41–50 of 93 posts
did you know that you can get a mint condition kindle 3 with 3G (free data for the device for life) on ebay for $30?
I consider the kindle 3 a nearly flawless device (save for it's lack of a frontlight). The fact that they are available, and the included 3G which just works, for $30, is a technological miracle in my mind.
It's amusing to note the short time frame the "books won't die" idea is working with. The original Kindle came out in 2007, just over ten years ago. That's a tiny blip in the passage of history. I don't know what the long-term fate of books will be. What will things be like in 50 years? 100 years? 500 years? I do know that if you expected books to be gone barely ten years after the first mainstream ebook reader your…
this car thing is a fad. I'm putting all my money in horses.
I've tried every format and device and I can't read e-books. Nothing, to me, beats a real book. I don't enjoy the experience for one, it strains my eyes (yes even e-ink). But also, and this is something I wouldn't have considered back when I was younger and it seemed like books surely must die in their dead-tree form, I actively seek ways to not be interacting with electronics and books are sublime for this purpose.…
For me, it depends on the book. For recreational reading, I strongly prefer real, printed ones. For reference materials, I strongly prefer electronic ones (stripped of DRM and converted into a non-proprietary format). I can keep my entire technical library on my phone and I can grep through the entire set of books for something in particular that I need to find. I remember the days when my technical library was in pr…
With a paper book, my brain seems to tag my memories of sections and scenes with how far into the book they were and where they were on the page. If I need to refer back to some earlier section when reading, that tagging lets me find it quickly.
With an ebook I don't get that page tagging, and also depending on the format and the reader might not get position on the page tagging.
For some ebooks, the ability to search by words is enough to make up for this, but for a lot of books I can find a given previously read section much faster and easier with the paper edition. If it is a book where I am likely to have to go back frequently, I'll probably get the paper edition.
Perhaps someday they will be able to make a thin enough display that someone can make an ebook reader that has a hundred of so screens bound together like the pages of a book. That would be awesome.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> History proves that nothing is more resilient than dead trees. That claim appears suspicious to me. Is there some data to back you up on that? > …trees are at least renewable, compared to all the e-waste in landfills now. While I agree that books tied to plastic hardware is bad, but felling trees isn't less evil either… it is only more so.
> While I agree that books tied to plastic hardware is bad, but felling trees isn't less evil either… it is only more so. No, it isn't. Paper is leagues and bounds more renewable and most data shows the rate of deforestation is going to stabilise within a few decades. Paper decomposes cleanly (and recycles) whereas a Kindle will be the same hunk of scrap for centuries if buried.
I've tried every format and device and I can't read e-books. Nothing, to me, beats a real book. I don't enjoy the experience for one, it strains my eyes (yes even e-ink). But also, and this is something I wouldn't have considered back when I was younger and it seemed like books surely must die in their dead-tree form, I actively seek ways to not be interacting with electronics and books are sublime for this purpose.…
For me, it depends on the book. For recreational reading, I strongly prefer real, printed ones. For reference materials, I strongly prefer electronic ones (stripped of DRM and converted into a non-proprietary format). I can keep my entire technical library on my phone and I can grep through the entire set of books for something in particular that I need to find. I remember the days when my technical library was in pr…
I've tried every format and device and I can't read e-books. Nothing, to me, beats a real book. I don't enjoy the experience for one, it strains my eyes (yes even e-ink). But also, and this is something I wouldn't have considered back when I was younger and it seemed like books surely must die in their dead-tree form, I actively seek ways to not be interacting with electronics and books are sublime for this purpose.…
For me, it depends on the book. For recreational reading, I strongly prefer real, printed ones. For reference materials, I strongly prefer electronic ones (stripped of DRM and converted into a non-proprietary format). I can keep my entire technical library on my phone and I can grep through the entire set of books for something in particular that I need to find. I remember the days when my technical library was in pr…
What I find missing with ebooks is a sense of 3D space. With a paper book, my brain seems to tag my memories of sections and scenes with how far into the book they were and where they were on the page. If I need to refer back to some earlier section when reading, that tagging lets me find it quickly. With an ebook I don't get that page tagging, and also depending on the format and the reader might not get position on…
What will the books of the future be made from? Will people living on Mars or in space stations pay dearly to ship books made from dead trees all the way from Earth?