3 ms·
The short version is that physical books have a much better user interface than electronic books by almost every criterion. Part of this is because of counterpr
by skywhopper 12y ago
The short version is that physical books have a much better user interface than electronic books by almost every criterion. Part of this is because of counterproductive DRM restrictions, but software and hardware limitations ensure that many uses of books, especially textbooks, fall far short in any electronic format.
We take for granted, or are just unaware of, many of the ways in which physical interaction with objects adds to the human experience of using them. Sense memory/muscle memory/spatial memory can all play a role in absorbing the content of the book, as can the physical interaction required to turn pages. For reference work, things like tabbed pages or over-printed index points or even just the ability to flip through the book or a section of the book at a glance has no equal in electronic form.
- profinger 12y agoThis for sure! I like that I can flip to the table of contents to look at something or to the back for the index and not lose my place. They're doing pretty well at attempting to approximate that but it still feels like I'm leaving something that will be difficult to find later. Especially with some of the crappier reading apps on mobile.
- TillE 12y agoI'm a huge fan of the Kindle for your typical linear fiction. It has many advantages over a stack of paperbacks. For any other kind of book, e-readers are an unsolved problem in terms of both hardware and especially software. I'm convinced that it's possible to make some really excellent textbook-oriented software (for a large-ish tablet device), but it certainly doesn't exist yet.