It's designed that way in part because it allows the battery on a Kindle to last an insanely long period of time but also because it's supposed to be easier on the eyes. Maybe I just spend so much time in front of a monitor that my eyes are trashed and I don't know the difference. But for me, on the iPhone, it just looks more crisp and readable.Can we just have an iPhone with a big screen? Or is this all about the batteries?
Marshall, unlike me, quickly settles into reading on the Kindle, then mulls over the prospect of a future without actual paper books and newspapers:
There's a lot I miss about print newspapers, particularly the serendipitous magic of finding stories adjacent to the one you're reading, articles you're deeply interested in but never would have known you were if it weren't plopped down in front of you to pull you in through your peripheral vision.I miss that too, but I canceled my NYT subscription a while back because I was leaving the folded paper on the table as I read what I wanted, free-form, on the computer screen. As Josh says:
... I regret not reading [newspapers]. But I just don't. I vote with my eyes.Yes, I've done that, and now my eyes — and my brain — have changed. It's hard now to read an unlit page.
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It's hard to read an unlit page
Now that Iphones are the rage.
Is this all about the battery
Or the triumph of the Illuminattery?
particularly the serendipitous magic of finding stories adjacent to the one you're reading,
The same principle holds for library bookshelves, when researching a topic, and for bookstore shelves when browsing. Students who are learning to do all their research via online databases are missing out on spontaneous learning experiences. They're expected to have narrowed a topic before they're even sure what they're writing about.
Whoever invents and new and long-lasting type of battery -- for phones, laptops, plug-in cars -- will be regarded as a veritable Messiah. Just think about what a ball and chain this one "little" technological limitation is. Perhaps it's the last remaining thing that keeps us tethered to the earth.
I like the idea of the Kindle, and think it or a similar device will be the future of information. It's a lot more convenient and transportable than a computer, and I can see a future where it's interactive. I'm waiting for further improvements though. Fourth or fifth generation readability, with some interactivity.
My wife bought me a Kindle for Christmas (old version). At first I thought the grey screen would bother me, but I'm quite used to it & enjoy it thoroughly.
Althouse quotes and comments:
“There's a lot I miss about print newspapers, particularly the serendipitous magic of finding stories adjacent to the one you're reading, articles you're deeply interested in but never would have known you were if it weren't plopped down in front of you to pull you in through your peripheral vision.”
I miss that too…
There is http://newsstand.com/ which presents a large number of media including The New York Times to one digitally over the Internet in exactly the same format as print — the same articles side by side and above and below, complete with all the (still) ads of the print version — but whose text one can also string search, an otherwise laborious task in the world of paper and ink.
Moreover, the data of pages and issues, if one chooses to hold onto it, can all be downloaded into one's local computer so an Internet connection isn't required.
I've been a subscriber not to the NY Times but the journal Nature by that means for several years and it's worked out pretty well.
As for the loss of ease of serendipitous browsing on the book shelves of physical libraries and bookstores that somebody lamented, I agree that's a shame, but I'd propose recovering that and more by improving our browsers and online search tools so they can easily present a “slice” of related works — selected according to various (hopefully configurable) criteria, not just alphabeticized by title, author, or library catalog number — that can continue to potentially attract one's attention to hitherto unseen connections.
Just wait for this technology to hit the street:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v226DYqlbHQ
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