Nick David Wright wrote:
Oh I read the entire thing.
But just to give you a little background on myself ...
I'm the guy who refuses to own a car and rides a bicycle everywhere. I'm also
the guy that mows my lawn with a scythe and a manual power reel mower. And I'm
also the guy that heats my home with wood. Oh and I'm the guy that refuses to
buy a chainsaw and cuts all my firewood with an axe.
So in some regards I am a confirmed luddite. ;;)
As is/was, in some regards, the "ink-stained wretch" who wrote that
article...
And then I come in and hop on my WiFi laptop and post digitally scanned
photographs on the internet.
There you go.
Buying and owning books is *not* Luddite now.
It will be before long.
The hardware has to get both better and cheaper. It has to overcome the
visual limitations of current display technology and it has to get to
the point at which the reader device is no more expensive than a typical
(hardcover) book. But both of these things are going to happen.
When it reaches the point at which the visual qualities are reasonably
close to paper and the cost of dropping your electronic reader into the
bath tub or leaving it behind on the train/plain is no greater than
losing a book... then we'll have a tipping point exactly like what we've
all seen in digital photography. If you're arguing against the future of
electronic books and shooting pictures with a digital camera you're
engaging in denial, pure and simple.
A lot of mobile (cell) phones are given away free now with service
commitments of no more than two years. That's likely to be the model for
electronic books eventually.
Everything Bob Walkden said about the pleasures of books is and will
continue to be true. It's also beside the point: It won't stop the
advancement of electronic books any more than the pleasures of film
stopped digital cameras.
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