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January 30, 2007
E books
This is of no consequence at all, but browsing around the Windsor and Maidenhead library site (see below), I came across this Gutenberg site with its remarkable list of "E-books borrowed yesterday"
Posted by Tim Coates at January 30, 2007 7:50 PM
Comments
I regularly download e-texts when I need excerpts from out-of-print public-domain sources but these are impractical to use in the same way as books. Most are simple ASCII text dumps without any inline illustrations. They can be useful for extracting short passages or quotations but unless you are going to go through the hassle of reformatting the entire book yourself they are not that useful.
Who in their right mind would prefer to read a pile of loose pages of badly formatted print-out that hasn't been properly typeset? Extensive reading on even a flat-screen or from stacks of loose pages are a good recipe for eyestrain.
It is interesting that the shoe now seems to be on the other foot in terms of digital media. If you do a quick search for "book trailer" or "vidlit" on Wikipedia and you will find that the wheel has come full circle. The internet is now being used to awaken new interest in books.
The impracticality of digital e-books (particularly for novels and other forms of fiction) has lead to the sudden emergence of technologies with use of cinematic techniques to promote new titles.
This can only be good news for library campaigners as it should effectively subvert the arguments of the paid political clowns - excuse me I meant library professionals - who are on a mission to strip our libraries of books and our museums of exhibits.
The so-called library modernisers must really take us for fools.
Posted by: Paul Fitzmaurice at February 1, 2007 4:52 AM