Kindles yet to woo University users

[dmaul1114]

Originally Posted by davidspitzer

We can be flippant about it, but we continue to consume without regard for the future or our children becuase it is convenient for us.

Quit having children and that will conserve much more than any one of us can do in the rest of our lifetimes.

Like I said, I recycle, conserve energy etc., I'm not worried to much about buying books and printing PDFs for my work. I do enough. And I don't plan on having kids either.

[ahi]

Originally Posted by dmaul1114

Quit having children and that will conserve much more than any one of us can do in the rest of our lifetimes.

Here, here!

I think you all should stop having children, and leave the world a nicer and better place for my children!

- Ahi

[LDBoblo]

Originally Posted by ahi

Here, here!

I think you all should stop having children, and leave the world a nicer and better place for my children!

- Ahi

We need someone to cut down the bloody trees though.

[Juliette]

I'd say why not, but it can't be just a basic device, touch screen and annotation (with drawings, too!) are essential. Which is the problem- not-too-basic devices costs.

Unless we use those books like library books, and ignore comments and other commentaries. Can work for some subject, but, for example, literature would suffer, and historical exegesis too!

[ahi]

Originally Posted by LDBoblo

We need someone to cut down the bloody trees though.

They'll have Japanese robots for that!

- Ahi

[Juliette]

Originally Posted by LDBoblo

We need someone to cut down the bloody trees though.

Yetis?

[davidspitzer]

Originally Posted by dmaul1114

Quit having children and that will conserve much more than any one of us can do in the rest of our lifetimes.

Like I said, I recycle, conserve energy etc., I'm not worried to much about buying books and printing PDFs for my work. I do enough. And I don't plan on having kids either.

Originally Posted by ahi

Here, here!

I think you all should stop having children, and leave the world a nicer and better place for my children!

- Ahi

Duh! I get it now, you guys are retarded - my mistake

[zerospinboson]

Originally Posted by davidspitzer

Duh! my mistake

For heaven's sake, can't you just not feed the trolls? It's been proven* often enough now that it doesn't discourage them.

* Proven, that is, by the enormous amount of "do not feed the trolls" signs that can be found via google.

[Grauheim]

Originally Posted by Juliette

I'd say why not, but it can't be just a basic device, touch screen and annotation (with drawings, too!) are essential. Which is the problem- not-too-basic devices costs.

Unless we use those books like library books, and ignore comments and other commentaries. Can work for some subject, but, for example, literature would suffer, and historical exegesis too!

Other than the touch screen, most of this stuff is just software, which isn't really expensive if you can amortize it over millions of units. I'm not even convinced annotation is really that important. Things like very easy searching and bookmarking are much more crucial.

And for students, $300-400 for a device could be saved back in as little as one year if the costs of the textbooks are lower. (Which they are, since publishers can rent them the text for one year rather than selling them a physical copy to keep.) This is why university textbooks are the killer app for e-readers. You can get a whole generation of young people used to the technology.

[pshrynk]

Please stop this calling names and being insulting. Mobileread is a community based on mutual respect and cordiality.

[dmaul1114]

Hardly trolling, just having a conversation and goofing around a little bit. No need for personal attacks and calling people retarded.

E-books are great---for somethings. But you can't expect everyone to want to use them for every reading purpose.

And the environmental high horse stuff gets old. I care, and I bet if we pick apart everything all of us do, people like David bashing those of us that are sticking with paper books and printouts for some work/academic functions usually end up doing more harm to the environment in total that I do.

Be it by living further from work, driving a lower MPG vehicle, not recycling as much, keeping the thermostat up/down more in the summer/winter, owning a larger house than they really need which costs more to cool and heat, haven't switched totally to compact fluorescent light bulbs, no recycling as aggressively as they can etc. etc.

So yeah, the environmental stuff gets old as I'm very conscious of it and do more than enough to offset the fact that books and printouts of journal articles (which I keep permanently or recycle) are much easier for me to work with. So I'm not going to take it all that kindly when people get on their high horse and say I don't care about the environment since I'm not willing to use crappy technology that makes my work much harder and time consuming (when I already can't keep up with my work) just to save some paper.

I do my part. When the technology is there to make the switch to e-versions of academic books, text books, articles etc. just as easy and efficient for me to use like I do the paper counterparts currently, I'll make that switch as well. I'm not going to waste money, time and effort on trying to use the crappy electronic options out there now. In 5-10 years when some company wakes up and puts out a nice 10-12" tablet that can display everything perfectly, allows on screen note taking and highlight that works perfectly etc., I'll be happy to move on. Just like I was happy to buy a Kindle and stop spending money and using paper for novels I'd only read once.

[dmaul1114]

Originally Posted by Grauheim

Other than the touch screen, most of this stuff is just software, which isn't really expensive if you can amortize it over millions of units. I'm not even convinced annotation is really that important. Things like very easy searching and bookmarking are much more crucial.

Annotation is huge IMO.

I highlight and took notes all over stuff as an undegrad and especially as graduate student.

As a professor it's even more crucial. Searching and stuff is nice, but I really just need to be able to flip through something I've read carefully once and marked up and find the parts I needed, and be able to recap my thoughts on it.

It's hard to find time to read something carefully and mark it up as is--so it really needs to be as efficient as writing and highlighting on a print out or paper book is.

Additionally, such technology makes it feasible to have students e-mail papers and I can do corrections and comments on it stylus just like I mark them up with a red pen now. And on a tablet that would be quicker and more comfortable to do that say trying to do it using track changes in word now which requires a laptop or PC which isn't comfortable to sit and read on for a long period of time vs. holding a table that's about the size of a sheet of paper.

Mark up capability is a must for me in my use of papers, articles and academic books.

[orion2001]

Wait, so people here are arguing that we should waste our hard earned money on expensive, unproven technology that will be obsolete in a year or two, and doing so while the actual product we buy is inferior to what is available to us, all in the name of feeling good about saving the environment?

Seriously, get back to reality here. I'm all for saving the environment and trying to have a minimal impact on it, but this is a bit ridiculous. If everyone willingly spent there money on being such noble early adopters, you do realize that there wouldn't be any market forces pushing the technology to improve? It is great that ereaders are becoming popular and also great that companies are coming up with products like the DX to try and replace regular textbooks. However, mass conversion to such a product will only happen when:

a) The price point is right and comparable to what we currently have.

b) When the new product is actually more useful than what it is replacing

Like it or not, these are the 2 key factors which will decide when a paradigm shift occurs in how people treat books. The lack of massive adoption now, will only help because it will spur further innovation as companies like Sony and Amazon try as hard as they can to improve eReader technology and enlarge their customer base.

That is one aspect of it. Then there is this whole argument that somehow eReaders are magically better for the environment. What proof do we have? Here are some points to consider:

1) Lithium Ion batteries while not deemed hazardous still pose a problem as most of them don't end up getting recycled (especially ones in products that are not user replaceable)

2) Other rare earth metals that go into PCB manufacturing are not renewable materials. Sooner or later there is going to be a big problem as these get rarer and more expensive. Already, China has a huge monopoly on a whole bunch of rare earth metals and are tightening exports of these materials: Reference Link

3) Ereaders aren't biodegradable. As millions and billions start buying them in the future, dropping them, breaking them and they start piling up in landfills and waste dumps, there isn't any environmentally friendly and nice way to do away with them. Books on the other hand...

4) All those servers hosting Ebooks, backing up ebooks, running 24x7 consume tons of power all the time. Maybe less than printing presses, but I don't know that for a fact...and I certainly don't know how well it would scale as more and more people adopt this technology

5) If we want to take it to extremes: Once I buy a book, it is on my book shelf and it doesn't consume any power. My ebook reader? Uses electricity all the time, has to be recharged, and then when I have to sync books, I have to use a computer that guzzles more power. Does that make you/me a terrible person now?

Seriously, some of you folk need to get of your moral high horse. Sure eBooks and eReaders are great, but to somehow suggest that they are magical environmental solutions and to scorn people refusing to adopt them from an environmental perspective is downright silly.

[davidspitzer]

Originally Posted by zerospinboson

For heaven's sake, can't you just not feed the trolls? It's been proven* often enough now that it doesn't discourage them.

* Proven, that is, by the enormous amount of "do not feed the trolls" signs that can be found via google.

you are of course right - I apologize to the serious people on this site

[ahi]

Originally Posted by davidspitzer

you are of course right - I apologize to the serious people on this site

An apology to everybody, except the people you insulted?

Well, I do believe I shall raze an entire jungle on the morrow to calm my quiet indignation!

- Ahi