Replacing phone use with reading is good, but making every waking moment productive by reading is sad (_I don’t waste my free time with nothing to read_), in my opinion. Jesus, even reading while walking. I would suggest anybody reading this to enjoy some time of total idleness, which I think it is much more necessary than reading more in today's hectic world.
How to read more books
231–240 of 310 posts
Re: How to read more books
#232Love this blog, appreciate the author. > This is probably the most difficult part. I had to remove all social media and streaming apps from my iPhone. I removed Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, etc. When I started, I found myself picking up the phone and immediately noticing that something was missing, since the only things left to do were check the weather, read boring emails, or see my bank account. These past few mon…
You reminded me of the 10 years I spent loading up Achewood every week after it was functionally ended. (Although recently I discovered Onstad has a Patreon, and is regularly drawing new comics again behind the paywall). Most of the internet feels the same way, but there are still pockets of creativity. If you can tolerate a podcast (or a radio play, if you prefer), I really enjoyed listening to the first season of Valley Heat last year. Very silly. A friend linked it to me, and I surprised myself by actually giving it a try; I am glad that I did.
Re: How to read more books
#233Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Look, it’s fine if audiobooks don’t work for you, and it’s fine to let your readers know why. Listening to an audiobook is not the same as reading a book. The whole point of the article was how to read more books, not how to have someone read books to you.
What a meaningless gatekeeping distinction. Unless your sole goal is to be a poser who wants to be perceived as a literate intellectual who is oh so cultured and well-read, however you consume the book is up to you. Who the heck is thinking “I really want to read more books, but only if it’s in the way this stranger tells me I should, not the way I enjoy”? If you like reading paper books, good. If you like reading el…
I dont know you about you, but the reason I read is to learn and retain -- many studies havnt shown audiobooks are much worse than reading for retention.
Example: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/247504935_They_Hear...
Re: How to read more books
#234Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why does it matter whether the writing is AI generated or not? You should always be critical of everything you read. I have stopped reading plenty of books after a few chapters when I realized there was little value in it for me.
We read books because the words convey meaning, not because they appear to.
Yet a good enough reader can distinguish between appearance and content. Better yet, everyone has their own type of favourite content. Maybe someone out there enjoys a 300 page Claude essay, you never know. Therefore the 'books after 2023?' argument is senseless sans the purchase part in which the contents may not be immediately obvious.
Re: How to read more books
#235I read 189 books last year, mostly due an accidental discovery.
I have a lot of trouble reading in noisy places, since I get distracted easily. My habit would be to put on some very minimal / low-information ambient music like Stars of the Lid and it worked well.
Then one day I randomly decided to put the audiobook on while reading and it was a revelation. After adjusting the audio rate to match my reading speed (usually between 2-3x depending on narrator / subject) it allowed me to totally lock in. Both "inputs" seem to reinforce each other. I researched and apparently people call this "immersive reading".
I find I can (just) listen to (easy) non-fiction like biographies, memoirs etc since they don't usually require much deep thought. But for fiction or harder/denser non fiction I read and listen at the same time.
Re: How to read more books
#236Earlier quoted context omitted.
I loved the article, but the only part that I didn't connect with was the blocking, and probably the goals (not sure if going for the numbers instead of the pleasure of reading something good is ideal long term). I think the author and you shouldn't necessarily be so hard on yourselves to go to these extremes of blocking of these things, usually it works for a while, but it might come back worse when you crack and tr…
> but the only part that I didn't connect with was the blocking, and probably the goals. Funny, because I found the post terrible but approve of the goals technique if done temporarily . Many many years ago I set myself a reading goal (first year it was number of books; second year and beyond it was time spent reading) and that served me well to both establish the types of books which aren’t worth it and create the r…
Ryan Holiday is a stoic influencer who happens to have written a lot books, most of them not good.
Re: How to read more books
#237Earlier quoted context omitted.
Agree. I'll listen to nonfiction because it just feels like a long podcast. Fiction I always read. But in general I'm not a huge fan of audiobooks.
A good non fiction book should take a year to "read" though. Because you'll need to stop, reread, scribble, look up online for other help. It should be a challenge!
Depends highly on the subject matter
Re: How to read more books
#238Earlier quoted context omitted.
How do you trust anything written after 2023 or so to not be slop? Or even trust the claims that it was written before 2023?
I wouldn't blindly trust a brand new author in 2026, but it's very easy to trust an author that has put out good writing in years past. Not hard to find, there has been plenty of great books written after 2023. New authors however will certainly have to earn trust for a few years now I think. It's similar with music, if someone puts out their first album in 2026 and has no singles or EPs, no YouTube presence, etc., i…
I don't understand caring about 'slop' in creative media. Its pressingly more important in programming because there are a lot of bugs linters, complicated language models and even fuzzy sandbox searches can't catch. Even if they did, coding is collaborative work and maintaining vibecoded infra is a genuine hassle. However, none of these apply to music or books. AI or not, humane feelings always shapes a piece to its last form and its entirely up to you to determine if you like it or not. AI generally fails to capture this, and if it didn't - a fluke -, why not enjoy the piece?
Re: How to read more books
#239I have gained so much by reading comments on Hacker News, articles, lurking in groups and forums, watching YouTube videos. Reading books is important because they have knowledge that is not accessible in another format. It is an efficient way to condense information and pass it around. At least it used to be, when paper was more scarce. Now books get fluffed up for padding. A lot of people should be writing articles…
Everything read on this website is entirely forgotten in two weeks time.
Re: How to read more books
#240I have gained so much by reading comments on Hacker News, articles, lurking in groups and forums, watching YouTube videos. Reading books is important because they have knowledge that is not accessible in another format. It is an efficient way to condense information and pass it around. At least it used to be, when paper was more scarce. Now books get fluffed up for padding. A lot of people should be writing articles…
I get what you mean about a great deal of books being fluff but are you sure you're not just looking at the self-help and bestseller section? Because this was my problem too, but I eventually figured out that if I really wanted to learn something or survey a subject, I'd end up with a college reference textbook. Or, audit a class and watch videos in Coursera or some other open education platform. The irony of your ge…
Some of the books containing the most important insights and knowledge are plagued by mountains of fluff. Having important things to say unfortunately doesn't always correlate with being a great or good author.