I’m an occasional reader, more newspapers than books, although I have made a resolution to read at least one book ( any book) each month this year. I’m about 1 and 1/2 books in as I write.
On the tube and train yesterday however I saw a lot of people reading on e-readers – kindles, i pads, etc.
Now, is it just me, or is there something else about reading a book? The physicallity , the cover, the size, even the smell. I know, I sound like a fully paid up member of the ‘Bring back vinyl’ campaign, but it’s just not the same , is it ? I don’t see how the Kindle gives you that same connection, that same belonging , that same ownership as a book. But don’t just take it from me. Listen to someone who’s actually researched this
Richard Cope is principal trends analyst at the research organisation Mintel. Here’s some of what was said in an article in The Times this week;
Invited to speak at one of the several hundred “content convergence” conferences that take place in London every year, Cope stunned his audience by singing the praises of what he dubbed “slow media”: books, magazines, newspapers.
Apparently he found that half of women and a third of men “like reading magazines because they give me time to
myself” and that 42 per cent of people will buy books and magazines for long journeys. When asked if they prefer to read a printed copy of a magazine to reading online or electronically, 71 per cent preferred print. That figure set Cope and his team delving — and here’s what they reckon. We are bombarded. We want a rest, a refuge, a break from connectedness.
Cope’s analysts say that the physical properties of a book or magazine matter. They are finite. We crave the satisfaction of reading to the last word or folding the paper as we finish the crossword. Limitless content is exhausting. It’s amazing that you can get several thousand novels on your e-reader. But where’s the feeling of closure?
The slow food movement was born out of a sense that we were becoming people who shoved things into our mouths without relishing it. Maybe we have been shovelling information into our brains in the same way.
Or am I just old?
Read the full article HERE
