Looking at my book, I could easily see the thickness and how far I had left till I reached the end. Sure, if I got a Kindle I could do the math. I'm on page 200 of a 350 book, but being able to look at the thickness left on the other side of your thumb is something that you can't get from a Kindle or any other e-reader and I'm not exactly sure I want to give up that visual.
Just a quick observation.
I'm a big fan of my Kindle, and part of it is being able to carry hundreds of books with me wherever I go without having to worry about the weight.
ReplyDeleteAbout how far you left in a book...they can't use pages as a unit of course, so instead they use something called locations. The bar they actually show at the bottom of your screen though, actually shows your progress as a percentage. So that's one way I tell how much I have left...if I read like 5 or so "pages" on my Kindle and I see that I've pushed the progress 1% along, I have an idea of how much reading I'm looking at for the entire thing. And whether the bar shows 25% or 62% or 98%, visually I know how much I have left so not knowing how far I have until the end hasn't actually been a big problem for me.
Instead, what I find problematic is if I want to flip back to a certain point in the book for whatever reason, I can't do it easy anymore. With a book, I just flip really quickly to the page, but with the Kindle, I either have to click through the pages or guess at what location I want to go. Not as easy and efficient if you want to do that. Nevertheless, for me I think the pros still way outweigh the cons.
Love my Kindle to death, don't know how I ever got along without it.
ReplyDeleteAs MMOGC said, the Kindle does tell you a % of how far along you are (it uses something called "locations" whatever that is) although the new firmware update coming soon will convert it to page numbers via a menu selection.
I'm already accustomed to the % so I don't really care about the page number system anymore. Besides, % tells me right away how far I've come and how far I have to go. With page numbers I would have to know how many pages there are to begin with, then approximate the % in my head. Meh. (Yeah, you're talking about just eyeballing the thickness though.)
I usually read rather thick books and its almost like an accomplishment when you can see that its the same thickness on either side of the spot you have the book open too, then it gets smaller and smaller as you read further. I'm sure the Kindle will save me tons of space and be a joy to have around especially when I'm traveling out of town since I always take a few books with me, but still... its one of those things you just enjoy as a reader, not unlike the smell of fresh cut grass in the summer or wood burning in the winter.
ReplyDeleteI know, an odd thing to mention huh?
sorry didn't mean to associate cut grass and burning wood with reading. lol You get my meaning I hope.
ReplyDeleteI do, and it's a very understandable thing. I know you're using the smells of burning wood or cut grass as an example of things that bring you comfort, like holding an actual book in your hands...but to a lot of people (including me to an extent!) the actual smell of musty pages is part of the appeal of reading a dead tree book too :D
ReplyDeleteIt does keep all the books from piling up in the house though. And it's way more convenient to download books than going to the book store.
ReplyDeleteWhile it isn't like holding an actual book, it is a really nice way to have books with you wherever you go.