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As far as the user-interface of printed books are concerned there is a very minimal, and understandable, set of features: - it boots instantly - has a

As far as the user-interface of printed books are concerned there is a very minimal, and understandable, set of features: - it boots instantly - has a high contrast and high resolution display - is viewable from any angle, in bright or dim light - permits fast random access to any page - provides instant visual and tactile feedback on the location - can be easily annotated - requires no batteries or maintenance. Current e-Readers cannot meet all of these specifications. Books do a great job of conveying static information; computers let information change. In my opinion, the local library will continue to exist as a place of knowledge if it can evolve to provide the tools to access changing/shared information. Otherwise, it'll just end up being a quiet place for students to work.

jamesrcole 15y ago
some minor points: > - is viewable from any angle, in bright or dim light they don't work great in poor light (I usually read in bed at night and have to use a head-lamp to brighten the page) > - can be easily annotated though you can go an add annotations to library books, the situation with annotating them is less than ideal. ebooks are potentially better in this respect. the other thing w/ physical books is that they easily get heavy when you have to carry around several of them.
stcredzero 15y ago
Current e-Readers cannot meet all of these specifications. We are pretty close, actually. I've booted my iPad only a few times in the past 3 months. The rest of the time, it's been in standby mode, and it "comes up" pretty much instantly. It is high contrast/high resolution. If it's not high contrast/high resolution enough, this is bound to improve. I've never had a problem with viewing angle or in dim light. Bright light visibility should improve. Random access has been good for me, including the use case of using programming books for reference. There is visual feedback, and I haven't missed tactile feedback. There are ways to annotate PDFs on the iPad. The iPad requires no batteries, and the maintenance has been limited to syncing and updating OS software. So, to meet your requirements, the next iPad just has to: - be viewable in bright light - incorporate tactile feedback (or equivalent) Perhaps improve in these ways: - increased display resolution - reduced maintenance - better annotation
theBobMcCormick 15y ago
Another advantage of real printed books is that real printed books are also inexpensive enough to be routinely given as gifts to small children, even in dirt poor families. IMHO, this is important as early readers are often young enough to be ridiculously rough on pretty much anything they play with, electronic or paper. They also lose things a lot. The difference with paper books is not that they're more durable, but that one book getting damaged or lost doesn't destroy a child's entire library and doesn't have a high replacement cost.
mironathetin 15y ago
For me most important: Printed books don't come with an additional amount of 999 books. They invite to focus and read one text. eBooks invite to browse the other 999 books too. At the end of the day we may find that we only blew our time instead of having enjoyed a good story (or whatever you wanted to read). Some may say that we can ignore the other 999 books. But then, startup firefox, find a 300 pages text and measure how long it takes until you check something else.
dgallagher 15y ago
My preferred way to read is to have a physical and digital copy. The digital goes wherever I go, on my laptop and iPad, and is easily searched with a query string. The physical stays at home, and has all of the advantages you mention. I love having both, and feel handicapped if I only have one. But it's still not ideal... -------------------- I envision a future where we'll have the best of both worlds; a physical book with double-sided e-ink pages. The front cover is a touch-screen running iBooks, letting you swipe around to find something to read. Touch it, and all of the e-ink pages instantly display the book. Now you can easily flip through it like a normal book, far faster than an iPad. Text-searching is a breeze, impossible with a paper book. Using your stylist, mark pages with notes, highlight them, do whatever. A small microphone lets you record audio notes, tied to a passage of text. Everything saves and syncs to the cloud, following you wherever you go. Errata auto-downloads and updates your books as needed. A small camera, integrated into the hard-cover lip that extends above each page, tracks your eye-movements and watches what you read, looking at facial expressions and pupil dilations, to determine what you found most important. In the future if some information it saw you read is wrong, you'll get an auto-email or tweet telling you about it. Every paragraph in the book will be connected to a community-discussion board, where you read and ask for clarification regarding confusing text, similar to djangobook.com. It's a social reading experience, letting the community at-large make comprehension easier. Physically the e-ink Book comes in many different sizes, from small and pocket-sized, to large and biblical. Text auto-adjusts, similar to the Kindle. Battery life is measured in months. Embedded video, audio, and animation is common. Something like that will kill paper books and e-readers, since it marries the best of both worlds.

jamesrcole 15y ago

some minor points: > - is viewable from any angle, in bright or dim light they don't work great in poor light (I usually read in bed at night and have to use a head-lamp to brighten the page) > - can be easily annotated though you can go an add annotations to library books, the situation with annotating them is less than ideal. ebooks are potentially better in this respect. the other thing w/ physical books is that they easily get heavy when you have to carry around several of them.

stcredzero 15y ago

Current e-Readers cannot meet all of these specifications. We are pretty close, actually. I've booted my iPad only a few times in the past 3 months. The rest of the time, it's been in standby mode, and it "comes up" pretty much instantly. It is high contrast/high resolution. If it's not high contrast/high resolution enough, this is bound to improve. I've never had a problem with viewing angle or in dim light. Bright light visibility should improve. Random access has been good for me, including the use case of using programming books for reference. There is visual feedback, and I haven't missed tactile feedback. There are ways to annotate PDFs on the iPad. The iPad requires no batteries, and the maintenance has been limited to syncing and updating OS software. So, to meet your requirements, the next iPad just has to: - be viewable in bright light - incorporate tactile feedback (or equivalent) Perhaps improve in these ways: - increased display resolution - reduced maintenance - better annotation

theBobMcCormick 15y ago

Another advantage of real printed books is that real printed books are also inexpensive enough to be routinely given as gifts to small children, even in dirt poor families. IMHO, this is important as early readers are often young enough to be ridiculously rough on pretty much anything they play with, electronic or paper. They also lose things a lot. The difference with paper books is not that they're more durable, but that one book getting damaged or lost doesn't destroy a child's entire library and doesn't have a high replacement cost.

mironathetin 15y ago

For me most important: Printed books don't come with an additional amount of 999 books. They invite to focus and read one text. eBooks invite to browse the other 999 books too. At the end of the day we may find that we only blew our time instead of having enjoyed a good story (or whatever you wanted to read). Some may say that we can ignore the other 999 books. But then, startup firefox, find a 300 pages text and measure how long it takes until you check something else.

dgallagher 15y ago

My preferred way to read is to have a physical and digital copy. The digital goes wherever I go, on my laptop and iPad, and is easily searched with a query string. The physical stays at home, and has all of the advantages you mention. I love having both, and feel handicapped if I only have one. But it's still not ideal... -------------------- I envision a future where we'll have the best of both worlds; a physical book with double-sided e-ink pages. The front cover is a touch-screen running iBooks, letting you swipe around to find something to read. Touch it, and all of the e-ink pages instantly display the book. Now you can easily flip through it like a normal book, far faster than an iPad. Text-searching is a breeze, impossible with a paper book. Using your stylist, mark pages with notes, highlight them, do whatever. A small microphone lets you record audio notes, tied to a passage of text. Everything saves and syncs to the cloud, following you wherever you go. Errata auto-downloads and updates your books as needed. A small camera, integrated into the hard-cover lip that extends above each page, tracks your eye-movements and watches what you read, looking at facial expressions and pupil dilations, to determine what you found most important. In the future if some information it saw you read is wrong, you'll get an auto-email or tweet telling you about it. Every paragraph in the book will be connected to a community-discussion board, where you read and ask for clarification regarding confusing text, similar to djangobook.com. It's a social reading experience, letting the community at-large make comprehension easier. Physically the e-ink Book comes in many different sizes, from small and pocket-sized, to large and biblical. Text auto-adjusts, similar to the Kindle. Battery life is measured in months. Embedded video, audio, and animation is common. Something like that will kill paper books and e-readers, since it marries the best of both worlds.