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<Friday, February 26th, 2010> [Vincent] The book is dead! Long live the book! I realized something the other day. I've been reading a lot of books lately, at least a lot of books for me. You see, I am generally NOT a reader. Part of the reason is that I don't like to acquire physical media. It takes up too much space and is a pain to move, which we do way too often. I try not to buy any media that required killing a tree or a dinosaur, if I can avoid it. So lately I've been buying and reading books on my... phone. On a stinkin' phone. I'm buying them from Amazon, using their Kindle iPhone app, but I don't own (or really want) a Kindle. Thinking about why I'm doing this, I think it boils down to a few things... 1. It's novel. I think this effect has worn off by now. 2. It's convenient to get the books. A few clicks, and there it is. 3. It's always there. I always have the phone nearby, so anytime I have a moment, I can read a bit. 4. It's smart. It keeps track of where I was last (across multiple books), keeps track of what I've read, lets me redownload anything I've already read, etc. 5. It's backlit. I can set the background to black, and read in bed without disturbing Amy all that much. Far less than a light, anyway. 6. It's cheaper (I think) than the bookstore. The big chain book stores are pretty expensive, I think partly because they throw away something like 60% of anything that ever hits the shelves (if memory serves). The library would of course be much cheaper, but that eliminates all of the other advantages. When I find myself unemployed in Manhattan someday, I think the library will sound like a much better idea. The downside? It's kind of small. I'll probably end up getting an iPad for a multitude of reasons, reading books but one of them... .:.
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