Why would you read a book !
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IMHO, books have advantages over the web or ebooks as a medium. They also have significant disadvantages. The key (to my enjoyment) is to maximize the former and minimize the latter: Bad: Books that require me to search for definitions, explanations, references, etc... I can search through an online document much faster and more easily. Good: Books that present pictures, diagrams, or code listings with the text referencing them on the facing page - even on a wide-screen PC, the two-page layout thing doesn't work so well. Good: Books that provide a narrative account of... something. I don't care if it's an actual story or just the author leading me through the construction of a program, but when i can curl up with a paperback, holding the spine in one hand so that i can hold a beer or rest my head on the other it is relaxing in a way that holding a laptop isn't. Which means i focus more on the text. Which means i retain more of it. Bad: Books that use references like a C programmer uses macros. Nothing like curling up on a long trip with a book, only to find half-way through the first chapter that it's referring to something else constantly, and until i read that thing i'm not going to get any of it. The worst ones refer to websites for anything non-trivial - these texts have absolutely no business being printed, since they so obviously want to be blog posts. Good: use creative diagrams. Don't do code - text - code - diagram; mix it up! Annotate (and not with source comments!) the code with explanatory text, and work it into the diagram such that i learn to see the structure in the code rather than taking your word that it's there. Or use a flow diagram mixed with output mixed with a stack diagram to illuminate the runtime. Or something else. Be creative - you have better resolution and a pretty good chance that the reader can write in the margins, so don't let the 96dpi world of web publishing hold you back. Bad: Poor spelling, grammar, mistakes in code, etc. I'll let a lot of things slide onl
Yes I agree, books sometimes have a unique flavour to it, which reflects th author, reminds me of the author Jeff Prosise , who has a unique style of writing. A book gives such personalized and rich experience that cannot come from online information. And yes their are advantages to online information also but I won't say that printing is dead any time in future. I find myself buying books more than ever.
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
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A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
"Smell is the most powerful trigger to the memory there is. A certain flower or a whiff of smoke can bring up experiences long forgotten. Books smell... musty and rich. The knowledge gained from a computer is... it has no texture, no context. It's there and then it's gone. If it's to last, then the getting of knowledge should be tangible. It should be, um... smelly."
------------------ John Andrew Holmes "It is well to remember that the entire universe, with one trifling exception, is composed of others."
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A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
Quartz. wrote:
printing will be dead in 10 years
He should be suffering from sort of phobia. :) Not everyone at this time can afford to be online in front of the system and even while driving, you can afford to keep reading some book but not carry a laptop always. When you fly, you are advised to switch off your electronic gadgets (including laptops) but no one refuses (or can refuse) your right to read a book. :rolleyes:
Vasudevan Deepak Kumar Personal Homepage
Tech Gossips
A pessimist sees only the dark side of the clouds, and mopes; a philosopher sees both sides, and shrugs; an optimist doesn't see the clouds at all - he's walking on them. --Leonard Louis Levinson -
A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
A book, every time. I have a huge pile of books, I order from amazon every month, read each one and add to the pile.
Christian Graus Please read this if you don't understand the answer I've given you "also I don't think "TranslateOneToTwoBillion OneHundredAndFortySevenMillion FourHundredAndEightyThreeThousand SixHundredAndFortySeven()" is a very good choice for a function name" - SpacixOne ( offering help to someone who really needed it ) ( spaces added for the benefit of people running at < 1280x1024 )
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A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
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A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
Because I had the great good fortune to grow up without teevee and/or computers, and to have grown up in an environment where love of books and writing was salient. Because books are real-world objects, that are tactile, portable, and are graphic design objects in their own right through the ways we are socialized to perceive text and typography. Because when I fall asleep reading, and the book drops to the floor or slides off the bed, it doesn't require a new motherboard. Even in the "technoverse" certain books, through a remarkable combination of graphic design, structure, and the writer's skills, can, imho, provide us with a cognitive richness of experience that I have yet to experience on-line (which is not to say that you have not experienced that, and may be just to say that I, old relic, have not because my cognitive habits are too shaped by over sixty years of having been read to, and reading from, books). For example, for me, Jesse Liberty's book "C# : A Developer's Notebook" is just such a "remarkable" synthesis of strong, clear writing, uniquely vivid graphic design, and use of text call-outs and annotation. It's much more than the sum of its parts and the underlying profound technical knowledge that Jesse transmits both scientifically and through judicious use of metaphor and analogy. If there's anything I have learned in my skewed ellipitcal life-orbit from the world of arts and letters into the technical, it's that technical learning (for me, anyway) requires multiple passes over complex material, a patient gradual absorption over time, and the book is, for me, the medium of choice. Fortunately for me, for you, for us, it is not a binary world underneath-the-hood : What could be a better example of a distinctively technoversic resource than CodeProject which, for me, is a community of teachers and students, peers (and gurus in the best sense of that word), a sea of understanding coming in steady waves of ideas :) It's hard to imagine now how I could live without CP, Wikipedia, Google, and I wouldn't want to imagine the world without such ! But a good novel in my hands, the cat sleeping next to me, the sounds of the talking lizards (they say "tookay, tookay' here in northern Thailand) and the frogs of the rainy season coming on-line after a heavy downpour : oh, there's nothing better for me than that. best, Bill "The greater the social and cultural distances between people, the more magical the light that can spring from their contact." Milan Kundera in Testaments Trahis
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A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
I think that there are positives in both. In terms on non-technical reading, books are still the go, they allow you into a world of fantasy. In terms of tech books, there is still a place for books - for a start, you only need 2 screens to work with if you have a book, one for an IDE, once for the email, browser etc, and sometimes, it allows you to get perspectives that you cannot find anywhere else, without the sift to go through the rubbish which is sometimes provided on google et al. PS (i still like printing out programs sometimes to find problems). :cool:
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A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
I think that books are becoming more and more important nowadays! I know this seems like a sweeping statement but let me justify it :). Lets assume your learning C. Now you can find thousands of articles online but do they guarantee you the following? 1. Enough exercises? 2. Consistency of material? 3. Accuracy? 4. Organization? ... I can go on and on! Moreover, continuing our above example. If i am new to C i won't have a clue where to start? What should i search? Pointers? Arrays? Data types? Chances are i will miss more then one of them and will be scratching my head 90% of the time :). BTW you can find all the news online (feeds, e-papers), its actually faster and up-to-date then the print counterpart but do they really threat the newspaper? :) I would say books are great to build your foundations and online articles can help you the latter construction of the technological wall! Chao!
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A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
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1. My eyes are getting old. With reading glasses, books are easier on my eyes. 2. Competent editors coupled with good checkers and good readers and peer review for one book are superior to 10 incomplete internet articles. 3. Books tend to cover subject matter in much greater depth than 99% of the internet articles you read. 4. I can take a book with me without lugging a laptop. 5. I can read on the loo without fear of dunking my laptop. 6. Books don't have hyperlinks to distract me from my original train of thought. 7. Books don't go into hibernation when I go to the frig for some milk. 8. I can put notes in the margin and place Post-It notes all over the book. 9. Unlike Internet content which sometimes disappears if a web site goes off line (like some of Fritz Onions excellent articles on asynchronous COM calls), books are around forever pretty much until the binding falls apart. 10. I get excited when a new book arrives from www.bookpool.com. I don't think books, particularly technical books have been replaced by the Internet. I do think the popular journals and magazines, (e.g. DDJ have been replaced by the Internet.)
CodeWiz51 -- Life is not a spectator sport. I came to play. Code's Musings | Code's Articles
CodeWizard1951 wrote:
I don't think books, particularly technical books have been replaced by the Internet. I do think the popular journals and magazines, (e.g. DDJ have been replaced by the Internet.)
An astute observation indeed, sir. Books are in a different league altogether.
The best way to accelerate a Macintosh is at 9.8m/sec-sec - Marcus Dolengo
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"Smell is the most powerful trigger to the memory there is. A certain flower or a whiff of smoke can bring up experiences long forgotten. Books smell... musty and rich. The knowledge gained from a computer is... it has no texture, no context. It's there and then it's gone. If it's to last, then the getting of knowledge should be tangible. It should be, um... smelly."
------------------ John Andrew Holmes "It is well to remember that the entire universe, with one trifling exception, is composed of others."
so true, nothing can replace the personal experience a book provides
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
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A book, every time. I have a huge pile of books, I order from amazon every month, read each one and add to the pile.
Christian Graus Please read this if you don't understand the answer I've given you "also I don't think "TranslateOneToTwoBillion OneHundredAndFortySevenMillion FourHundredAndEightyThreeThousand SixHundredAndFortySeven()" is a very good choice for a function name" - SpacixOne ( offering help to someone who really needed it ) ( spaces added for the benefit of people running at < 1280x1024 )
Sounds like me :) My collection of technical book[^] I would love to know what kind of books you like or recommend (both tech/non tech)
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
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Because I had the great good fortune to grow up without teevee and/or computers, and to have grown up in an environment where love of books and writing was salient. Because books are real-world objects, that are tactile, portable, and are graphic design objects in their own right through the ways we are socialized to perceive text and typography. Because when I fall asleep reading, and the book drops to the floor or slides off the bed, it doesn't require a new motherboard. Even in the "technoverse" certain books, through a remarkable combination of graphic design, structure, and the writer's skills, can, imho, provide us with a cognitive richness of experience that I have yet to experience on-line (which is not to say that you have not experienced that, and may be just to say that I, old relic, have not because my cognitive habits are too shaped by over sixty years of having been read to, and reading from, books). For example, for me, Jesse Liberty's book "C# : A Developer's Notebook" is just such a "remarkable" synthesis of strong, clear writing, uniquely vivid graphic design, and use of text call-outs and annotation. It's much more than the sum of its parts and the underlying profound technical knowledge that Jesse transmits both scientifically and through judicious use of metaphor and analogy. If there's anything I have learned in my skewed ellipitcal life-orbit from the world of arts and letters into the technical, it's that technical learning (for me, anyway) requires multiple passes over complex material, a patient gradual absorption over time, and the book is, for me, the medium of choice. Fortunately for me, for you, for us, it is not a binary world underneath-the-hood : What could be a better example of a distinctively technoversic resource than CodeProject which, for me, is a community of teachers and students, peers (and gurus in the best sense of that word), a sea of understanding coming in steady waves of ideas :) It's hard to imagine now how I could live without CP, Wikipedia, Google, and I wouldn't want to imagine the world without such ! But a good novel in my hands, the cat sleeping next to me, the sounds of the talking lizards (they say "tookay, tookay' here in northern Thailand) and the frogs of the rainy season coming on-line after a heavy downpour : oh, there's nothing better for me than that. best, Bill "The greater the social and cultural distances between people, the more magical the light that can spring from their contact." Milan Kundera in Testaments Trahis
BillWoodruff wrote:
technical learning (for me, anyway) requires multiple passes over complex material, a patient gradual absorption over time, and the book is, for me, the medium of choice.
you can say that again. Thats another very important and Solid reason to stick to books
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
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I think that books are becoming more and more important nowadays! I know this seems like a sweeping statement but let me justify it :). Lets assume your learning C. Now you can find thousands of articles online but do they guarantee you the following? 1. Enough exercises? 2. Consistency of material? 3. Accuracy? 4. Organization? ... I can go on and on! Moreover, continuing our above example. If i am new to C i won't have a clue where to start? What should i search? Pointers? Arrays? Data types? Chances are i will miss more then one of them and will be scratching my head 90% of the time :). BTW you can find all the news online (feeds, e-papers), its actually faster and up-to-date then the print counterpart but do they really threat the newspaper? :) I would say books are great to build your foundations and online articles can help you the latter construction of the technological wall! Chao!
nutkase wrote:
I would say books are great to build your foundations and online articles can help you the latter construction of the technological wall!
You said it all in a line
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
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A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
I gather general information online, but when I want to go to the core I buy books. For instance there are thousands of C++ tutorials, but for true understanding rely on books. Again there are books and books, I always prefer online material to crash courses or pocket reference books.
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A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
Easier to read in bed/on the toilet/in a plane/in a car/etc... :)
------------------------------------ "I want you to imagine I have a blaster in my hand" - Zaphod Beeblebrox. "You DO have a blaster in your hand" - Freighter Pilot "Yeah, so you don't have to tax your imagination too hard" - Zaphod Beeblebrox
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A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
Books don't have flashing advertisements that take the majority of UI estate.
We are a big screwed up dysfunctional psychotic happy family - some more screwed up, others more happy, but everybody's psychotic joint venture definition of CP
blog: TDD - the Aha! | Linkify!| FoldWithUs! | sighist -
A friend of mine was arguing that nowadays you can find all the information online, why would somebody buy a book ? He also claims that, printing will be dead in 10 years Well I think a book is better because, 1. It gathers all the related information together 2. The layout is in a way which is easier to understand 3. Information on the web can be inaccurate 4. Searching for information on the net can take time, a good book give you all the required information at a single place 5. A book also teaches way of doing things in a unique author's style, who can be experienced on the subject Which one would you prefer, a book, rather than searching information online or vice versa and why?
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
I can take a book to bed, and I can lie on my couch with a book. I suppose I will get used to a light-weight 'reader' device that allows the same, because I get used to anything, but the qualitative experience of close on thirty-eight years of feeling and smelling paper, reading two opposing pages, etc. will retain some not insignificant inertia.
Semicolons: The number one seller of ostomy bags world wide. - dan neely
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Cheap, portable, easier to eye, durable and personalized experience Wow thats lot of good points, ow i can argue strongly about the topic
Omit Needless Words - Strunk, William, Jr.
Author of the Vista Gadget Book: Creating Vista Gadgets using HTML, CSS, & JavaScript. Sample chapter here Selling Your Gadget
Sadly, in my country (Romania) book have stopped being cheap for about 10 years now. I rarely afford to buy fiction novels and almost never technical books, which more than everything, are ridiculously expensive.
Come to the dark side! We have cookies.
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Benefits of the book - by me: 1) They're cheap, so you mind much less leaving one on a bus/plane/train than leaving a laptop(or whatever) on a bus/plane/train. 2) Books are portable, require no power and are unlikely to crash at the least opportune moment. 3) Even a cheaply printed book is far easier on the eye than a computer screen. 4) Books can be taken into the bath without fear. 5) Bookmarking is as easy a turning the corner of a page, adding a piece of paper or using a post it. 6) You're unlikely to get mugged because of your book. 7) You can annotate books however you want. 8) You can lend a book to anyone you wish without reprisal. 9) Books are not DRM protected. 10) The "book format" doesn't become obsolete. 11) They're durable and long lasting. 12) When friends come around, they'll be impressed by your collection - and will ask to borrow from it. Nah, the book is here to stay. :)
martin_hughes wrote:
- They're cheap
In developed countries only. Books are expensive elsewhere.
martin_hughes wrote:
- Bookmarking is as easy a turning the corner of a page, adding a piece of paper or using a post it.
Try finding the right bookmark out of 100 in a 500 page book.
martin_hughes wrote:
- You can lend a book to anyone you wish without reprisal.
Except when you want it back to check for something and the person you lent it to is on holiday, at home or forgot it at a friend's house. Books are not easily copyable.
martin_hughes wrote:
- The "book format" doesn't become obsolete.
Try reading a 100 year old English book. Plenty of differences. Give it another 100 years and you may not understand it at all. Not that most books last that long without special care. Also the format itself has been changing plenty. Chapters, line-breaks, paragraphs, indexes, contents lists, punctuation, page numbers etc. have all been added to the format over time. (I love books, got a whole wall of them and hope to continue getting more and pass them onto my children. But they are not perfect and we shouldn't ignore the benefits of other technology. It won't be long till we have tablets that have the best quality of books and the best qualities of digital technology.)
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.