Attack of the Book Worms!

Black Swan

I tried downloading and reading e-book novels, but now I'm back to paperbacks and hardcovers. Although I spend hours a day looking at a computer screen, to read a novel that way just didn't work for me. Something was missing. I like the feel of a book and its paper pages.

How about you?

MrJoeSoap

Have never tried, I find it really hard to read big chunks of text from a screen. Give me a book any day.

I really like CD books for long commutes.

star-pants

Never really tried reading a book off the screen.... But I would say I'd prefer a paper book - sit all snug and off into another world

Karoma

Blue_Lagoon wrote: »

I tried downloading and reading e-book novels, but now I'm back to paperbacks and hardcovers. Although I spend hours a day looking at a computer screen, to read a novel that way just didn't work for me. Something was missing. I like the feel of a book and its paper pages.

How about you?

I'm the same. I dunno whether I want to risk the few hundred euro on an e-book reader that fits in my hand...

Ruu_Old

Never tried it, prefer to carry my huge books around in bag (or with a string tied around them). Oldskool.

Wertz

Never tried ebooks, no point....I can barely read a newspaper article online, don't know why, but I could read tens of thousands of words in a forum and wouldn't notice it.

[edit] Don't know what it's like with a dedicated reader, but to me at least, reading print on a screen doesn't gte me as....involved, as what it would do in ink on a page. You tend to skim read e-text more than the real thing or something...

is_that_so

E-books never became the nemesis they threatened to be. E-books are great for techie or how to type of stuff that you can skim through but not my choice for anything else. Some books need to be handled and have their pages turned. As for readers imo it makes little sense. Unlike Ipods you are not likely to be skipping books every couple of minutes.

Lands Leaving

I tries with e books, and audiobooks, and at the risk of sounding old fashioned, they just dont work. You need somethin in your hand, the smell of the pages, its just not right without that

~Rebel~

The thing i love about proper physical books is that it takes me Away from computers and television. No power, no screen glare, no low hum of electricity.

I find a book does a much better job of emersing the reader in the story and engaging your mind to visualise what it is your reading.

Also as others have said, i think we've all developed a more skip reading style when it comes to reading from a screen, and its a tough habit to get out of. For newspapers and magazine type content the internet/laptop is fine, but for a narrative, something you want to be fully engaged in, you just cant beat a good proper old fashioned book.

An Citeog

~Rebel~ wrote: »

The thing i love about proper physical books is that it takes me Away from computers and television. No power, no screen glare, no low hum of electricity.

I find a book does a much better job of emersing the reader in the story and engaging your mind to visualise what it is your reading.

I'd definitely agree with that. I much prefer paper books and paper in general. I find it so much easier to read notes, novels etc when I have them in my hand.

pretty-in-pink

I much prefer actual books, you can snuggle in something comfy, curl up and get lost in another world. Computers just don't do that.

Creamy Goodness

for actual novels/naratives = paper ftw.

for techie books ebooks ftw ctrl+f is a life saver.

Naikon

Cremo wrote: »

for techie books ebooks ftw ctrl+f is a life saver.

QFT:D
I own a few "techie" e-books, and it does not bother me if I am at the screen.
When reading such books, you are generally working with commands at a terminal so no biggie.
Proper Novels on the other hand...

Red Hand

I love benzene so I always read paper books.

JIZZLORD

Cremo wrote: »

for actual novels/naratives = paper ftw.

for techie books ebooks ftw ctrl+f is a life saver.

exactly, part of the fun of reading is the mobility, you can read in the garden or during your lunch at work etc,

Blowfish

I read books all of the time on my lappy, but haven't gotten around to getting a proper reader (and probably can't afford one either). I have used my mp3 player to read books in text format though, the only drawback being that it's an old player so the screen is fairly small.

Oman

i find it hard to read a long post, let alone a novel but I'll speed through a book

Aisling(",)

paper books for the win....it just wouldnt be the same especially with fantasy type stuff where you kinda drift off into a world where they dont even have electricty

Capt'n Midnight

pretty-in-pink wrote: »

I much prefer actual books, you can snuggle in something comfy, curl up and get lost in another world. Computers just don't do that.

qft.

Groucho Marx wrote:

Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.

Mrs. MacGyver

E-books are too much effort on the eyes. Prefer the 'old fashioned' paper variety!

themadchef

Ink on paper for me too, screen reading too hard on the eyes. also much handier to lend the actual book.

fenris

I use ubook, fbreader or justreader for reading ebooks on a PDA (XDA exec, Zaurus, Dell Axim, N770), works very well, I got used to reading ebooks while laid up in hospital, two injured thumbs made real books a too painful but an ebook set to autoscroll did the business!

Still reading ebooks now, they are great for reading in bed - no need for a light and much more portable than paper - no need to choose which books to bring when traveling, just bring them all!

Audiobooks in the car while comuting to work let you feel that you are getting some value from the travel time plus I find that I listen to books that I would not have considered reading.

But even with all of the above, sometimes a proper book and comfy chair with soft light coming over you shoulder is what life is all about!

johnnyskeleton

Project gutenberg is great - all the classics for free whenever you want them. In my last job I have unsupervised access to the internet and I read the Count of Monte Cristo when I should have been working.

But give the choice of a paper book or a book on a computer without any other factors like money, availability and getting caught reading, I'd prefer a paper book anyday. Especially old first editions.

Karoma

fenris wrote: »

I use ubook, fbreader or justreader for reading ebooks on a PDA (XDA exec, Zaurus, Dell Axim, N770), works very well, I got used to reading ebooks while laid up in hospital, two injured thumbs made real books a too painful but an ebook set to autoscroll did the business!

Which do you find best for the Axim (uBook?)? Any that handle .chm too? I've tried reading books on my PDA - even in landscape it's only about 9 words wide and 4 or 5 lines long...it's slow and painful.

Saint_Mel

Download and e-book ... then print it out
Everyones a winner

Tzetze

.pdf + bookr + hacked psp = happy tzetze

SimpleSam06

Blue_Lagoon wrote: »

Something was missing. I like the feel of a book and its paper pages.

MrJoeSoap wrote: »

Have never tried, I find it really hard to read big chunks of text from a screen. Give me a book any day.

Wertz wrote: »

Never tried ebooks, no point....I can barely read a newspaper article online, don't know why, but I could read tens of thousands of words in a forum and wouldn't notice it.

Lands Leaving wrote: »

I tries with e books, and audiobooks, and at the risk of sounding old fashioned, they just dont work. You need somethin in your hand, the smell of the pages, its just not right without that

themadchef wrote: »

Ink on paper for me too, screen reading too hard on the eyes. also much handier to lend the actual book.

Saint_Mel wrote: »

Download and e-book ... then print it out
Everyones a winner

The reason ebooks don't work is because you are looking at a luminous light source, which is sending information to your eyes in RGB (Red-Green-Blue). This is not natural, as in our eyes aren't built for it, so it becomes a lot of effort after a certain point in time.

The answer to your woes is already in place, just not sufficiently developed to be on the mass market yet. This is called Electronic Paper. It is a non-luminous screen (you need a light source to read it), and produces images in the same way as paper (CMYK, Cyan-Magenta-Yellow-Black); as such it is the "natural" way to read, our eyes can handle it a lot better. It can be crumpled or bent like ordinary paper, and for ultimate win, it doesn't need power to keep an image on the sheet, so your battery life goes through the roof.

I can see them completely replacing normal monitors in the future, and you could store a thousand books in something the size of a packet of cigarettes - you'll likely have the battery life to read them, too.

lisbon_lions

Definitely paper source for me. I like audio books too though when im driving a 4hr plus drive to the NW

SimpleSam06

Just an update to my post there, looks like Sony has already brought out a prototype device, retailing at around €200 - €300. Reports are that although there are some problems with flickering when you turn the page, it is a massive step up from normal screens, and actually better to read than a normal book. You can apparently read it consistently for almost a week before you need a recharge.

WhiteWashMan

books are just one of the greatest pleasures in life.

an e-book just doesnt work for me. its about the smell of it, the feel of it, the ability to stick your finger in between the pages and close the book when youre thinking about something thats happened in the story. its about being able to lie in bed and reading, and getting ready to turn the page when youre 2 paragraphs into the current pages. its about the quiet, its about knowing how far you are into the book, about paper and cardboard.

its about not being any sort of technology. its just about the pleasure of reading.


i just cant seem to get any of that on me laptop

Pigman II

SimpleSam06 wrote: »

The reason ebooks don't work is because you are looking at a luminous light source, which is sending information to your eyes in RGB (Red-Green-Blue). This is not natural, as in our eyes aren't built for it, so it becomes a lot of effort after a certain point in time.

The answer to your woes is already in place, just not sufficiently developed to be on the mass market yet. This is called Electronic Paper. It is a non-luminous screen (you need a light source to read it), and produces images in the same way as paper (CMYK, Cyan-Magenta-Yellow-Black); as such it is the "natural" way to read, our eyes can handle it a lot better. It can be crumpled or bent like ordinary paper, and for ultimate win, it doesn't need power to keep an image on the sheet, so your battery life goes through the roof.

Reading is not natural either. I've never seen a dog pick up a novel by Virginia Woof.

SimpleSam06

bedlam wrote: »

The flickering you mention is the page refreshing. With out this there would be ghosting on the screen of previous pages.

Roll on the day when they can get refresh rates similar to currently available monitors. How cool would that be?

Pigman II wrote: »

Reading is not natural either. I've never seen a dog pick up a novel by Virginia Woof.

You missed the point there, which is that we did not, at any time in our evolutionary history, from monkey to steam age, stare at luminous light sources for prolonged periods of time. We are in no way built for it, it damages our eyes and is stressful. In terms of being "natural", as in non-damaging to our eyes, reading a book has little more effect on your eyes than staring at a rock for a few hours.

Reflected light from books is fine; bright monitors are not. So by moving to a CMYK based colour scheme, the new epaper makes displays a hell of a lot more comfortable for us.

Agamemnon

Pigman II wrote: »

I've never seen a dog pick up a novel by Virginia Woof.

They prefer Laurence Sterne.

Pigman II

SimpleSam06 wrote: »

You missed the point there, which is that we did not, at any time in our evolutionary history, from monkey to steam age, stare at luminous light sources for prolonged periods of time. We are in no way built for it, it damages our eyes and is stressful. In terms of being "natural", as in non-damaging to our eyes, reading a book has little more effect on your eyes than staring at a rock for a few hours.

me, the new epaper makes displays a hell of a lot more comfortable for us.

I'm sure the first people who picked up a book thought "hey I'm not built for this", "ideas should only be transferred orally!" Yet here we are. My point is you cannot say staring at a screen is "unnatural" unless you acknowledge that reading itself is also unnatural. Being unnatural in itself has never stopped us from doing things however.

Tar.Aldarion

Has to be a real book for me. I love them.

fenris

ubook works well on the axim, you can just tap the bottom corner of the screen to page forward rather than getting thumb ache from using the d-pad

I normally set the font size and colur manually to something legible against a very dull/dark background.

I think that there was a post on aximsite recently about a chm reader or converter.

I went through the Wheel of Time, the Malzan series and the entire Game of thrones series on ebook recently and don't feel that I have missed out on the paper experience to an extent that counteracts the pleasure of being able to read a chapter while waiting for a meeting or even just over lunch.

humanji

Pigman II wrote: »

I'm sure the first people who picked up a book thought "hey I'm not built for this", "ideas should only be transferred orally!" Yet here we are. My point is you cannot say staring at a screen is "unnatural" unless you acknowledge that reading itself is also unnatural. Being unnatural in itself has never stopped us from doing things however.

But reading is natural. When you are looking at things, you are reading, just not in the same literal sense as is meant with books. You recognise the shapes and objects and the symbols that can represent them. Reading words in a book isn't that different.


Anyway, I don't have much time for books now. I listen to audiobooks when I'm at the gym because they help me forget that I'm suffering

Aseth

Read several books that way but still prefer paper ones

SimpleSam06

Pigman II wrote: »

I'm sure the first people who picked up a book thought "hey I'm not built for this", "ideas should only be transferred orally!" Yet here we are.

Gah no you missed it again. Biologically we have never spent large amounts of time staring at the sun, candles, lanterns or whatever. This is not a social statement I'm making here, its the how we are genetically. Therefore, luminous screens are bad for your eyes, and things like books are fine.

Pigman II wrote: »

My point is you cannot say staring at a screen is "unnatural" unless you acknowledge that reading itself is also unnatural. Being unnatural in itself has never stopped us from doing things however.

I did clarify what I meant by natural earlier. I'd also say its not natural for us to strap 90 kilos of lead to our backs and go bungee jumping; by which I mean we aren't designed for it, and it will cause long term damage to our bodies. Unnatural in this case = not in our natures = not something we would do in the normal course of things. Such as staring at the sun for hours on end.

Your eyes don't give a rats arse if you are looking for rabbits in tall grass or reading the complete works of Tolkien. They do give a rats arse if you are reading it from a luminous screen however. While we treat it as a neccessary evil, if technology advances to the stage that we can get away from it, we should certainly take advantage of that.

bedlam wrote: »

The refresh I am referring to is not the same as a monitor refresh rate. When you "turn" a page the device will clean the screen by filling the whole page with black, then white "ink" to remove any traces of the previous page before drawing the new one. This process which last less than a second is misconstrued by some as screen flicker

Just like paper an eink screen does not refresh (unless changing a page) so has zero flicker.

Yes, I know, thats why it uses no power to keep the image on the screen. What I heard with the Sony offering was that it took a couple of seconds and produced noticeable flicker. Still, maybe that was just the bibliophiles.

What I'm talking about is the actual refresh rate, so they can be used as a replacement for monitors. At this stage, its only a matter of time, IMHO.