E-reading isn’t reading.......

[dmallind]

5. Reading has fuck all to do with your fingers.

Bombastic pseuds have been parroting this tripe for years and e-books continue to expand in number exponentially, overtaking "real" books this year, and doubtless within a few decades relegating them to curiosities like scrolls are to us.

What is a "real" book? Does paper and glue and ink constitute a book? No. The essence of a book is one thing and one thing alone - the words. Words that on a screen can take on a different size or font to suit your needs or preference. Words that can be stored many thousandfold on an e-book compared to dead trees, meaning I have at my fingertips any of the (at the moment) 1547 works, wherever I go in a form that never creases or tears and is never awkward to hold open at the page you need. Words that can be illuminated from behind to make a tired spouse less cranky. Words that remember where you left off no matter how many books you are reading at the same time.

I know it's trendy to pretend that "real" books have some amazing and essential tactile or aesthetic properties, but that's bullshit. The crap you tear off a Xmas gift and throw away? The market-driven packaging on nigh everything we buy,that gorges landfills and litters streets? The junk mail that you sneer at and recycle without reading? Made of exactly the same shit as "real" books, and often in the very same "conjoining synaesthesia" (pompous twaddle) form.

If the vital essence of a book to you is anything but the words, you are not using it correctly.