I love our ebook future

[Flub]

Just look at a single page of my Kindle app on iOS. I remember taking up far too much luggage space taking books on holiday. Now I have access to my entire library in my bag/pocket

 

 

[Hawklord]

Been reading ebooks legally and illegally since 2001 when I bought a Palm m101. I used to have to manually find the page I was at in the ebook (that's if I could actually find a digital version of the book on eDonkey/eMule) so I could continue reading without taking the book with me and I could even read in the dark without disturbing my wife! Not to mention how much weight they added when travelling anywhere.

 

Now, I have a huge Kindle library at my fingertips that syncs across every device and I've spent way more on books that I ever would have. I don't even remember the last time I read a physical book

 

tldr; I love ebooks  

[Flub]

And don't get me started on comics. I paid a grand for a 12 inch iPad pro just to get the very best experience

[Miner Willy]

And you can make the words bigger when you got old and blind. 

[Flub]

39 minutes ago, Miner Willy said:

And you can make the words bigger when you got old and blind. 

 

Or middle aged and hard of sight

[davidcotton]

Use to go to (disabled)boarding college back in the mid-late 80's and it used to be a bit of hassle packing for 3 weeks at a time which books to take.  These days I imagine they just sling a kindle and ipad (other book reading and tablet devices are available)in the bag and they'd be set!

[Vimster]

On 10/05/2020 at 09:33, davidcotton said:

Use to go to (disabled)boarding college back in the mid-late 80's and it used to be a bit of hassle packing for 3 weeks at a time which books to take.  These days I imagine they just sling a kindle and ipad (other book reading and tablet devices are available)in the bag and they'd be set!

Oh I was at a "blind school" in the 80s and well remember the "totals" (blind kids) having to carry these huge braille tomes around, either that or absolutely useless talking books that abridged the shit out of everything, censored out swearing etc. And large-print books were cumbersome. 

 

As someone with poor eyesight I absolutely love my Kindle largely thanks to the fact I can boost the text size. There is a stack of paperbacks next to my bed but it's really difficult going back to struggling through them when I have a Kindle full of stuff to read. Back in the day it was just something I had to put up with, not so hard it was impossible but definitely took more effort than people with normal sight - I envy people who can just sit there with a book and not have to read words at a time. It was a revelation when I was told that normal people will take in a whole line in one go whereas I have to scan across it. 

 

Anyway, add in Calibre and that's the ebook experience. Love it. 

[Flub]

20 minutes ago, Vimster said:

As someone with poor eyesight I absolutely love my Kindle largely thanks to the fact I can boost the text size.

 

 

This single thing gives access to an almost unlimited set of books to people who previously had to rely on an extremely limited range. It's a godsend.

 

These days my focal distance has changed enough that I'd really struggle to read a lot of books in print. I used to be on the ebook train for the convenience but these days the accessability is a huge factor.