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posted by n1 on Sunday June 15 2014, @03:39AM   Printer-friendly
from the tl;dr dept.

Tim Gray, writing in the New York Reviews of Books, has a very interesting article that asks whether it has become impossible to find the uninterrupted blocks of time that are needed to read serious works of literature, and whether the change in the reading environment is also changing how books are written.

Ordinarily I ignore the "Computer Bad! Destroy Society!" arguments, but I have to say that what he describes seems all too familiar. I can't recall the last time that I actually sat down for two or three hours just to read.

I grew up spending hours each day, every day devouring books of all sorts. Is this a thing that's lost to people raised with Internet, Game Consoles, and Smartphones? Pardon me if I sound like an old fart.

 
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  • (Score: 2) by rts008 on Sunday June 15 2014, @07:06AM

    by rts008 (3001) on Sunday June 15 2014, @07:06AM (#55528)

    It sounds like he has attention span issues, or cannot manage his time, or even can't nail down his priorities.

    Because of technology advancing, I read now more than ever.

    I havehad an eBook reader for some years now that has 2 GB internal storage, but a slot for a (up to 32 GB) an SD card.

    It came with 150 free books on the internal chip(I think all, or most came from Project Gutenbrg), and I have my complete ebook library on the 16 GB SD card I currently have.

    I take it everywhere, and it is quite convenient to wake it to where I left off, with one button press..instant on.

    It's a cheapy I picked up as a discontinued item on Newegg about 4-5 years ago for $49.99(free shipping)

    The battery only lasts several days due to having an LCD screen, but that's what I wanted...one I could read in low light/dark, and NO touchscreen!
    And yes, it even runs Linux! (I forget what distro).

    "The Book" by Augen is what it is.

    Before that, I found Baen Free Library online back around 1999-2000, and since I had a very nice CRT, I read a lot online. Baen was just the spring board.

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