7 ms·
I would prefer someone come up with a new form of binding so books lay open flat and effortlessly, rather than feeling as if someone is seemingly implicitly tel
by apocalypstyx 8y ago
I would prefer someone come up with a new form of binding so books lay open flat and effortlessly, rather than feeling as if someone is seemingly implicitly telling me I should also invest in the purchase of a pair of Jaws of Life in order to use them.
- sago 8y agoThere have been several of these already. Paperbacks where the spine is not glued to the perfect binding. O'Riley used one such technology at one point (RepKover, by Otabind—not sure if it still does). But it is quite a step more expensive. I'm not sure whether the sales are worth it.
- miobrien 8y agoYes. I've felt this way since reading thick science fiction paperbacks as a kid. It's a pain to hold these things open for hours at a time. And, making matters worse, these paperbacks were printed in small fonts. It's no surprise I've had glasses since I was 12. As to bindings, I've always been a fan of spiral bound books. There's also the Japanese style of printing shorter books in multiple volumes (at least I think this is the case - correct me if I'm wrong). Given my aversion to paper-based reading, I've enjoyed using my Kindle, smartphone, and tablet to read. However, now there's two more problems. First, my smartphone is a constant source of distraction (calls, texts, work emails, personal emails, app notifications, etc.). Second, it feels like I spend the majority of my waking life looking at either a computer screen, a smartphone screen, or a Kindle screen -- it's kind of unsettling.
- jessriedel 8y ago> It's no surprise I've had glasses since I was 12. You might have been facetious, but FYI, the favored theory for the cause of normal myopia is insufficient UV light exposure during childhood. Eyestrain and close focal distance are not thought to produce it even though the latter is correlated with low UV light from being indoors.
- mallomarmeasle 8y agoI guess you mean most favored theory by you? I do not find UV exposure to be a consensus opinion after a brief glance at the subject. There is at least some support for myopia being associated with close focal distance activities, as mentioned in this meta analysis: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4618477/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4618477/
- jessriedel 8y agoNo, I was going based off my memory of this 2015 article, which summarizes the evidence and expert opinions: https://www.nature.com/news/the-myopia-boom-1.17120 https://www.nature.com/news/the-myopia-boom-1.17120 In particular, my article discusses randomized experiments and the opinion of multiple disagreeing experts. Your article (also from 2015) is a meta analysis of observational studies on the correlation between near work and myopia, not the overall question of myopia origins. As far as I can tell, I don't think they try to test whether light exposure is the underlying cause, nor does you article claim represent the opinions of anyone besides the three authors. I welcome links to more recent and comprehensive reviews, though. I definitely don't think this case has been closed.
- amhokies 8y agoThis is why I switched to a Kindle. I can comfortably hold it in either hand without having to pry the pages open.
- jobigoud 8y agoSame. I have a big protective cover for my Kobo that when opened doubles as a stand. So I don't even need to hold it. I keep my hands warm and only use them to change page.
- sigstoat 8y agoone of the pictures in the article certainly makes it look like the books are willing to lie flat, with just a little effort. (i was expecting this article to be someone reposting an NY Times article from the introduction of mass market paperbacks, and forgetting to put a date on it.)
- thrower123 8y agoI really hate the bindings on most textbooks and technical books that I possess. You pretty much have to break the spines to get them to actually lay flat, and not have the pages turn on you, but if you do that and actually handle the book at all, sheafs of pages start falling out. Spiral binding would be so much better. If it was just a little bit cheaper to get on-demand printing done, I'd love to get some of my books converted into something like a rugged three-ring binder.
- ballenf 8y agoI took a couple textbooks to my local copy shop – Kinkos back then – and had them cut off the spine and hole punch the pages. Placed them into a 3-ring binder. Only for books you're keeping I suppose. Or maybe you could re-sell directly.
- Jtsummers 8y agoWe have a binding machine in my office. I use that for our technical and procedural documents. It's more compact than a binder, and you can still slip plastic covers around it to protect the contents when put away. Updates require a bit more effort to insert but I've found that it's not too annoying.
- abecedarius 8y agoWarning: rant. These terrible bindings you have to fight are a relatively new development. Back in the 80s even mass-market paperbacks, while they didn't open flat, at least were not "perfect bound" (the orwellian term for this cancer on book UX -- OK, I have feelings about books). When I ordered a new Knuth volume 4A and found it couldn't be comfortably read -- you had to hold this heavy book open firmly at just the right angle or else the text on the inner margin would start to edge into hiding -- it was the last straw. Reading it in bed was an exercise in weightlifting. Even Knuth can't stop this? People can warez e-books instead, you know.
- jacobolus 8y agoThe cloth version of Knuth 4A (Additon Wesley) has real binding which lies flat and has visible inside margins. Are you talking about a paperback? Some of the worst books I have seen are the print-on-demand ones by Springer. It’s tragic that pretty much all of their math books from the past 10–15 years are only available in this format. Springer used to produce very nice books up through the 1990s.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- clickok 8y agoThe problem with most recent books is that they use a glue-based binding, but the glue seeps into the spine far enough that it makes laying them flat difficult. However, if you bind it yourself, you can get the desired behavior pretty easily. I have a summary of my process in the footnote of an older comment[0], but I've been able to get it working with hardcover books, and experimented with using a little bit of thread to reinforce the binding. So far, none of my books have come apart and they all lay flat. The problem with this is that you either have to print your own books or remove the binding from existing ones and then rebind them, which is not especially time consuming but not exactly fast either. I wonder why this style of binding isn't more common? Is it just too expensive or are there durability concerns? ----- 0. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15877525 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15877525
- kbenson 8y agoI find it oddly satisfying and appropriate that in this forum where people are regularly recommended to just write a small program for themselves that solves their specific computer or technology problem, you reply to someone's problem with book construction with a suggestion and help for actually rebinding the book to solve the problem. Well done. :)
- boromi 8y agoIt's still not clear from reading your description how this is better works? You're just gluing together the bottom of a whole bunch of pages?
- clickok 8y agoI took some pictures to demonstrate the final product[0]. I am not an expert bookbinder, but it works well enough and is cheap and easy to do by hand. This is the result of tinkering; presumably someone who knows what they're doing could achieve better results. ----- 0. https://imgur.com/a/60zP8vn https://imgur.com/a/60zP8vn
- zrobotics 8y agoExpense. I can't share a link, but I had helped a friend self-publish, and she eventually ended up going the paperback route. She had the option to have the book bound in a similar way (sewn, not glued) but her out of pocket expense would have been 4x higher. Last I heard, she had recouped her costs, but there's still a case of books left.
- psychometry 8y agoWe already have that and most paper notebooks have that feature: spiral- or circular-bound pages.
- jumelles 8y agoSmyth-sewn bindings lay flat.
- grkvlt 8y agoSpiral binding is the solution, but it looks ugly, there is no spine area anymore and the pages rip out more easily. Good for technical manuals, less so for fiction. I do actually have a few 'publishers proof manuscript' (presumably for pre-press copy editing and review) spiral bound copies of books that I found in a second-hand shop, and although easy to read, the pages got crumpled and torn very quickly when I transported them in my backpack.
- booleandilemma 8y agoCan’t effectively stack them.
- sverige 8y agoIt was invented long ago. Section sewn or case binding allows a book to lay flat. It is considerably more expensive than other methods, though.