Touching on my earlier post about this year’s reading list, I feel compelled to add this little piece of information: most of the books on my list are traditional, but I am trying to increase my e-book reading. Not that I am eschewing print for pixels, but it’s a form that I feel compelled to try my hand at consuming, and here’s why.
It’s portable. A book is a book, no matter how small, but sometimes it’s not always feasible to tote the hardcopy around (and for some books it’s a lot less feasible than others). It’s a lot lighter to carry one device with dozens of e-books loaded on it than to carry the actual print versions of the same books.
Multiple platforms. A print book is always on paper, whether it’s a hardcover or a paperback. But an electronic book can be on a large-reading device (Kindle, Nook or iPad… or similar), or smaller devices like cell phones and iPods. Most of them allow for cross-platform/device syncing so a piece can be started on device A, continued later on device B, etc.
The platform, though, could be an issue. While the ability to change the font size is a great thing, I’m leery about doing too much reading through my cell phone or iPod, just because it feels like only reading a few lines before tapping for the next screen. A few months ago, there was a part of me that was really diggin’ on a Nook (Color, most likely), but I opted to follow my friend Chris’s lead… sort of.
Forgive the slight disconnect in the flow here… I started drafting this one a while ago and am trying to finish it now… I really like bells and whistles – they are often what makes a device more useful. That’s why I love me some iPad. I can read, I can surf, and I can play games (and in a pinch, I can even do some real work, but the interface is a little weak for anything really typing-intensive). And with the help of a couple of apps, I can have several bookstores (Amazon, B&N, iBooks, etc.) all on one device. As much as I love the iBooks interface and the design (the rendering of page turns helps to still maintain the “book” feel), it’s still a computer screen, and I can only stand staring at a computer screen for so long before the eyes go crossed (or the wrist starts to get cranky from the device weight). I’ve gotten several files from Barnes & Noble, so Kindle wasn’t an option (epub files are more device friendly), and the more I thought about it the more I fell on Chris’s side.
He’s a bit of a purist: an e-reader should be an e-reader, without all of the extra bells and whistles. No wi-fi. No 3G. No games. And the more I thought about it, the more I found myself agreeing with the idea. I had been considering a plain reader to tote to work (the iPad, while great, can be bulky if you’re trying to have it on AND work around it). I had a rebate card that was needing to be used, and settled on a Sony PRS-350. The only thing I can honestly say I’m not overly thrilled with is the lack of memory expansion (but with ~1.5 GB [formatted] memory, and the average ebook being 1MB or less, it’s not that big of a deal). For the last month or so I’ve been quite happy with it. I’ve toyed with resizing the text but still have it set for medium.
Which I think takes me back to where I was originally thinking... the text scaling is like that of HTML and heading sizes. While you can change the size, it’s difficult (read: tedious) to mark up pages as a writer. I’m thinking that my e-reading will be more for pleasure, and if I decide I find something I want to pick apart and see how it works I will find/make a dead-tree copy so I can bleed red & blue pen and a variety of highlighter colors over it. In the original text markup style.
2 comments:
I thought the same thing but opted on the Kindle for traveling. I was going to get a Nook or an IPad but it was too many apps for my taste. I'm quite pleased with it so far, although I only had it a week. It took a long time before I moved from a book to an e-reader
as a person that just decided to get the E-reader, I completely agree with you. It took forever to decide what to get and with all the readers out there, the thing I looked for was a device that did not cause eye strain and read like a book. I got the Kindle and am very happy with the purchase so far. I still like to read a hard cover book now and then, though.
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