Quote:
Originally Posted by Sweetpea
I forsee a glorious role for paper books. They will be treasures. They will also be more expensive, but who cares, they'll be collector's items.
The paperbacks will disappear, in favor for electronic. But the hardbacks will be works of art. Something you will want to show in the living room. So, you'll have author Yyy's latest novel on your reader only, and Watership Down on display in your livingroom.
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I find comments like this rather intriguing. I look at the future of ebooks to be like what happened with music. Once upon a time you bought a record, came home, blew any fluff off it, put the record on with a set of headphones and listened to it whilst reading the cover. Similar with tapes, you took off the plastic, in went the cassette, you read the sleeve (sometimes with lyrics) and you had a ball. CDs were very similar to cassettes in that respect.
Then came MP3s and they were going to kill CDs. Music shops still exist, CDs are still bought and sold. Now of the people I know who buy MP3s still buy a CD of their favourite music and only buy MP3s for mainstream songs they like to have. I do the same with ebooks, buy mainstream books that I want to read but buy the paperbacks of books that I really like and for no real recognised reason I just want to have sitting on my shelf.
I guess what I saying is I don't see how books will become treasures. Records and LPs are a thing of the past and some die-hard people adore them, but they can be picked up for a few dollars at any sale or second hand place. Ebooks IMHO just represent a new way of accessing literature. Is it better than reading paperbacks? Comes down to the individual person. I never had to charge my old paperbacks but then I have never had sore hands after using my ereader for prolonged periods of time (I read large books).