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Michael Rosenwald writes in the WaPot that textbook makers, bookstore owners and college student surveys all say millennials still strongly prefer reading on paper for pleasure and learning, a bias that surprises reading experts given the same group’s proclivity to consume most other content digitally. “These are people who aren’t supposed to remember what it’s like to even smell books,” says Naomi S. Baron. “It’s quite astounding.” Earlier this month, Baron published “Words Onscreen: The Fate of Reading in a Digital World,” a book that examines university students’ preferences for print and explains the science of why dead-tree versions are often superior to digital. Her conclusion: readers tend to skim on screens, distraction is inevitable and comprehension suffers. Researchers say readers remember the location of information simply by page and text layout — that, say, the key piece of dialogue was on that page early in the book with that one long paragraph and a smudge on the corner. Researchers think this plays a key role in comprehension - something that is more difficult on screens, primarily because the time we devote to reading online is usually spent scanning and skimming, with few places (or little time) for mental markers.
Another significant problem, especially for college students, is distraction. The lives of millennials are increasingly lived on screens. In her surveys, Baron writes that she found “jaw-dropping” results to the question of whether students were more likely to multitask in hard copy (1 percent) vs. reading on-screen (90 percent). "The explanation is hardly rocket science," says Baron. "When a digital device has an Internet connection, it’s hard to resist the temptation to jump ship: I’ll just respond to that text I heard come in, check the headlines, order those boots that are on sale." “You just get so distracted,” one student says. “It’s like if I finish a paragraph, I’ll go on Tumblr, and then three hours later you’re still not done with reading.”
(Score: 4, Insightful) by VLM on Wednesday February 25 2015, @07:50PM
Next up in the astroturf rotation, why all good men prefer horses to the new fangled unstylish automobile.
Something I do like about paper is resolution. I don't work in an open office plan, so I have the space to take 10, maybe 16 sheets of print and spread them all over a desk resulting in the equivalent of a square yard of display that must be tens of thousands of pixels on a side. Good luck buying an electronic device with those specs. Sometimes you need that. Not often, but it happens.
Anecdotally I do all my "work reading" thats related to the job while multitasking, so its good training for the kids. After graduation they're going to have one tab open to google, another to the upstream github, another to some tutorial, all while coding in an emacs window on another monitor.
As far as distraction I've found I have to kill all the notifications on my phone to get work done. Any work.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 25 2015, @08:22PM
Your "resolution" is one problem that e-readers have yet to solve. I prefer printing technical documents, especially when there are complicated instructions, or diagrams, because I can flip pages, or put the pages of interest next to each other on my desk.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Ethanol-fueled on Wednesday February 25 2015, @08:34PM
Not to mention being able to more readily hand-write notes and circle things on paper drawings. I deal with a fuckload of drawings during my day-job and we're constantly fighting the ISO inspection preparation Nazis in being able to have our own paper drawings with hand-written notes in drawings laying around.
Of course, that may not be a problem if engineers could draw and write procedures that are not in glaring need of basic common sense and logical flow, but engineers lacking common sense will be as timeless as the discipline of engineering itself.
As for reading paper books for pleasure, well, no shit. You can drop them in the swimming pool, jacuzzi, or toilet without losing a significant investment. And you know those fucking kids are cannonballing all over the pools and jacuzzis because Gen. X-ers don't believe in disciplining their children.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by VLM on Wednesday February 25 2015, @08:53PM
I thought of another example of "innovation" people who don't boardgame LOVE to tell boardgamers how awesome games look on their phone and the future of board gaming is going to be on the phone.
Meanwhile I got a tournament scale Agricola game going on covering two card tables and I probably need three tables and I'm thinking to myself, and where am I going to find an android phone with a screen that covers three card tables at 100 dpi much less the 600 or so stuff is currently printed at?
Or Steel Wolves, that needs like an entire room? Even COIN series takes some table real estate? Ever try pathfinder card game with 6 characters, thats like 48 or 52 or whatever piles of cards?
Also my set of Dominion cards from a decade ago is still playable, but my phone and computer from 2005 isn't working so well... I kinda like the idea I could whip out "Phantom Leader" in 2035 and play if I want.
(Score: 2) by Jaruzel on Wednesday February 25 2015, @09:00PM
I'd never swap out my massive dead tree fiction collection for e-ink, simply because reading is just *better* when it's a flexiable, warm, book that needs no power, and has always 'instant on'. Proper bookmarks are also more trust-worthy than a digital flag on a file.
For technical tomes though, I'd love an e-reader - it needs to be at least 10" screen size, and be able to display PDFs correctly formatted. If such a thing existed I'd buy it in heartbeat and fill it up with the 1000s of technical manuals I've been meaning to read...
This is my opinion, there are many others, but this one is mine.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by frojack on Wednesday February 25 2015, @10:32PM
See, I'm just the opposite. Tech books, I need paper, so I can scrawl on it.
I dislike, (but completely understand) software or hardware manuals in PDF form, because you can't easily zip from place to place.
And reading history that has many maps is a nightmare on an e-reader.
But regular reading, for enjoyment, give the an ereader every time. Oh, and make it e-ink please.
Nothing messes up your sleep worse than staring at light emitting screens late into the night.
Reading a physical book with one hand, or no hands? Great.
Irritating font? Change it.
Forgot your ereader at home, pick up exactly where you left off on your phone.
No, for casual reading anywhere, anytime, give me an ereader every time, and take these moldering paperbacks out of my sight.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by stormwyrm on Thursday February 26 2015, @12:13AM
For tech books, paper may be nice, but electronic editions offer something that can be really valuable: the ability to quickly search for specific information. Finding out where a massive manual mentions how to do X is relatively easy with a properly built PDF, but can be incredibly clumsy with paper.
Numquam ponenda est pluralitas sine necessitate.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday February 26 2015, @01:52AM
True, search is nice, as long as your reading platform lets you quickly bookmark your present position so that you can return.
A physical book with a good index, and a few extra fingers to retain your current page works too. I've noticed that PDFs seem to dispense with indexes, relying on search capability.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Balderdash on Thursday February 26 2015, @03:28AM
I use an early 7 inch Android tablet to read for pleasure.
Cool Reader in night mode works very well. Black background with light gray text doesn't seem to interfere with sleep as much as a white background and black text.
I browse at -1. Free and open discourse requires consideration and review of all attempts at participation.
(Score: 1) by WillAdams on Thursday February 26 2015, @02:48PM
True, but the new-fangled electronics do afford some options which paper don't. I've been doing the assembly instructions for a hobby-level CNC milling machine ( http://docs.shapeoko.com [shapeoko.com] ) --- after it was featured in _Popular Mechanics_ we had much less mechanically inclined people buying them and trying to put them together --- people who couldn't intuit the location of "hidden" parts the location of which was implied by symmetry, but not explicitly shown.
Converted the diagrams to SVG and added a clickable parts list which would highlight all instances of a part:
http://docs.shapeoko.com/content/tPictures/PS20029-100.svg [shapeoko.com]
One can zoom in / out as desired and a number of people have put their machines together w/o printing the instructions, instead just using an iPad, Android or Windows tablet to view them.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Friday February 27 2015, @12:00AM
One can zoom in / out as desired and a number of people have put their machines together w/o printing the instructions, instead just using an iPad, Android or Windows tablet to view them.
Yes sir +1000 to that post the days of my printing out a schematic diagram or PCB layout are over, its all tablet for a couple years now. Zoom and scroll all I want. I imagine tablets and phones will sweep the construction industry sooner or later too.
Much as I used to screw around making hand drawn diagrams in the bad old days when working on my car, but now I use the phone camera as my "breadcumbs" to make sure I don't leave parts out.