[Binko]

I went to my local library the other day for the first time in ages. I'd stepped on my cheap kindle and broke the screen. So I thought I'd try paper books for a change. When I was a kid libraries were my main refuge from a difficult home life and I've always been fond of hanging out in various libraries.

I look around and the first thing I see is 3 massive aisles of audiobooks and compact discs. Hundreds upon hundreds of items in an archaic format that nobody cares about any longer. Then I start wandering the book aisles and it's simply depressing. Thousands of bulky, clunky old books just sitting on shelves, the overwhelming majority of which are most likely never checked out.

It was all rather bleak and depressing. To top it all off, I went up to one of the librarians to ask a simple friendly question about my library card and she was taciturn and unfriendly. It reminded me that the librarians were always the worst part of the library.

I ended up checking out a couple of books but found them unreadable. Paper books seem so clunky and heavy and awkward. I can't lay on my side holding them with one hand and flipping pages with my thumb. So I took them back and borrowed my wife's old kindle keyboard model.

My point is that all this stuff should just be digitized and made accessible through a variety of simple devices. So anything that works towards that goal, such as OverDrive, is fine by me.