Luddite or techy?

[etudiant]

Would you be comfortable reading on an electronic device, such as Kindle or others that are now hitting the marketplace? Or do you just feel more comfortable with the “real thing”, physical copies of books that you can leaf through, and old bookstores with their musty smell and obscure titles; and be speckled booksellers who seem weighty with their knowledge of the world?

These devices will be a big transition in reading if they do truly catch on. No more carrying ten pounds of books in your vacation suitcase. Font size will always be just right. Many trees will be saved. No books more than $10.

Libraries may now get into the act, according to this NY Times article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/15/books ... =1&_r=1&hp

What do you think: Yea, or Nay?

[DWill]

I say 'nay.' Just as there is comfort food, there will always be for me 'comfort reading,' which means having the physical paper object in front of me. I will admit it makes sense to read on a Kindle or similar device--because almost every writer produces his or her work on a computer without physical pages. But I don't care. The savings in paper sounds nice, but you have to then take into account the power needed to recharge batteries, not to mention the bother of doing this. Plus, we'd have no rare first editions!

Our reading habits will surely change if we switch to electronic formats, and this is what I see as the main drawback. We won't be reading hundreds of pages of text, regardless of the advances made in the eye-friendliness of screens. Kindle-type devices will morph into entertainment devices mixing in video and audio. It could be the end of reading as we know it (sounds ominous and apocalyptic).

[etudiant]

I can see your point about these being turned into something frivolous. Already features are being added, such as email and Internet, notepad, talking book features, etc. They could incline us to being lazier.

On the other hand, to take the other side of the street momentarily, I can’t help thinking…..firmly held belief can be hard to shake. When Robert Fulton tried to explain the idea for the steamboat to Napoleon in 1802, the later replied:

I fail to see, good sir, how lighting bonfires beneath the decks of my battleships will enable me to gain any advantage over my adversaries whatsoever!

It took over a hundred years before shipbuilders stopped adding small masts for sails beside the funnels of steamships…….. just in case.

[Grim]

Wanna be Luddite, but definitely a techy. I absolutely LOVE my MacBook and iPod. Of course I don't spend that much time on the computer, preferring to read books, rather I view technology as a great way to integrate a well rounded, productive and efficient life.

In many ways new technologies are intimately connected to the past. Human history has been a continual series of unprecedented changes, locking humanity into a technological path which requires appropriate safeguards.

When talking about technology we can discuss two important implication of rapid technological change: the control dilemma, and the condition of ubiquity. The control dilemma is when we don't know enough about how a new technology is going to turn out as it develops to implement appropriate safeguards, as a society of users we may become locked into a developmental path which prevents future controls. The condition of ubiquity arises from the fact that technological development in no longer localized, again creating problems for product safety regulation.

In response to these factors of modern technological development there arises four main attitudes towards technology (remembering that human history is essentially a contiguous series of technological change) each with their own attributes and expected responses:
a.) technophilliac - likes implementing rapidly replaceable technology controlled in a localized way
b.) technocratic - likes large long lived technological infrastructure (Ethernets), cutting through developmental BS to do appropriate risk analysis in response to the expected control dilemma, this is a person who essentially strives to define new technology
c.) techno-skeptic - likes the appropriate technology with low resource requirements
d.) techno-fatalist - essentially a rejection of new technology favoring the old

Which of the four personality types in relation to technology are you?

[stahrwe]

Does anyone on this forum use a Kindle? I hear they break easily.

Technology is great, I have a Palm Tungsten that I used to write my book. I could carry it in my pocket loaded with my manuscript, multiple versions of the Bible, commentaries, a 640,000 word dictionary. I also like the ability to share books online. I have almost all of my book on Googlebooks so people can read it. On the other hand, I don't especially like reading from a screen. Sitting in front of a computer or holding a laptop is not enjoyable. Maybe the Kindle solves that, but I also like to buy used books, especially of they have been written in. I feel a connection with someone else who read that book.

[johnson1010]

I think the Kindle is good for travel, but i would rather read from a book.

Though the technology is improving, i don't like the idea of a book that needs to be charged. Reading from a screen becomes painful after a while, something doesnt sit right with the contrast. Electronic files are more vulnerable to loss, deletion, and corruption than a book. When i buy a book i will have it until it rots. It will be there for my kids to read, or to lend to someone else who could benefit from it. Books also serve as nice conversation peices, as they are available on your shelf for people to puruse, and begin to unravel what your interests are. They are almost like a social resume.

[seespotrun2008]

Would you be comfortable reading on an electronic device, such as Kindle or others that are now hitting the marketplace? Or do you just feel more comfortable with the “real thing”, physical copies of books that you can leaf through, and old bookstores with their musty smell and obscure titles; and be speckled booksellers who seem weighty with their knowledge of the world?

Either one! Bookstores are awesome and I love holding a good book. But I love computers too and it is great for getting magazines and things that you would just have to recycle anyway. Plus you can find free classics online.

[seespotrun2008]

Kindle-type devices will morph into entertainment devices mixing in video and audio. It could be the end of reading as we know it (sounds ominous and apocalyptic).

Ewww. Scary. If our books become entertainment comparable to much of the news on television, then I would have to pass.

[DWill]

On the other hand, to take the other side of the street momentarily, I can’t help thinking…..firmly held belief can be hard to shake.

I could be eating my words in 5 years or so. I'm not adventurous when it comes to technology. I wait a good long time while grumbling about stuff we don't need...then I get on board, but always in a limited way. Social networking will have to do without me, and I don't care about cell phones, regard them as necessary only. A kindle-type device which could carry many books on it or send for more at any time could draw me out, perhaps.

[etudiant]

“Which of the four personality types in relation to technology are you?”

I suppose I should be careful with the term Luddite, as I only got a cell phone a couple of months ago, and then had to pour over the instruction book to figure out how it worked.

In general though, I think if a new technology works, and is useful, then I am comfortable with diving in, even if it seems a little odd at first.

I think that new technology often causes social and even psychological change, as DWill has pointed out, and this is something worth keeping under observation. Sometimes the changes are hard to see coming. To go back to the steamboat analogy, I’m sure no one in1802 would have had the slightest idea that all that black smoke coming out of the new steam engines would eventually cause a big problem.


“When i buy a book i will have it until it rots.”


Amazon may have shot themselves in the foot with this issue, by withdrawing already purchased e-books from Kindle users because of a copyright dispute. There was some bad PR on the net over this recently.



“Books also serve as nice conversation peices, as they are available on your shelf for people to puruse, and begin to unravel what your interests are”

I agree. Nothing shapes our personal environment like a bookcase. It’s a window into our personality.

My guess is that Kindle-like devices will take off in popularity, but they will never completely replace conventional books. We have seen this in the past. New technologies have some notable advantages, and go on to capture the public imagination. But often the old technology still has a number of attributes, some perhaps a little subtle, that will endure. The old gives way somewhat, and is shifted to more of a niche market. In the 1920s, it was thought that radio would replace live theater. It did not. There is an energy to live theater that radio couldn’t quite replace, so it endured, in a smaller form. In the 1950s, TV swept the world, but didn’t quite blot out radio. Radio still had some intrinsic advantages, and so survived, but in a diminished way. There are still many sailboats in the world today, but only in a niche market.

Kindle devices are a no-brainer for some applications. Students will no longer have to sell a pint of their blood at the pawnshop in order to pay for their university texts. We will save on endless recycling of newspapers and magazines. No more paying $39.95 for that new release in hardcover. But I think many books will still be published in conventional form. They may have to change, in order to play up the advantages of a paper book. More pictures and graphics perhaps? I’m not sure.