{"id":2632,"date":"2010-01-02T11:54:55","date_gmt":"2010-01-02T16:54:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/?p=2632"},"modified":"2010-01-02T11:54:55","modified_gmt":"2010-01-02T16:54:55","slug":"literature-new-media","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/2010\/01\/literature-new-media\/","title":{"rendered":"LITERATURE & NEW MEDIA:"},"content":{"rendered":"

T<\/span>wo interesting articles today on the neverending speculations about what e-books will do to change reading habits:<\/p>\n

John T brings up the NPR note<\/a> that focuses on Amazon’s reader and this statement by a writer:<\/p>\n

“Over the last couple of years, I’ve really noticed if I sit down with a book, after a few paragraphs, I’ll say, ‘You know, where’s the links? Where’s the e-mail? Where’s all the stuff going on?’ ” says writer Nicholas Carr. “And it’s kind of sad.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But I find that to be a back and forth switch that toggles itself depending upon which method of reading is being done. If I’m reading “straight” text for a while–a while meaning anyplace from an hour to a couple days–I’m momentarily stumped by finding links in a hypertext piece–and here, I’m talking seconds of indecision. Then back to straight reading where I will indeed be looking for links, as Carr notes. Though not with the sense of sadness, but rather mere readjustment to the medium.<\/p>\n

Then this in MacWorld<\/a>:\u00a0 “Sales of electronic books topped their paper-based cousins for the first time this past Christmas day, according to Amazon.com”\u00a0 With the caveat:<\/p>\n

“Given the timing of the event, it\u2019s likely that the spike in e-book sales recorded by Amazon was due primarily to the high number of gift recipients who opened up the brand-new Kindles they found under their Christmas trees; nonetheless, this milestone could represent a watershed event for the inexorable rise of e-book readers in general, and the Kindle in particular.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Yes, that would explain a good portion of it. It’s the typical case of receiving the expensive medium as a gift and then need to feed its hunger with the software.<\/p>\n

I don’t know why we’re really even arguing at this early stage of the transition. Any innovation that changes society’s manner of “doing” necessarily involves a bit of generational changing of the guard. Grandpa doesn’t always give up Old Nellie for the Model T that easily. Not by choice, perhaps, but by habit, income restrictions (think about how upgrading even a home use computer is a major decision when old programs won’t work anymore with Bill’s latest software releases) and a small percentage by stubborn resistance or by mere desire to remain in one’s comfort zone of familiarity.<\/p>\n

Time will tell, then; though I believe that while all the old literature slowly finds its way onto disk and internet servers, there will always be shelves built for books.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

T<\/span>wo interesting articles today on the neverending speculations about what e-books will do to change reading habits: John T brings up the NPR note that focuses on Amazon’s reader and this statement by a writer: “Over the last couple of years, I’ve really noticed if I sit down with a book, after a few paragraphs, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[15,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-literature","category-new-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2632"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2632\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2633,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2632\/revisions\/2633"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}