The future of books?

http://www.infosyncworld.com/news/n/6403.html

It's just more uneccessary technology to pollute our planet with. No thanks. I like looking at the spines of my collected novels in my room - they make it cosy - more than a flat metal or plastic palette will ever do.

I truly believe this is a fad. Maybe the very rich will go for it, but outside that I'll be very surprised (and highly alarmed) if everyone goes for it en masse. It is pointless, pointless, pointless.

JB

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I'm sorry, but whoever up in Sony decided that books themselves are an encumberance needs a slap. Anyone who loves books, cover, feel, smell et al, will be appalled at this proposed development, and it will flop big time.

Books and music cannot possibly be compared. A song is an ethereal thing, a story is not. It is generally written down and has mass.

JB

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From article...the product is a modified version of the company's Librie device, which has already been available for some time in Japan and met with limited success...

Limited being the word.

JB

Hi JB,

It may be pointless, but so are 4x4s in cities and 50 inch plasma screens in tiny living rooms. Ho hum.

Absolutely. So why add to it?

The future of books?

Well, sorry to go against the grain and all that, knowing how wonderful books are and that, but I'd just lurve one of these things. If I had the money, I'd buy one tomorrow.

A friend of mine bought one of the first RocketBooks, which was a similar device and claimed it saved him a fortune in books.

They might not be popular with the masses, but if what is important in a novel is the text, then it shouldn't matter the format you get it in. With these things you can set the text size. When you turn it off, it rememebers where you were up to. It's a gadget, a gimmick, and it won't change the world and probably won't kill the printed page, but I think it's as cool as any iPod.

Colin M

Smudger, thanks for that.

Traveller, fascinating article.

I'll watch developments with interest ...

Andrea

...while I'm going to drive a flaming truck into the front of the Sony building.

JB

You becoming a Literary Fundamentalist?

No, don't shoot, just joking, honest!

Andrea

Not a fundementalist, an environmentalist. Who gives a flying f*** that the ice caps are melting and that Britain is coughing up dead whales - let's create more unnecessary pollution folks with our battery powered gizmos. Let's get faster and faster and faster until we fall off the bloody edge - yippee!!!

I'm no saint, but I do think it's time we had a look at ourselves. Why do we need an electronic book?

JB

Why do you need a computer. Use a manual type writer if your that much of a techno-phobe. You'll still get your script read.

I dunno. I just don't like these electronic book things much. Maybe I should try one out.

JB