271–280 of 383 posts
I dont understand this anti-digital-books attitude honestly. The books themselves are just paper. What really matters is their content. And everyone can read the same content on their phone. Having this in mind, how is reading an EPUB any worse than reading a hardcover (besides personal preference)?
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> I used to read books all the time. I spent most of my waking hours as a teenager reading books. I’m 35 now and can barely hold attention on anything, I read maybe 3 books a year if I’m lucky. Even on Hacker News I almost exclusively read and comment on the comments, not the actual article unless I see someone says “have you read the article?” I used to be this way too. Then I just started reading again and now I ca…
What's your e-reader of choice and what kind of unlimited plan are you on? Thanks
I spend way too much time on the internet, listening to a deluge of podcasts and videos at high speed, reading gobs of articles, but I still manage to read 30 books a year. However this overconsumption of information indisputably harms my ability to create in general; I write less content, less code, less drawings, less music than I used to.
I was never a reader. I’ve played video games since I was a child, for over twenty years, and social media for almost as long. I wonder how much harder it will be to develop mental patience and critical reasoning as someone who has never known what it’s like to slow down and enjoy the thought process of reading a book. I have never not felt like my mind’s going 100mph
My intro to reading for fun was via comic books: I got bored really easily reading regular books. The next step was reading Harry Potter series, which I found incredibly immersive and enjoyable.
I guess my advice would be to try things you might like rather than what are considered to be important or classics. If there’s something that piques your interest, reading is almost like an adventure, trying to get to the end to know the full story.
But I do read a lot, still, thanks to the Kindle. I re-read a lot of beloved books, so having the library on the device or easily available is important. But I also find as I grow older it can be harder to concentrate on things. The TV is on too often in my house, and there's really not a good place to escape from it, and it is much more a distraction than the Internet.
Still, I manage to get through between twenty and forty books a year, both new and old.
While the article veers a bit all over the place at its core it's about a topic I have given a lot of thought to - relationship between information form and content and our expectations. I still read books but I'm very against fetishising them. I don't understand the emotional connection with paper, typewriters and the general attitude that medium destroys the content. What I think happens a lot is the old correlatio…
Today, the closest thing I can think of is popular TV shows and movies; but also, video games, social media etc. What was once the exclusive domain of books is now accessible via other media. Of course the book people are mad at this but I agree with you that it’s kinda antiquated to lament that books have lost that place in society.
HN represents a wellspring of deeper reading than is generally afforded by the current entertainment cruft portals of the web - reddit, FB, insta, USA today, financial times, etc etc down to the SEO hellholes of recipe sites, youtube product placement; you get the idea. Let's appreciate HN for the quality of reading material and its curb on our drift to the rest of the 'popular' web. And I don't think I'm alone in al…
I used to read books all the time. I spent most of my waking hours as a teenager reading books. I’m 35 now and can barely hold attention on anything, I read maybe 3 books a year if I’m lucky. Even on Hacker News I almost exclusively read and comment on the comments, not the actual article unless I see someone says “have you read the article?” I don’t really know why. I have 8+ hours a day screentime on my iPhone, whi…
What you need is a habit change, which begins with an identity change (becoming a reader, or book club member). That will have long lasting effect, but identity change is not easy to begin with. So you setup systems and structures in place to encourage reading. The easiest way I think of is to download audio books that you would like and go for a walk. Other examples: You can uninstall distracting apps. You can publicly announce how much you want to read, or commit to writing some article that requires you to read something.
These ideas are outlined in Atomic Habits. So the solution to your problem of not reading lies in reading this book :)
This is the big thing for me. I easily waste an exercise habit, a social life, and a hobby most days. None of it spent on anything fulfilling. Then it often seems like I’m bored or there’s nothing else to do and I distract myself from the reason why with the reason why.
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> HN represents a wellspring of deeper reading than is generally afforded by the current entertainment cruft portals of the web - reddit, FB, insta, USA today, financial times, etc etc down to the SEO hellholes of recipe sites, youtube product placement; you get the idea. HN _thinks_ it represents a wellspring of deeper reading just like every other site mentioned also thinks. Same as the others it is a shallow echo…
Agree. I purposely spend less time on HN now because it's a lot of the same thing over and over that I realize I get sucked into. A site like https://techurls.com/ lets me see what's trending without getting sucked into the comments. As far as books go, I read every night and usually bounce between entertainment and usefulness.
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None of those things have the addictive and distraction power of the Internet. Along with the Internet has come ubiquitous things like laptops, tablets, and cellphones. It is an actual problem, not one for people to merely "worry and kvetch about".
Wasn't TV viewed in the same light? I imagine a large segment of humanity has always looked for addictions.