAAAAMAAJ&dq=the%20way%20of%20the%20world%20congreve&pg=PA98#v=onepage&q&f=false) is an example.
What I mean is they can still have compatibility issues, just with the reader's education.
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e-readers don't have to be a replacement for real actual physical books! they are just a cool thing that take up less space and provide perhaps a wider/quicker range of access.
This is my feeling exactly. It is a tool for when I want the content of a book for entertainment. I have several hundred at my fingertips. I'm pretty happy with that.
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I don't have an e-reader personally, but the people I know with Kindles primarily use them for technical/reference books. Do textbooks come in electronic editions?
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the funny 'c' that looks like a capital "E"
OK, so I'm familiar with the other bits (reading ye olde books is an important part of a growing lad's history education), but I don't know this. Can you link to an image of this? (Or point out where it is in what you linked, if I missed it in there...)
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Probably meaning things like the C at the start of "Christ" at the top left of the fourth image down here (http://cassland.org/images/PrayerBook/) (yes, that old prayer book is mine).
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I think they mean like the "c" in "Collected" in the very last image - it's got a ligature connecting it to the "t".
p.s. Beautiful book!
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I don't have an e-reader personally, but the people I know with Kindles primarily use them for technical/reference books. Do textbooks come in electronic editions?
Yup, and they're about half cost or so from the college textbooks I've seen.
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I think they mean like the "c" in "Collected" in the very last image - it's got a ligature connecting it to the "t".
p.s. Beautiful book!
yes like the one in Collected
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If my textbooks had been available on Kindle, that would have fully tipped the balance for me as I spend over £100 on textbooks each year, plus an extra amount on books for the exam (which have to be a specific edition and unmarked etc so would have to be a physical copy). Unfortunately they don't seem to be available which is why I am still dithering.
For me an e-reader would be entirely about convenience, like a library in my pocket. As I said before, I love books and quite often a book I have read in the library has led me to buy another, or even the same, book. A good example is the collection of books I have with me now - one of them was bought because I had got another work by the same author out of the library and enjoyed it, and one is a French version of a book I read in English from the library.
Basically what I'm saying is that I think e-readers might even encourage some people to buy books, not discourage them. I feel the same way about music being available online or on Spotify or whatever. Greater accessibility will lead to greater sales.
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Ryan's grandma is legally blind and can't read anything smaller than about 24pt text. We bought her a Kindle for her birthday because she can increase the size of the text to the point where she can read it. She was so excited when he showed off his Nook and she was able to read what was on the screen, because anymore she is limited to audio books.
We have a buddy who's a small truck driver. He recently bought a Kindle and said this is the first time in years that he's actually sat down and read books. He can bring it with him on long days and take a break and get some reading done, and if he's bored with the book he's currently on he can switch over and read one of the magazines he's got a subscription to. Given the choice, he would just not bother buying or checking out physical books, but he's devouring them on his Kindle.
We got the entire White Wolf series of books so that we can bring them with us to LARP. Considering they're often $35 apiece and therefore nobody else has the whole set, they've come in handy many times. And since the printed books are all hardbound and the size of a small textbook, even the people who have them aren't going to lug around several BOXES of books to a biweekly game.
We download all our books for free, but the ones I like I still buy. There's something about holding a book and getting to enjoy its cover, and being able to easily lend it to other people.
Conversely, we bought my mom a Kindle last Christmas because she reads SO much, but she never uses the thing. She likes it but doesn't understand how to get books onto it or where to find them, and she doesn't buy books so the Amazon store isn't much help. She still prefers going to the library. It's frustrating because when we got it we told her "If you don't think you'll use it, let us know and we'll just exchange it for something you'll use" but she didn't want to tell us that she wouldn't use it because she thought we'd cry for days over it, so it was kind of a waste of $200. It's definitely not for everyone.
As far as the e-ink debate, we've found that turning the brightness down on the Nook makes it a fairly moot point. I don't think I could read it for QUITE as long as paper or e-ink without getting eye strain, but it's a pretty negligible difference. The fact that it's a tablet computer is enough to make me very happy we didn't go with the Kindle. The newer model may be easier to use, but we found that the one we got for my mom was a pain in the butt to get around on.
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I don't want to sound rude because I'm really not intending that. But do remember that you have the Nook Color - it's different than the original Nook because it is, as you said, a tablet computer. The original Nook is much like the Kindle only with a little touch screen at the bottom.
I'm also not trying to nag here. It's just an important distinction, I think. Also - you can try selling your mom's Kindle and get her an original Nook. She can still get books from the library. It is somewhat complicated at first though so really you might be better off just selling the thing to someone else.
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You didn't come off as rude! Yeah, the original Nook is much different. I guess what I'm saying is I'd much rather spend $270 on a tablet than buy the original or a Kindle for $170ish. But then, we had use for a tablet and we had the extra $100 to spend. Not everyone is in that situation.
I think even if we were to get my mom the Nook, she still would be lost. She's a technophobe and is afraid that she can wipe a hard drive just by hitting the wrong key at the wrong time. I mean, she's 71 years old so she's kind of used to doing things a certain way. Also I think she really just likes going to the library, but she also travels a lot so we thought the Kindle would be handy. She's coming to visit in March so I think I'm going to load her up with books and see if that helps any. She was all excited the other day though because one of my brothers got her an Amazon gift card and she bought an e-book with it. She wants so badly to like the thing, but I think she's just hesitant about trying to learn how to use it.
Even though I'm not as much of a Kindle fan, I still recommend it very highly - it's just that now that there's an alternative, I prefer the alternative, but that's all personal preference.
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one more happy e-reader story from my family:
my dad and i both got kindles for christmas (thanks, mom!) and, as a gymnastics coach and gym-owner, he nearly cartwheeled with excitement when he realized he could put the entire Men's Code of Points on his Kindle.
gone are the days of carrying 158 printed pages in a binder around to meets/competitions.
you should have seen his face
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Probably meaning things like the C at the start of "Christ" at the top left of the fourth image down here (http://cassland.org/images/PrayerBook/) (yes, that old prayer book is mine).
That is a beautiful book, Paul. Jealousy. I think that the feeling of reading books over a century old is probably the best thing about doing historical research - well, second-best, after reading old documents and thinking you're one of the few people who have touched this in the past two centuries - so I am inordinately jealous that you can do so whenever you want.
Cheers for the help on the fancy C, folks!
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Alright guys you've convinced me, I'm going to start saving up to buy one of the damn things.
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Come to think of it I could afford one now but... I'm going to save!.
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Honestly I'm completely impressed by how cheap these things have become. Sure, they're basically single-purpose devices but still, going from 400 dollars in 2007 to 139 now. They're getting better and cheaper, I am continually amazed by how awesome technology has become.
Also, getting public domain books has been the greatest thing in the world. I could potentially complain because I have no idea whether the translations of some of these are any good or not, but that would mean complaining about free books. I really wish this thing would arrive in the mail already, I'm so excited for it.
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How long are you going to save for?!.
Don't rain on her parade, she looks so excited.
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I'm going to save for?!. as long as it takes to afford it out of my wages (which will be like three weeks but whatever).
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Also, getting public domain books has been the greatest thing in the world. I could potentially complain because I have no idea whether the translations of some of these are any good or not, but that would mean complaining about free books.
The Anna Karenina translation I was reading was pretty wonky at times. At least I think it was, I've never read any other versions so I have nothing to compare it to. Maybe that's how it was written.
The way the books are processed to digital form may have had something to do with it too though, if Hyperion is anything to go by.
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For the most part, when transferring books to digital form, the page is just scanned. A computer is the one "reading" everything, and transferring the type on the page to the type in the e-book. With no logical reasoning, it has no way to know that some letters don't actually make real English words. No one goes over these files if it's for a public domain book, which I find a little silly. But then again, that would involve time and money, and they'd no longer be free books.
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this is why I prefer to buy public domain books. I find the formatting and proof reading to be worth the 1-2 dollars they charge.
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Only semi-related, but my girlfriend actually works for her University library proofreading scanned copies of textbooks for handicapped students. She's actually really fond of the job in that it lets her read random obscure subjects that she would never take the classes for.
*she would like to to be known that her job is nothing so pedestrian as a "proofreader". She is, in fact, an "eText editor"
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That sounds like the best job ever.
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That seriously does.
Amazon just notified me that my package has been shipped and is expected to arrive on friday. Can barely contain my excitement, I love getting new technological doodads. Plus now I now that my entire weekend is pretty much going to be me reading, which I am so down for.
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I'm not sure what is holding me back from being excited about this, which suggests that actually I don't need one. Is it likely that I am wrong?
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It might be that you don't quite see how big of a change it will be? Maybe? From carrying books around, that is.
If you were close to anyone that had one I'd say ask if you can borrow it for a day or two, try it out. But I'd pretty much only let my boyfriend and maybe two other people borrow mine so I guess it depends on who it is.
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I did use Jens's for a while and it was nice but I didn't carry it around or anything so I don't know how that would change things. I think you might be right, since there are very few books which fit in my handbag so I generally don't carry them - but I cope quite happily.
On the other other hand one of my goals for this year is to become better-read. Maybe that is A SIGN.
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it's not just the weight/volume though, i'm constantly being amazed by seemingly simple things like...for example, the internet browser. I was reading this neat little "kindle single" thing about human evolution, it's history, and future, with a huge focus on the present and what new technologies might drive humans to speciate in the future (i think it was called Homo Evolutis or something. cost me two bucks. i recommend it).
so anyway, i was reading this and there was some sort of theory or principal i wasn't familiar with, but it was underlined...so i clicked on it and it took me right to it's wikipedia page. And if what you're reading doesn't have that functionality, you can always just look up words while reading without even needing to use the internet. it's wonderful.
I feel smarter already.
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I love Calibre, it helps me organize all my side-loaded books.
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I fucking love my kindle 3g.
Free Reading!
Free old classics... http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page (http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page)
Free PDFs of awesome papers published on every topic ever! http://scholar.google.com/ (http://scholar.google.com/)
Free transfer of these things to kindle without any stupid wires... [email protected]!
Free Internet!
You can browse the web, anywhere, on a decent sized screen, for free, forever. It's hidden under Experimental but there is a web browser that is pretty okay. I use it to read everything2 etc when I am bored and stuck somewhere but none of the well, tons of things on my kindle already are what I want. It's no multimedia experience but if you just want to read, it's great.
Eventually I might bother to buy a book in the kindle store... but we'll see. I don't see it happening quite yet.
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So I got my kindle and uploaded all my books onto it after marveling over the beauty of the thing for a few hours. It's totally the sexiest piece of technology I own. I started reading quite quickly, figuring I'd sort out my insane number of books on it later.
The next day I decided to organize all my books by author and I came to an insanely frustrating realization. The Kindle has one of the worst UI in the entire world. The only way to sort your books in any manageable order is to create collections, none of which can be done on the computer (which would be so much faster) but have to be made by manually typing in everything on the kindle. After I created my collections folder in reverse alphabetical order so that all my collections would be in normal alphabetical order, I find out that you cannot keep them that way. Any time you access a collection, it automatically puts it at the top of the list. I have become incredibly anal about having my things in alphabetical order and this just grates on my nerves. Why isn't there a default option to have collections created for you by author or by genre or whatever? Why couldn't they just group everything by author and give you the option of tagging things by genre?
I found out there is a way to keep them in alphabetical order by putting an underscore in front of every title and sorting your collections by title. I am going to do this but it's so.....primitive and clumsy.
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Yes, but I have over 400 books on it right now and to have condensed by author would take it from over 40 pages to flip through, to about 17. Doing the whole "sort by:" keeps it at over 40 pages. There just isn't an elegant solution for condensing your library by authors and keeping it alphabetical. I'm also angry because I spent probably around 5 hours yesterday doing all this.
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Yes, but I have over 400 books on it right now and to have condensed by author would take it from over 40 pages to flip through, to about 17. Doing the whole "sort by:" keeps it at over 40 pages. There just isn't an elegant solution for condensing your library by authors and keeping it alphabetical. I'm also angry because I spent probably around 5 hours yesterday doing all this.
I found that extremely annoying, too.
My workaround is just putting the current books / series I plan on reading next on the Kindle and keep the books organized the way I want them on my computer.
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Because then you can't browse through your collection.
Half the time when I pick a book from my bookshelf I just happened to notice it while glancing over at my books.
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But maybe I'm not looking for something specific. Maybe I'm just really, really anal about having my things in alphabetical order. Maybe I want to see my list go Adams->Vonnegut all in the right order because that kind of organization makes me happy. Maybe I hate the idea of having William Gibson at the top of my collection just because I'm currently reading one of his books.
And if I am looking for something specific I am more likely to look for the author first. I should use the search option but I am more likely to simply look through my pages of authors to find the one I'm looking for. I should use search but I really don't like the fact that I should rely on this instead of neatly categorized options.
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I don't have a Kindle (yet) so I'm just interpreting what it seems like he said, but being able to create groupings that persist between sessions seems like a pretty standard organizational feature. Like in iTunes I can create various playlists to group my music however I want: playlists for parties, playlists for exercise, playlists for mellow background, whatever. I organize my bookshelves by grouping books according to general subjects (humor books, pop psychology books, books about programming, books about 3D animation, etc.) Would I be able to make groupings like that on the Kindle?
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Huh, none of that bothers me. I have a bunch of books on mine and I mostly just add a new book to a few collections (I treat them like tags on the internet, like on blogs and shit) when I get it onto the kindle. Of course, I only have around 30 books on mine right now. I don't see the need to have every book I could possibly want to read on there.
I'm fine with having a bunch of things I've been meaning to read on hand.
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Ah, but to me this doesn't seem trivial or even convoluted at all. I have all my DVD's arranged by title, all my books are alphabetical by author, and it would give me an incredible sense of calm if I was able to do this on this device. The fact that I cannot arrange it in the specific way that I want is my only complaint about this wonderful device.
I'm feeling better about this now, I spent around 4 hours reading today and I really, really love the percentage I have made it through the book. I'm reading The Stand by King and I'm 10% through it. Does anyone know how they sort out locations? I try to ignore them because The Stand has 22034 locations, a number which terrifies me.
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When my daughter was in library school, she went to parties at the apartment of a guy who arranged his books alphabetically by publisher. He claims he did this just to mess with student librarians.
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I never bother with alphabetical organisation but I'm glad to hear that you can create collections, because I do that with physical books too (I've been having to restrain myself from reorganising my employers' bookshelves according to my own opinions of their books). One more point in the Kindle's favour!
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Barmymoo, a key fact is that you can put a book in more than one collection. I really like that!
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I am now twenty euros away from being able to afford the non-3G version from my savings. Another two weeks and I'll be able to afford internet and also shipping! Then it is crunch time.
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That will be handy for those of us not living in countries other than the UK, such as France.
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Are you going to be grabbing the power-adapter as well? Or perhaps a shiny case? What about Gelaskins? Which are absolutely gorgeous and amazing, plus they protect it from scratches.
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speaking of accessories, i could use some recommendations for cases for my Kindle 3G. I want to get a sweet leather one but most of the stuff on Amazon looks pretty shitty and they all have some really negative reviews, even if they're pretty highly rated in general. It's hard to discern the wheat from the chaff, if you know what i mean.
There's a couple leather ones that look decent enough I just don't wanna spend $30 on something that's gonna end up being really cheap and shitty, so I was hoping someone around here might have some experience with it.
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There are Oberon (http://www.oberondesign.com/Kindle.php) covers as well. Expensive but seriously worth it. Real leather, thick and protective, and beautiful. I have one for my Nook and I love it.
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those do look nice, but they're definitely too middle earth for me.
i don't need people thinking i'm nerdier than i already am, what with all the reading in public that i'm already doing :wink:
after looking at etsy though, i think i might actually just try to make my own. i mean, i've never really made anything like this before but i think i could probably do it. i'd be cool to make a case out of an old book or something.
i dunno i'm gonna have to think about it and keep looking around
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Then I have another link for you!
How to Hollow a Book in 80 Steps (http://rive.rs/projects/hollow-a-book)
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wow thanks that's exactly what i need
i've always wanted to hollow out a book for something
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My problem with almost all the armor and stuff is that they totally cover the kindle up. My mother has a leather case and for her "it's like reading a book." which is not what I want at all. Gelaskins were the easiest choice, even if all they offer is scratch protection but they have the advantage that they're gorgeous. I also picked up one for my PS3, mostly because I could not resist at all. I almost want to get more technological doodads just so that I can deck them out with gelaskins.
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Here's mine right now - green Oberon cover, DecalGirl skin called Radiosity, and some light with a brand name that I don't remember. Oh and a Borsa Bella bag thingy. Click to zoom.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/nekowaffer/th_100_2543.jpg) (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/nekowaffer/100_2543.jpg)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/nekowaffer/nook/th_100_2572.jpg) (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/nekowaffer/nook/100_2572.jpg)
I just fold back the cover and read it that way. I love it.
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I just bought a Kindle. Stay tuned for the next exciting installment of May Is Behind The Times, Jumping Bandwagons.
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Here's mine right now - green Oberon cover, DecalGirl skin called Radiosity, and some light with a brand name that I don't remember. Oh and a Borsa Bella bag thingy. Click to zoom.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/nekowaffer/th_100_2543.jpg) (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/nekowaffer/100_2543.jpg)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/nekowaffer/nook/th_100_2572.jpg) (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/nekowaffer/nook/100_2572.jpg)
I just fold back the cover and read it that way. I love it.
You are just WAY too crafty for the rest of us. Ever consider going into the custom eBook Reader cover market?
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I just bought a Kindle. Stay tuned for the next exciting installment of May Is Behind The Times, Jumping Bandwagons.
This is not the autobiography title thread.
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That is not my autobiography, merely a single chapter.
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Also I was excited to load books onto it before it had even arrived, like Kris told me I could, but it didn't work and Jens pointed out it's probably because I got it sent gift-wrapped. Oh well. Gift wrapped is cool.
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You are just WAY too crafty for the rest of us. Ever consider going into the custom eBook Reader cover market?
I didn't actually make any of that, aside from putting the little bit of extra DecalGirl skin on my light. But, I have been getting into sewing and could certainly make the bag.. the leather cover, not so much!
Congrats Barmymoo :D I had to go buy my Nook in person - I just couldn't wait for shipping.
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I just bought a Kindle a few weeks ago. Aside from being in that honeymoon stage of new gadgetry, wherein I still believe my new shiny toy can do no wrong, it's really nice to be able to buy books without having to wonder where I'm ever going to put all of them. Also it's slightly more protected from my moments of idiocy than a book would be--if I break the thing, or leave it some place, I've still got all my books on my computer.
Now. If only I could get the books I already own in ebook form without having to rebuy them. But that more falls under "hopelessly illogical dreams I have."
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Yeah, that would be nice. I'd feel a little strange carrying around a regular book now that I have my Nook.. so if I could just get the whole Song of Ice and Fire series on there then I'd be set.
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I have no qualms whatsoever about procuring e-books for free if I have already bought the paper version.
But then, I have no qualms about doing this with books I have NOT bought.
I'm not really a qualm kind of gal.
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*cough*demonoid*cough*
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Or pirate bay.. or you know, other things. I've only gotten one series like that but kind of want to get more once I run out of stuff to read. Which will take some time 'cause I have something like 500 books right now.
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There was a download with 1000 fantasy books that I 'obtained'.
It has everything I could ever possibly think of reading in the genre (with one or two newer exceptions).
Still waiting on my Dance of Dragons . . .
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Considering the amount of time I've spent downloading music, you'd think it would have occurred to do this with books. A bit slow on the uptake I am.
Speaking of being slow, another reason I like my Kindle: Internet. Internet. Internet. Because I'm one of those woefully behind the times people who still don't have a smart phone, and therefore being able to access the internet from anywhere is still a novel idea to me.
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Yeah, I haven't pirated any books... (well, yet) but I wouldn't have any qualms with downloading a book I already have a paper version of. Not that I probably will, since I generally don't get bothered by carrying a few paper books around.
On the 'books and music are the same so go forth and pirate' angle - I don't quite agree. I'll try to explain that. I have (and will continue to) go to shows of bands whose music I download. There aren't so many events along those lines for book authors, and I don't think I would enjoy most of them - so I'm unlikely to become an alternate source of income other than from pure royalties/sales.
What does everyone else think?
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I have the same philosophy when it comes to movies, books, and music. If I download something and really enjoy it, I will go out and buy it. The fact that I can download movies has not prevented me from buying DVD's, what it has done is given me the opportunity to make my DVD collection much more refined and awesome. I am treating books the same way. If I download a book, read it and love it, then I will go and buy it. If I download music from a band and I really enjoy them, if they come to my town I will buy a ticket and see them.
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If I know I will read a book again and again, I generally go buy it, especially with classics or favorite authors. My relatives like giving me gift cards so that helps.
Cheap thrillers though? I'm so freaking sick of buying them for $10. I don't get that much enjoyment out of them, they're just "something to read". Our library doesn't have a very big selection, so that's kind of not a viable option.
If I bought every book I ever read, I'd be broke. Flat broke. I've already spent several thousand dollars on the books I do have, and I don't make enough to even justify that.
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What does everyone else think?
I don't know how anyone could honestly justify not downloading one while downloading another.
"I do pirate a lot of music, but I don't pirate books! No sir, I think there's something wrong with that."
Ah, a very solid and thoughtful counterpoint to my general rule that I follow personally. Well said! ;)
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I pirate the fuck out of books and music but like, it's not that hard to imagine a hypothetical argument on how the two are different? Publishers and record labels are very different creatures, and artists and authors are in vastly different situations - for instance, like Nick pointed out, touring/band merch is a thing a band can cash in a lot more on that they can records whereas an author doesn't really have anything similar.
oh come on you know those fuckers are making billions off of book signings, they're just rolling in it
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I usually only get older books anyway.. books that, if I were buying the physical version, would be free (from the book thing) or insanely cheap at some yard sale.
The only thing I miss about getting books from yard sales is the interesting things left in them. My boyfriend was reading Stephen King's The Dark Tower the other day and found an old (1992) Amtrak ticket from NY to MD and a dentist's business card.
That and the musty smell are lost with e-books. Though I do love the plastic-y smell of new gadgets.
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Publishers and record labels are very different creatures
I'll be darned if I can remember where I read it, but I distinctly remember reading an article written by a professional author which explained that, actually, publishers and record labels operate in practically identical ways.
Come to think of it, I probably found the article on these forums somewhere. Anyone know where it might be?
Your overall point is pretty spot on, though.
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Cheap thrillers though? I'm so freaking sick of buying them for $10. I don't get that much enjoyment out of them, they're just "something to read". Our library doesn't have a very big selection, so that's kind of not a viable option.
Not that you want to, but if you did want to buy them, trade paperbacks are your friends. I don't spend more than $8 or $9 on those things, often less. Granted, it's been a while since I've spent money on them.
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I'm not sure I know what the difference is between the paperbacks I get and trade paperbacks? Are they different somehow? Even at that price, though, with the way I devour books it's still not worth it to me. If I were to buy them as fast as I read them, at $5 a pop I'd be spending $15 a week.
I do love a good book sale at the library, or finding a bunch of books at a yard sale. I picked up about a dozen books for $3 at a yard sale once, and even though maybe 4 of the books were actually worth reading a second time... hey, it was only $3. It's so hit-or-miss though.
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Sorry, I just double-checked, and I got the term wrong. I meant Mass-market paperbacks. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paperback#Mass-market_paperback) Though, from what you're saying, it doesn't really matter with the number of books you'd be buying.
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I think either way, they're basically the same thing as what I'm already getting - the stuff you find in the "current best-sellers" section of Walmart. Like, every once in a while I'll pick up the latest Michael Connelly book or whatever, but the cheapest they seem to sell them for anymore is maybe $8, and usually it's $10. I remember maybe a decade ago they were only $4.99 apiece.
I just need a good fluff piece every once in a while, but I think the fluff is overpriced. I hate to say it, but... I'd rather download it for free. I don't want shelves and shelves of the things, I'd run out of shelves fast haha.
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Okay, I'm either misremembering, or have got wishful thinking about the price. Actually, now I'm thinking about it, and I'm pretty sure I was full of it when I wrote that post, so nevermind.
I always wish that book prices were based on quality. I'll happily shell out extra money to get a fancy copy of some book that I love, or for a hardcover by one of my favorite authors. But... those fluffy books made up most of what I read for years. And now that I'm trying to scale down my book collection, those take up 80% of the books that'll be going to charity. Big waste of money on books that really aren't worth it.
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Pretty sure that argument was against pirating books.
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Not Gaiman's argument, Toba's.
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Nope. (http://zine.openrightsgroup.org/features/2011/video:-an-interview-with-neil-gaiman)
Interesting aside:
Soon after getting my Kindle I downloaded a massive pile of books off of a less than legitimate source.
The first book I ever read on my Kindle?
American Gods.
The reason it was the first one?
American Gods was the last physical book I had bought to read for my own enjoyment and just hadn't gotten around to it.
No, that doesn't make a lot of sense. But I really enjoyed it.
ALso, I'm glad every day that I did that because I keep finding books in that pile that I enjoy.
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Now. If only I could get the books I already own in ebook form without having to rebuy them. But that more falls under "hopelessly illogical dreams I have."
This. My wife just got a kindle recently. She has about 15 titles on it so far. We have about 2000 books in our house apartment (both librarians - occupational hazard). I like being surrounded by them; it makes me feel cozy, but if we could magically zap most of them into the kindle, our next move would be soooo much easier. Last move: 47 boxes of books :mrgreen:
*EDIT* "just...recently?" I need to report myself to the department of redundancy department.
Also, I'd really only wish for that if I could magically zap them back on to the shelf after the move. Actually just zap the whole move. And zap some new shelves from IKEA without having to drive to Atlanta.
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If e-readers existed when I was in highschool I would have carried around the entire Robotech series, and probably Dragonlance too.
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Hi guys, I just want to show off my sweet Kindle case:
(http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e263/blooper663/IMG_0788.jpg)
(http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e263/blooper663/IMG_0787.jpg)
I got the case from a secondhand store at some point last year, and till now I used it to keep sketchbooks in. Not long ago I found out that my Kindle fits perfectly in it, so now I have my Kindle, a moleskine, pen, reading light and a year planner all in one place, it's so good!
(That's it, I just wanted to show off, continue whatever you were talking about now)
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I noticed yesterday my kindle has a small scratch on the screen. I definitely need a case :|
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Showed my mother Gutenberg last week. She has emailed me at least 20 times telling me the books that she's downloaded off of it. On the one hand, she gets her Russian literature and on the other my mother has the NEED to let me know about it.
I've also noticed how much easier it is for me to read multiple books at a time. I had an incredibly hard time doing this with paperbacks but with the kindle I currently have 3 books that I'm reading right now. It's quite awesome.
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I got the wifi, non-3G version and am having trouble using the web browser - as in, it just doesn't work (keep getting errors to do with lack of security certificates). Is this a common problem?
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I'm not sure Barmymoo, it has always worked OK for me. Are you using https sites or just http ones?
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HTTPS seems to be the main issue but both - Amazon itself, yahoo, facebook are the ones i've tried so far.
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Huh. I never thought to use mine as a way to access anything that even required authentication to read - as I use my Kindle to read things. It seemed to scale badly to 'heavy web apps' such as facebook the one time I did try to log into my facebook account. Perhaps I should have used mobile facebook - that would probably have worked much better.
As a note to people in general: the Kindle web browser isn't hardcore enough to do much of anything but browse relatively simple web pages, in my experience.
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Same goes for the nook browser.
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soooo... I just got a kindle as an early birthday present. The library where I work is going to start carrying e-books. Yay, right? I was in a conference call with the sales guy from the unnamed ebook vendor (which is pretty much the only game in town for libraries and popular e-books) - the ebooks they carry work with practically every platform known to man....
EXCEPT KINDLE :psyduck:
I know amazon is evil, blah, blah, but it's still annoying. :x
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yeah, that was the main thing that really put off from getting a Kindle (before I actually got one) but then I realized that I don't even know where a freaking library is in my area, and plus....FREE 3G FOREVER DUH.
so yeah...it's super lame, but considering how completely awesome my Kindle is, it's not a huge deal. It might be a deal-breaker for other people (regular library patrons, for example), but to me it's pretty much just a disappointing footnote.
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Isn't it possible to just convert the files into something usable? I was sure someone posted a link to a program that does that (kind of having a shitty night, I will let someone else do that legwork).
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Calibre can probably convert files to a Kindle-usable format, but you can't convert any files that have DRM. I'm assuming that library books have that. It's why I love my Nook :D
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I haven't really ever considered getting any sort of e-reader, but -- for whatever reason, I find myself very curious about it lately -- can you write in the margins somehow? Or is there some way to take notes?
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The Kindle has a note-taking tool, rather like adding a note in a Word document I think although I haven't used it yet.
Guys, I am kind of regretting not getting the 3G model now, as many of you suggested I would. Do you happen to know if there is a way to upgrade or would I have to buy a new one?
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I don't *think* there's a way to upgrade but they seem to be pretty resellable so you might be able to recoup some of the cost.
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My technophile dad just gave me his old Nook! He just got a Kindle.
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So, my kindle broke. Sort of. It kept resetting every single time I turned it off and then on again. And would let me browse about two or three pages before locking up. Reset the entire thing (to factory settings) and then upgraded the firmware. Working perfectly now.
Another con of the kindle, hopefully we haven't discussed this before. These e-readers, they have problems, they are not perfect. They can/will break and you won't be able to access what you want to read. I had to go for a few hours without any entertainment because my ability to read was impaired. Books do not have that problem.
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Books run out of pages and then poor you didn't bring another one. I think this happens more often than ereaders kick off and stop working.
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Yeah, but your book running out of pages is a) forseeable, and 2) easily remedied by having another book.
A piece of technology not working properly means that you lose access to everything and it can be quite difficult to fix. Potentially I might have had to send in to Amazon for a replacement.
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I accept the risks for the benefits. They're worth considering when deciding whether to get an e-reader, though.
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For sure, I just wish I had fully realized that when I was making the decision.
Still the best purchase I've made this year. It was also in sleep mode for three days and there was no change in battery life, again I am astounded with this device.
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it's pretty amazing how they can just sit there, holding an image on the screen, without actually using any power.
i was amazed when i peeled the plastic instructions sticker off the screen only to realize that it was 100% clear and the instructions were being displayed on the screen...in the box...just waiting.
i was like :psyduck:
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I made a thing.
Nerds who know *nix: this lets you put files you write onto your Kindle, without a bunch of rubbish. If you use Linux and really like reading on your Kindle, this is a thing you want.
markdown-kindle (http://cons.truct.org/projects/markdown-kindle.html) is the thing I made!
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I got one of the oberon design kindle covers, this one, in saddle[/ur] in the mail today and it is AWESOME. (http://www.oberondesign.com/shop/cart.php?m=product_detail&p=1307)
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Hey guys, i have a website all about e-readers if you are looking to compare what is out there and stuff.
http://goodereader.com/blog/
latest reviews are the nook simple touch, amazon kindle special offers and kobo touch.
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Hmmm, I've had a read of the various reviews all over the place and I'm having a hard time deciding between the various e-reader factions. I can't say I've looked at Sony, Bebook or any of the smaller companies very seriously.
Kindle looks nice but I don't like the proprietary formats.
Kobo touch sounds good but is hard to get in Australia.
Nook sounds fine but I haven't seen anyone seriously praising it.
Does anyone have any definite recommendations? I'm pretty much down to those three. I've tried all of them and they all seem good in their own regards.
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I love all three nooks, but they're not really meant for use outside of the US. So that could give you some issues. I had the first generation nook and loved it. The touch screen could be a little wonky sometimes. I prefer the Nook Simple Touch - it's the perfect size, and easy to use. You can also borrow from the library with nooks.
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My dad has something called Calibre, which removes the proprietory formatting apparently and does lots of other fancy things. I haven't tried it yet but it might solve the problem for you.
If you do get a Kindle, I heartily recommend the Kindle covers, because I just got one and it's really good!
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Calibre can convert lots of different file types to lots of other file types. It's been very useful for me. It just can't remove DRM.
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It seems I find myself in a similar situation as Barmymoo a few pages ago. I'd like to make myself better-read, so I was thinking of buying either an e-reader or one of the more popular (and more expensive?) tablet pc's. It would also be useful for college textbooks and scientific journals; a lot of my study material is in the form of pdf articles I have to download from a library that the university has a subscription to. A quick look at the available e-readers makes the Nook stand out as nice to have because of Android and WiFi, but since I live on mainland Europe it'll be impossible to get without jumping through some hoops (namely, the Atlantic). So, would I be better off getting a Kindle, or something that's easier used as a computer, or something else entirely?
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Assuming you got the e-reader and not the tablet, I'd say Kindle since PDFs are a big thing for you. You can root the Nook Touch pretty easily (Still trying to decide if I will rot mine or not) and get all those functions anyway, but it's native for Kindle and doesn't require voiding the warranty. Of course, you can unroot android devices and ignore the warranty problems, so that's not really an issue. With the availability of Calibre (http://calibre-ebook.com/) I'd say it's mostly a matter of consumer principle which one you choose since they are both quite good at what they do.
When it comes to the tablets they have, I'm not quite as sure. They all have decent note taking tools on them now, though the tablets are a little more intuitive with it. I haven't had a chance to use the Kindle tablet yet, but if you plan to do a lot of actual book reading as well, then I'd still suggest the dedicated e-readers. From what I've seen of the Kindle Fire, it's not going to be that much different from the Nook tablet outside of giving you streaming services if you are a Prime member. The e-ink screens are just a ridiculous step up from reading text on an LCD and I can't really recommend the tablets for that.
I guess if a full browsing experience is important to you, the tablets are a good choice as they'll also give you the full color pdf and slightly better note taking capabilities, but personally I'd go the wi-fi Nook Touch/Kindle touch and download Calibre (http://calibre-ebook.com/) immediately either way.
Edit: Also, keep in mind if you are seriously looking at the tablets, the Kindle Fire is almost a year newer and has a dual core processor, so it is likely going to be a bit snappier and more capable with multi media services.
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Thanks for the advice, but... "mainland Europe" sadly means that the Nooks, Kindle Fire and Kindle Touch are out of my reach. There's possibly the option of using an intermediate shipper, but that might cost me more than I save on the exchange rate. International options are limited to Kindle, plus keyboard, plus 3G, or DX. I'm not sure how widespread other kinds of e-readers are in my area, so it's a rather limited selection.
Edit: Hmm, there seems to be one e-reader maker that's based in the Netherlands: Icarus reader. (http://www.icarusreader.com/) Doesn't look too bad.
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I use my Kindle for reading PDF articles too, and find it very helpful because if I highlight something or write a note on it, I can come back to it very quickly by going to an index page of my own comments. So much quicker than if I were to try and find the same note on a piece of paper and then relate it to the physical page of a book! I can't comment on other methods because I haven't used anything else but my Kindle is perfect for studying - especially since I prefer to make notes on paper than on my laptop, so I can get completely away from the temptation of the internet.
Irony: I am currently supposed to be reading an article that I didn't bother putting onto my Kindle, so I've got distracted from reading it on my laptop by this forum.
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Good to know! Did you get your Kindle from amazon.fr? I'm bordered by the German, French and British Amazon stores, but none of them allow me to deliver it to the Netherlands, and point me to the international orders instead. The good news is that it saves me a bit on the dollar/euro exchange rate, but the bad news is that there's a €30 import fee which completely negates this.
So I'm currently looking at either this Kindle (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003DZ1Y8Q/), released in 2010, plus import fees, or, as ereaders.nl recommends, a 'Sony Reader Touch PRS-T1', releases right here in a week for the same price, has a touchscreen, card reader, and Android. Choices, choices.
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i highly recommend getting the 3G version if you can afford it and its available in your area
it's only a little bit more expensive and honestly i've used the 3G to check my email and download books far more often than i've used the wi-fi for the same
then again, if you are in a more urban environment and there's wi-fi flowing every which way then i guess it wouldn't matter, but for me the 3G is indispensable
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I ordered my Kindle from the British site and had it delievered to my mum's house, and then picked it up when I went to visit. Now that I'm back at uni (in the UK) I've got wifi but I'd agree that if you can afford it, the 3G is useful sometimes. Then again, I'm fundamentally opposed to being emailable at all hours of the day and night! If I'm reading a book, I'm reading a book and emails can wait.
LTK, if you have friends/family in German, France or Britain who might visit you or you might visit some time soon, maybe you could order it to them and have it brought over/collect it? But it might be simpler to just order it from the International one. Quite annoying that you'd have to do that - you then have to buy books from Amazon.com, right? Or are you not actually tied to it? Does anyone know?
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Man, I'm really just considering to get the Sony reader and forgo all the hassle with Amazon. 3G is nice to have but why buy an outdated product when a new release is just around the corner?
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Why reject a perfectly good product purely for the novelty factor? :evil:
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Hmm, yeah, good point. :P But Sony's reader has a couple more things going for it aside from 'it's new'. Features aside, I can easily return it if it's not to my liking, and then get a Kindle (or something else) instead. So I'll put in the pre-order and see what that gets me!
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good luck!
definitely let us know what you think of it, i'd love to hear some trusted reviews of things besides Kindles for my own future reference if and when my Kindle eventually craps out
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I like the dedicated reading nature of my Kindle because I end up reading instead of the 9000 distractions that I would have on a computer or tablet.
Also: e-ink \o/
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e-ink is so fucking awesome
it's hard to understand exactly how awesome it is until you are actually looking at it with your own eyes
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I really hope they develop color e-ink soon because I really want the new tablet-esque readers but don't want to deal with the disadvantages of an LCD screen.
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There is actually a method of combining e-ink with a coloured overlay, but apparently no one uses it because it effectively halves the screen resolution, reduces brightness and makes colors look washed-out. I came across this article (http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/06/blackandwhite_ebooks/)(from 2009) about it. The fact that two years later, neither the Nook Color or the Kindle Fire uses color e-ink, indicates that they don't have high hopes for it.
When you think about it, it's actually a bit strange that, with all of recent history's amazing technical advancements, no one managed to make a quality color display that you can comfortably read in the sunlight so far. I think that's the first time I've seen an indication of the physical limitations of consumer electronics.
Coincidentally, this article (http://www.pcmag.com/slideshow/story/288482/e-inking-the-deal#fbid=R_ztVxc_AOY) about uses of e-ink outside of e-readers just popped up. An e-ink-based dynamic camouflage pattern, whaaaaaat.
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it's actually a bit strange that, with all of recent history's amazing technical advancements, no one managed to make a quality color display that you can comfortably read in the sunlight so far
Don't be so impatient! I remember when the engineers in my company got hold of their first 5-character liquid crystal display. You had to look at the right angle, the contrast was pathetic, the updating was slow, and it had a short useful life. OK, I'm ancient, but it still wasn't that long ago.
Oh, and this (http://penny-arcade.com/comic/2011/10/12).
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Typing this on my e-reader right now. Using it for web browsing doesn't work bad at all. Keyboard responsivity is good, but it takes a while before the screen catches up.
Calibre was the first thing i tried to download, but this thing apparently didn't like it, said it failed to download because it's unsupported. So i'll probably end up rooting it. The good news is, people are already busy making how-tos.
Oh, and the only words in its dictionary are SONY and Reader. Useful!
Welp, looks like the first book I'll be reading is the 632-page EULA.
Looks like it's easy to plug it in via USB and transfer files to it. So what's the first thing I put on? That's right, screensavers! :-P A bunch of those can be found on nook-look.com , some of them are really classy. You can just ignore that they're made for Nooks, what's important is that they're 600x800 and monochrome.
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(http://i263.photobucket.com/albums/ii134/LaurensK90/PICT0300.jpg)
There you have it. Not a wallpaper, I can really read QC on this! And it's sharper than it looks on this crappy photo. Reading books is better though. It's incredible how you can have access to humanity's greatest literal achievements on something no bigger than a trashy romance novel.
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If anyone is still interested, I have now hacked the reader with some Russian software. It runs a bog-standard Android OS now, which is cool. Only I don't own any other Android devices, so I'm not quite sure what to do next...
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Run The One Android Game (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k22BB8VPI5o), of course! (http://i.imgur.com/jEZXQ.gif)
Or install the Kindle client and Adobe Reader for redundancy's sake.
Do you have access to the Android Market? That opens up a lot of options.
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Mmmyeah-nope. Non-adapted, this e-ink screen reaches between 1 and 2 FPS, so anything animated is pretty much out. I'm glad the hack came with AWDLauncher, because it has a mad number of options to disable all that wooshy crap.
The Android Market tells me I need to link the device to my account, and when I try to do so, the reader crashes. Instead I'm pulling apps from 4shared.com, which is the next best thing!