angelyne, I share both of those distractions: too much time spent converting texts, and too many texts to choose from when it's time to read (how could such a thing be possible?!) In the case of the latter, though, the problem is that I have many texts to choose from, but still not even a majority of the collection I hope to eventually have at hand.
The conversion time really is a nuisance, but I expect it to taper off. I'm in the process of acquiring e-copies of all the fiction in my paper library, and converting it to a readable format (preferably HTML with an .opf file). This gives me flowable text that's recognized by most reader software import routines, or at least the two I use (eBw Librarian and FBReader). But because not everything is formatted and moved to the iLiad yet, sometimes it's still easier to read on my laptop or on the linux desktop where I'm doing the conversion work.
There's no room in the house for enough bookshelves to store all my books, and I like to re-read favorites, usually multiple times. So the effort will pay off in the end. But I'm still in the situation where I'll think of something I'd like to read this evening, but not have it in a convenient format/location yet. (OTOH, that used to happen when all the paper books were out on shelves -- I'd spend an hour looking for the book I had decided I really wanted. Once things are converted, this should get better!)
Now I just need to figure out what to do about my non-fiction library... probably time-consuming non-destructive scanning. I'm not looking forward to it, but a lot of the titles are fairly obscure, and it looks like mostly computer science books and a few self-help books are out there for non-fiction. (My non-fiction falls into categories like educational research, game design, linguistics, and international adoption.)
I like tech, but I don't usually spend money on it unless I think I'll use it (I satisfy my cravings by reading
Wired,
Make, etc.) I don't use the iLiad as much as I expected, but it's summer and I'm between graduate classes, when I usually have stacks of PDFs to read every week. So I don't think right now is the best time to judge how much use I'll normally get out of it. And again, when the library is fully ported, I think I won't want to be anywhere long without it.
