Books in the Brave New World

[monk222]

Now that books are finally entering the world of networked, digital text, they will undergo the same transformation that Web pages have experienced over the past 15 years. Blogs, remember, were once called "Web logs," cultivated by early digital pioneers who kept a record of information they found online, quoting and annotating as they browsed.

With books becoming part of this universe, "booklogs" will prosper, with readers taking inspiring or infuriating passages out of books and commenting on them in public. Google will begin indexing and ranking individual pages and paragraphs from books based on the online chatter about them. (As the writer and futurist Kevin Kelly says, "In the new world of books, every bit informs another; every page reads all the other pages.") You'll read a puzzling passage from a novel and then instantly browse through dozens of comments from readers around the world, annotating, explaining or debating the passage's true meaning.

Think of it as a permanent, global book club.

-- Steven Johnson for The Wall Street Journal

I suppose there could be some fun aspects in the new world of e-books, but I hope it will be only an extra option for our reading experience. I feel locked in to the old world of solitary thought between one reader and his book. For me, reading a book is tantamount to a religious meditation. It feels like quality time with the power of the word. I love the speed and hyper-communicativeness of the Internet, but in the end, it strikes me as being crassly utilitarian - more about skimming and clicking than deep thinking, and more about socializing than making one's peace with God, so to speak.

Comments

Books

[poovanna.livejournal.com]

Regarding information, I rely more on notes I make during reading. So, regular book or e-book does not matter much (although it is easier to make notes from e-books because you can use copy/paste).

However, the more complicated the ideas, the less I am able to understand by reading - better & more fun to talk with friends over the white board (all of us have one in our homes & I think it is one of my best ``investments'').

Even though I do not own many, I do adore books. Not so much for the information, but for the sensory experience. Elegant hardbound books are a treat to read. I love the way they are sturdily stiched, the feel of the thick acid-free paper, the way the pages smell, the beautiful & accurate typesetting.

Quite an immersive experience!

Re: Books

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

The whiteboardable matters of your reading would seem to involve problems of a more technical nature, and I can imagine how the social element only enhances the experience more - everyone helping to work out a problem.

Needless to say my reading matter is not like that, and the kind of problems are such that it's not about coming up with answers as much as it's just about stewing in them and becoming more comfortable in them: life and death, beauty and love, disappointment and alienation, purpose and chance, blah blah blah.

On the other hand, history books, which also are a staple of mine, are a step closer to being like technical matter, getting straighter in one's understanding the who's, what's, when's, and why's. But even here, there is a sense of fatality about it, instead of the sense of building to a true conclusion.

Re: Books

[poovanna.livejournal.com]

...problems of a more technical nature, and I can imagine how the social element only enhances the experience more - everyone helping to work out a problem.

Ya, I like the social aspect. The problem at hand or one's skills are secondary. It is mainly co-operation & having fun.

On the other hand, history books...there is a sense of fatality about it

Is it because you think we do not learn from history?

Re: Books

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

We learn some things. But we apparently aren't able to learn enough to keep life from being enchained in its little pains and wars. The poor will always be with us, it seems. The human condition seems to be a tragic one.