Scott W

eReaders - What is everyone's thoughts?

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I honestly haven't used one. I feel like a Luddite on that front, but something about the tactile feel of a book is a small (but key, at least I think it is) part of the experience for me. Part of it is also wanting to have a library on display (which seems old-fashioned, and going through a move right now showcases the folly of such a notion) and the freedom to underline things should I choose to, or write in the margins (I don't usually do this, but it has happened). I understand you can highlight passages and take notes of sorts on many e-readers, but...I don't know. I think a part of it is leaving some sort of physical evidence that I engaged with a thing. If someone decades from now should find my book collection, my having creased those spines and turned those pages will be apparent. Some sort of connection with past readers, part of why I buy used books, they have history to them. 

 

I guess I'm nostalgic about books. My girlfriend has an e-reader, perhaps I should evaluate it firsthand and revise my thoughts.

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I haven't used an actual e-reader (no Kindle or Kobo or whathaveyou) but I have increasingly begun using my iPod Touch to read public domain books. I still prefer having an actual, physical book, but for the most part its not too bad. The problem is sometimes getting a book with really wonky formatting... page numbers in the middle of a paragraph, that type of thing. Probably alleviated when you get eBooks from a reputable source (Amazon or some such) instead of just random websites with free books.

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Probably alleviated when you get eBooks from a reputable source (Amazon or some such) instead of just random websites with free books.

 

Surprisingly, no.  The few professionally published e-books I've purchased are riddled with hyphenation errors, spacing issues, and other issues.  Many publishers don't put as much care into their e-books as they need to.

 

And the DRM!  I lost books switching from an iPhone to a Nook to an iPad mini so I am basically done buying books from either corporation's stores.  Only buy epubs that you can open everywhere!

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I go through phases for both eReaders and paperbacks. Never hardcovers. I can't stand reading hardcovers. That's where I go Kindle every time.

 

Other than that, it's really just a matter of inertia. Usually once I read one thing on my Kindle, I'll read the next thing and the thing after that on it, too. Then something'll inspire me to grab one of the unread paperbacks off my shelf and I'll end up reading that, too. Or I'll go to a bookstore and buy a handful of books and that'll get me off the Kindle.

 

I do love a lot of aspects of reading with the Kindle. I have a Paperwhite, which is killer since I find myself reading a lot at night, out on my front porch with a beer. There's a streetlight on the corner that can light up a book for me if I stand at just the right angle, but that process is way easier with the Paperwhite. Plus, I use the dictionary constantly (I do the same with paperbacks, too, but it's obviously a quicker process with an eReader!).

 

I'll have to echo other sentiments here, though: I just love the feel and look of a book. I put my through the ringer while I'm reading them and I love the creases in the spine that form while I get through them.

 

But otherwise! Love 'em both! At the end of the day, I'm just interested in the words on the page, whatever form that page takes.

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 Personally, I love real books. The sense of intellectual space one can generate when surrounded by a well-read library has always been infatuating for me. The only thing I've ever struggled with is my incredibly poor penmanship makes taking the notes I so often wish to take somewhat cumbersome and dangerous if my block lettering overlaps the printed text. Current eBooks still struggle with note-taking, and like others have mentioned it is difficult to make a connection with the object the way you do with a physical book. I personally think this makes an argument for the fact that even though we traditionally consider books a text-only medium visuals play a definite role. The space, color, and shape of a book all provide it a sense of individuality that disappears in a kindle.

So why get an eBook?

I've been thinking a lot recently about the ethics of physical books as a way of navigating this problem. They cost us trees, they take up valuable space, and they don't allow for the freedom of information that a socially annotated book does. I've found it amazingly insightful to peer inside the mind of other readers when loading the social notes for The Sun Also Rises on my Kindle. Can we argue that sharing our insights is a moral good? Perhaps.

I will be the first to admit I have a chip on my shoulder when it comes to books. I had to donate a 2,000-book library when I discovered I was too poor to move it across the country with me.

 

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I recently started considering buying an eReader because the original Roger Rabbit novels are only available digitally. I also wanted The Stand but I finally found it in a charity shop after over a year of searching (including public libraries in various cities and boroughs). Still Roger pretty much justifies the £100 or so cost. I'm not getting telly at my new place (excluding LoveFilm streaming and online catchup) so that should cover the cost of it and give me time to actually do some reading outside of my lunch break.

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I have a Kindle (the one just previous to the "PaperWhite"), and LOOOOOOVE it. 

 

I've gone almost completely digital at this point for books. Between Audible on my phone and the Kindle, I tend to be carrying 30+ books with me at all times. The screen is great, the battery MUST work on some sort of magic to last as long as it does, and just generally find it awesome. Debating whether or not to upgrade to the paperwhite to get the built in screen light, which could come in handy.

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I prefer physical books usually, but on the other hand I've somehow went from reading more books to reading more articles, blog posts, papers etc.

 

I wanted to buy a Kindle Paperwhite last year, but later got an iPad Mini as a gift and my desire for an eReader-only device vanished. The iPad mini is good for reading because the size is about right (could be fine even at 2x smaller), it's not as heavy as the large iPads, and then you can do a lot more than read books on it. I read PDFs as well, and articles from the web via Instapaper. I can do both of those on the iPad as well as e-Books. I think I haven't read that many actual e-books on it, actually. Also, many of the books I want to read don't seem to be available as e-books.

 

For a big novel, I usually prefer physical formats, even hardcover.

 

I might buy the next iPad Mini if it has retina screen -- because the resolution on the first mini is not great and I'd also like to get a 3G one, so that I don't have to share my phone's 3G to the iPad (not as comfortable with iPhone 3GS as it could be -- have to use bluetooth and it keeps disconnecting and never connects automatically).

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The screen is great, the battery MUST work on some sort of magic to last as long as it does

 

E-ink displays work by placing a transparent sheet over thousands of tiny transparent capsules making up the screen's pixels. Each capsule is filled with teeny pieces of positively-charged white pigment and negatively-charged black pigment, with a grid of electrodes running beneath it. Whenever the grid produces a negative charge beneath one capsule, the positive white pigment is attracted to the bottom of the capsule and the black pigment is repelled to the top, making the capsule as a whole appear black. The opposite happens for a positive charge, and shades of grey are achievable by careful coordination. Because the display will naturally stay in place without a charge, it only consumes power during the exact moment that the display is being changed (like turning the page), so it consumes almost no battery life. Effectively, a Kindle's display is turned off basically all the time except when the image changes. Neat, huh?

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The opposite happens for a positive charge, and shades of grey are achievable by careful coordination. 

Up to fifty, in fact!

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My preferred method of reading is actually audiobook if only because I had a severe eye injury in college.  While I recovered my sight, my eyes dry out really quickly and become bloodshot.  Having a job where I stare at a computer all day and then going home to my hobbies which involve staring at another screen, I have a hard time reading afterward.

 

I used to hate the idea of ereaders until I got my hands on a Kindle.  I have a Kindle 3 now and love it.  I still read a lot of paper books, mostly because I owned a lot of books beforehand and we have a really good library system.  The big push for me was having to move a lot.  I got really sick of packing and transporting over six double-stacked bookshelves' worth of books.  My first move after getting the Kindle was to donate most of my public domain books to the library and just download them.  Now I'm in the process of whittling down my collection book by book as I read them.  Only the really special ones will remain.  The one thing I will miss is the old book smell.  Can't beat it.

 

My wife has a Kindle Fire HD which works well for her purposes but if I were to try reading from it for long periods of time my eyes would erupt into blood fountains.  I like that my Kindle 3 has no backlight.  Unfortunately my wife piggybacks onto my Amazon account so now I have a huge library of romance novels associated with my name.

 

On a side note I think it's interesting most people are using a new medium to read the older classics, whereas a lot of modern novels are still purchased in the classic paper format.

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I would like to echo the sentiments of those who said that if you travel a bit for work, an eReader is worth its weight in gold. It was by far my most important item during a multi month work trip overseas this year.

After I got used to it a few years ago, it's kind of hard to turn back. Recently upgraded to the most recent Paperwhite after my Kindle 2 died; I slightly preferred the size and non touch screen of the older model. I typically highlight a word or change the page on accident at least once per day.

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I've been having a hard time finding a copy of "At The Mountains Of Madness" outside of digital copies this week, and it reminded me that I'm still intrigued by the idea of getting one of these.

 

You might say it re-Kindled my interest.

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I've been using Calibre more and more for my own eBooks. It's a really solid bit of library management software. You can get a plugin for it that strips away DRM, at which point you can convert it to any number of formats, add metadata/cover art, etc. It even has an automated feature to email to Kindle, so if you buy an epub at one online store it'll one-click convert to Kindle-friendly format and email to your @kindle email address for upload.

 

Of course, it's a bit of a hassle if you're satisfied with one ecosystem, but if you want to get the most out of your library, don't want to be locked into an ecosystem, and don't mind losing special Kindle-specific features like Whispersync, it's pretty good stuff.

 

Edit: Realized I didn't actually state my opinion on ereaders. I love them! I had a Kindle Keyboard and upgraded to a Kindle Paperwhite this year. It's way more convenient for me than regular books mostly because the books I'm most interested in are generally huge tomes of hard sci-fi/fantasy stuff that would weigh three or four pounds and barely fit in my tiny man purse. Plus, backlit epaper screens means better reading at night beside my girlfriend in bed, since it doesn't bother her even with all the lights off.

 

Only disadvantage is the ability to develop a backlog as with other digital formats like a Netflix queue or Steam catalog. With physical books, I just feel ashamed seeing a voluminous stack of books sitting on my physical nightstand, a sensation not really felt with my Kindle. As a result, I just buy anything of marginal interest on sale on the Kindle Store and my backlog is enormous.

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The Kindle Pagewhite is truly a sight to behold, it even conviced my dad of ebooks to some extent, and hes a former librarian + somewhat of a techno grouse. Very pleasant to read on, even for people that detest screens.

 

that being said, electronic books creep me the fuck out. I just see 1984, changing history to fit the political landscape, ninja edits, the slow erosion of absolute truth.

 

I see despots salivating at the prospect of an information cloud, where nothing is a solid and everything can be redacted by an invisible hand in realtime.

 

there have been cases where secret edits have been done to physical books (Tragedy and Hope comes to mind) it took some serious sleuthing to catch those, think how easy it is to control knowledge when they could literally edit something under your very nose.

 

hopefully the two will coexist. An ebook reader is an amazing tool, but there are some things that should really have a physical copy backing them up.

 

be wary of people that want to get rid of books, I think thats a real lesson from history

 

Oh and finally, they should give me a free fackin ebook when I buy a physical copy of something, charging extra is ridiculous especially this early in the game, if you want customers you need to hand out some testers mane

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Oh and finally, they should give me a free fackin ebook when I buy a physical copy of something, charging extra is ridiculous especially this early in the game, if you want customers you need to hand out some testers mane

 

I would totally go for that. I really like my Kindle, but it hasn't replaced paper books.

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I enjoy reading Kindle Singles type e-books (stuff that's longer than a long essay, but not as long as what most people would consider to be a proper book), but I have a hard time sticking with novels on Kindle type devices.

 

I don't have any really informed opinions about the different types of devices though.

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I was really pro-physical books, but I bought a Kindle Paperwhite because I'm planning on travelling and it's easier to carry around than a stack of books. Very quickly it has replaced physical books for me, at least for the time being. I like to read during my breaks at work and it's very convenient to hold and read while eating, as well as just being lighter to carry. I'm probably just on a bit of a high because I bought it just a few weeks ago. I still love reading physical books so I'll probably just switch between the two as I feel like it.

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I live in Canada where E readers only function properly 4 months a year.  The other 8 months the temperature makes the screen fade.  But I still have one because I enjoy carrying a library with me.  Its a lot lighter than lugging along over 300 books.

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WHOA HELLO!

 

I'm looking to upgrade from my four-ish year old Nook and I'm wondering if anyone has any opinions on the more recent Nook vs Kindle debate. I want one of the light-up ones, so the GlowLight or the Paperwhite. (I don't know if there are non-light-up ones anymore, that's how little I know about this stuff.)

 

Cursory Google searches seem to indicate Kindle is the better choice for everything except dumb DRM restrictions. DRM is the reason I went with Nook last time. But DRM is so easy to remove off books I buy that I can put anything I want on a Kindle at this point.

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The benefits of the Amazon DRM seem to outweigh the deficits, what with their syncing stuff and multiplatform cloud download stuff. I use Calibre to handle all non-Kindle books, which is really handy for converting ePub/PDF files I buy elsewhere, stripping Kindle DRM if need be, and syncing files easily to a plugged in Kindle/automating email to @kindle.com.

 

I love my Paperwhite. My wife has the last gen normal Kindle with an unlit screen, and I actually like it too because it's smaller and has physical page turn buttons. The Paperwhite is touch-only, which is not super great for one-handed reading in bed or something. That said, it's not a huge problem and I still prefer my Paperwhite over last-gen non-touch non-lit Kindles I've owned.

 

I'm honestly considering upgrading to a Kindle Voyage + 3G next time around, as it has page-turning sensors in the bezel, a really high DPI matte display, and the Whispersync would be superhot coupled with 3G connectivity. But I'm also a big dumb idiot who would pay $250-ish for a super fancy eReader, so don't pay attention to me.

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I don't have any other device on which I'd read besides the ereader, so syncing doesn't really matter to me.

 

That said I was looking at the Voyage after making this post and it looks real nice. I think I'm going to just wait for that.

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I own a kindle fire and ipad. I prefer to read on the kindle fire, usually short novels that other people recommend. If I enjoy the book enough I will purchase a hard copy and re-read it. I still like the feel of a real book in my hands, but sometimes if I hate the book I will rage quite and throw into a dark corner forever. I prefer iPad for comic books and graphic novels, e-book for casual reading and hard copy for nostalgia. 

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