Quote:
Originally Posted by axel77
Now this topics are revived, I recently came upon a line in a book that talked about hypertexts in academic context. One major problem they are presumed to have is the symbolic status of the book.
The book is *the* symbol for scholarliness.
And I consider Hornby is freightened eBooks might destroy that symbol. And this is even justifiably so. The eBook has potential to destroy the book as symbol for scholarliness. I consider however Hornby mismatches it with the destroyed symbol also scholarliness as concept will be destroyed also, and I think this is wrong.
However yes, it will be far more difficult if you superficially watch a man at his (home)office to determine if s/he does any "inteligent" work or just reads facebook junk all the determine. Currently you can go into his homeoffice you see walls of books, and you think, wow that wo/man must be smart (or at least well educated, I think one can fairly distinguish this traits). In the "new age" of eBooks, you will just see a cosy room, and some device lying on a table. You cannot say if s/he uses it to read about Hegel and Aristoteles or if s/he plays tetris with it all the time. There are less clues, less symbols, you'd really need to talk with him/her.
Also due to this one device does it all, at least with the notebook I catch myself quickly doing distractive things, like posting on mobileread, instead of working what I wanted to do.
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You may well have hit it right on the head. How is a person supposed to "judge" the "character" of another if one cannot quickly glance at the titles (or lack thereof) lining that person's bookcase? Yep. I get the feeling that Nick Hornby is that shallow of a person.
Derek