Have ebooks changed your reading habits?

[LadyKate]

Originally Posted by twowheels

30 years? 30 years ago you could read the text faster than it would download!

I can imagine you now...

miniterm
atx4
atdt 555-5555
TS> connect unixhost
$ ftp 
ftp> open mrcnext.cso.uiuc.edu
Connected to mrcnext.cso.uiuc.edu
220 FTP server ready.
User (domain.name:(none)): ftp
331 Password required for user-name
Password: ftp
230 User user-name logged in.
ftp
ftp> ascii
200 Type set to A.
ftp> cd etext
250 CWD command successful.  
ftp> get PG000.TXT
200 PORT command successful.  
150 ASCII data connection for PG000.TXT (128.174.68.206,3134) (2881 bytes).  
226 ASCII Transfer complete.  
local: PG000.TXT remote: PG000.TXT
2939 bytes received in 0.066 seconds (43 Kbytes/s)  
ftp> bye  
221 Goodbye.  
$ cat PG000.TXT

<...300 bps text scrolls by, as HarryT reads it at a real-time 300 bps rate...>

LOL the download speed wasn't all that slow in the 80s. And primarily text files compressed were not that large.

[kacir]

I have started reading ebooks way before there were any e-ink readers available.

Ebooks and later pocketable readers and even later e-ink readers have changed my reading on many, MANY levels.

I grew up as a voracious reader and heavy user of quite a few different libraries. I never owned more than a small bookcase worth of books. I knew from very early on I would never to sustain my reading appetite with the books I actually physically owned.
Being a library user I got used to an opportunist approach to getting books - you usually browse through the just-returned-pile and get interesting looking stuff there. When I went looking for a specific book, it was usually when I was looking for other books in series.

I live in a non-English-speaking country and at one moment I decided to start reading in English. When I ran out of locally available English books here I have discovered e-books.
You can read a long rant about the whole history here: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...74#post2100274

E-books caused that now my reading is much more varied and I have discovered new niche generes and obscure authors I like.

Plus, I do not have to worry anymore what I am going to read on holiday, or when camping or when I finish the batch borrowed from a library.

[LadyKate]

Originally Posted by patrickt

Sorry, but you don't "read" audiobooks even if you put the word in quotation marks. You listen to audiobooks that someone else is reading to you. My mother used to read to me. I know what you mean, though. I've never read "To Kill a Mockingbird" but I saw the movie starring Gregroy Peck. So, I "read" the book on the movie screen.

I enjoy reading. Some don't. That's perfectly legitimate but listening or watching isn't reading.

Reading braille is still reading even though the eyes are not involved. Audiobooks that are true to the book (not a performance) are also a form of reading. The blind have been using audiobooks for years, with volunteers reading them and describing the illustrations and samples etc onto tape.

[Geralt]

I think patrickt doesn't really understand audiobooks. If he did, he wouldn't compare them to movies.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by Geralt

Not true. I use MP3 player (Sansa Clip Zip).
And I can read perfectly well, ebooks or pbooks. I "read" audiobooks because they are completely different experience and I like how they make me feel. I often find they create a completely different kind of atmosphere and with a good narrator they can enhance my experience of a book, believe it or not.

Most of my audiobooks are books that I've already read the normal way (either ebook or paper book). I agree that audiobooks give a very different and frequently greatly enhanced reading experience. Also, for me, it's a bit like re-reading a book in that since I already know how the book will end, I can enjoy the craft of the book and the reader.

[soulfuldog]

Yep, I certainly read more and am also more likely to read by series, and follow books by a particular author. I'm also more likely to try different genres of books, with paper books I'd take a lot more care over what I would read as I didn't like to not finish a book. It's easier to put down an ebook I'm not enjoying, and to me thats a good thing too.

[twowheels]

Originally Posted by LadyKate

LOL the download speed wasn't all that slow in the 80s. And primarily text files compressed were not that large.

I was quite actively using computers in the 80s, and 300 baud was the standard for much of the 80s, and I could (and did) read text faster than 300 baud.

edit: first youtube video I found: https://youtu.be/BkHwT6o6Jvw?t=147

[patrickt]

I totally support audiobooks. My only quarrel is refering to listening to a book being read to you as the same as reading a book. Considering an MP3 player as an ereader is silly.

[twowheels]

Originally Posted by patrickt

I totally support audiobooks. My only quarrel is refering to listening to a book being read to you as the same as reading a book. Considering an MP3 player as an ereader is silly.

I find that 6 months or so after "reading" an audiobook, I can't remember which books I "read" and which ones I "read". The experience is different when I consume it, but the final outcome is the same.

[patrickt]

Originally Posted by Geralt

I think patrickt doesn't really understand audiobooks. If he did, he wouldn't compare them to movies.

I think Geralt doesn't really understand the difference between reading and being read to. If he did......

People who read by braille use their senses to translate the symbols on the page to words in their mind. People who are read to, don't.

[Geralt]

Originally Posted by patrickt

I totally support audiobooks. My only quarrel is refering to listening to a book being read to you as the same as reading a book. Considering an MP3 player as an ereader is silly.

Nobody claimed MP3 player is an ereader. We just corrected you in assuming that people only "read" audiobooks through tablets and phones. Aside from them even some ereaders have the ability to play audiobooks.

I'm gonna repeat myself again because I don't think you get it. Audiobooks are books. They have the SAME content. Same words, same sentences. So in that sense when you read a book and "read" an audiobook you absorbed the same content in different manner. Same thing with ebook and paper book. Same content, different medium and way of reading it.

[Geralt]

Originally Posted by patrickt

People who read by braille use their senses to translate the symbols on the page to words in their mind. People who are read to, don't.

So hearing is not a sense but touch is? Lol!
People who listen to audiobooks use their brain to make sense of what's being said, pretty much the same as they do with making sense of what they read.

[HappyMartin]

I read far more series now. It was tough to find complete series as PB in South Africa so I avoided them. I don't see it as a totally good thing. I read a lot of series that weaken as they go on but I will persist with the series out of a misguided sense of commitment.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Geralt

So hearing is not a sense but touch is? Lol!
People who listen to audiobooks use their brain to make sense of what's being said, pretty much the same as they do with making sense of what they read.

With the very greatest respect, I do have to agree with Patrick here. Being read to is a different experience to reading a book yourself. That's not to say that it's inferior; just that it's different. I too enjoy listening to audiobooks, but, certainly for me, I don't consider it to be reading a book.

[Geralt]

Originally Posted by HarryT

With the very greatest respect, I do have to agree with Patrick here. Being read to is a different experience to reading a book yourself. That's not to say that it's inferior; just that it's different. I too enjoy listening to audiobooks, but, certainly for me, I don't consider it to be reading a book.

Nobody's arguing they are the same. No more than pbook and ebook are. Of course they carry different experience (as if I didnt argue that point too much already).
But Patrick here, just few posts back equated audiobooks with movies, and now he's arguing that hearing is not a sense, but touch is.
I'm just waiting for the next pearl of wisdom.