Are you going to make the one hundred books read goal?

[orlok]

I think we all know reading and listening are differing activities - no-one is disputing that. But if you have been through the whole book, word for word (and I do agree that unabridged versions are the only appropriate version - imagine skipping through a paper book missing out random sections!), then you can have said to have "read" it either way - it amounts to the same thing. I know as much about the book whether I have read or listened to it.

Anyway, as Hamlet53 says, these are personal challenges, and nothing anyone else thinks or says makes one iota of difference to my challenge. If I want to count reading the ingredients on the back of a Heinz 57 can as one of my challenges marked off, who's to stop me?

[Loosheesh]

Originally Posted by orlok

Anyway, as Hamlet53 says, these are personal challenges, and nothing anyone else thinks or says makes one iota of difference to my challenge. If I want to count reading the ingredients on the back of a Heinz 57 can as one of my challenges marked off, who's to stop me?

Ah, sanity!

I listened to quite a number of audiobooks the first half of the year - 25 of them, and all unabridged (I'm usually leery of anything abridged ). I'd love to revisit a couple of them in their text versions, especially Manning Marable's Malcolm X biography.

[CWatkinsNash]

The only people who should get to decide if audiobooks "count", regardless of abridged or unabridged, are those that are listening to them, especially since some people listen to them because it's the only way they can enjoy the book. If you don't think they should count, then don't count the ones YOU listen to.

/end rant

[Nyssa]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Well, for 2012, we'll have to let Nyssa make the call on audiobooks.

Jon, I'm more of a facilitator and quasi-den mother than I am a rule maker. The main goal of the 2012 Reading Challenge is for the participants to chose their own individual goals, and therefore set their own rules as to how to reach said goals.

I want this to be a fun experience for all involved.

As to my personal opinions:

Abridged vs unabridged: If I were keeping score, abridged would not count, or at the very least, it would lose marks. Unabridged is definitely preferred because, by definition, it is the author's "complete" work.

On audio books: I have never listened to an audio book in my adult life. In fact, the last one was probably a book on cassette in grade school. I have just recently, however, downloaded one as a free KSO offer from Audibles.com. I will reserve my feelings on this until after I have actually experienced an audio book.

[sun surfer]

Originally Posted by Catlady

Listening is passive. Reading is active.

Perhaps, but either is a way of processing information, and in the case of books, the same information. You can learn by listening or looking (or touching; i.e. Braille).

It's similar to the difference between going to the theater and seeing a live performance, and sitting at home watching a video of the performance on PBS, for example. Even though the content is exactly the same, the experience is completely different.

I don't think that the comparison is similar. In the case of going to a live performance versus watching a video of the exact same live performance, the way of processing the information is the same.

Of course it's often nicer to go to the theatre, but that's because of the environment and scale. Live, everything is all around and in the moment, while on video you're focused on a small screen.

I don't see a similar difference in reading text versus listening to someone speaking the text.

[JSWolf]

I think most of us are in agreement that abridged should not count since it's not the author's complete work.

As for audiobooks, I'll wait for Nyssa's decision on that and abide by what she has to say. Until she decides, I'm done with the subject for now.

[Loosheesh]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I think most of us are in agreement that abridged should not count since it's not the author's complete work.

As for audiobooks, I'll wait for Nyssa's decision on that and abide by what she has to say. Until she decides, I'm done with the subject for now.

Wasn't she clear enough?

Originally Posted by Nyssa

Jon, I'm more of a facilitator and quasi-den mother than I am a rule maker. The main goal of the 2012 Reading Challenge is for the participants to chose their own individual goals, and therefore set their own rules as to how to reach said goals.

I want this to be a fun experience for all involved.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Loosheesh

Wasn't she clear enough?

Yes, she was very clear hence...

Originally Posted by Nyssa

On audio books: I have never listened to an audio book in my adult life. In fact, the last one was probably a book on cassette in grade school. I have just recently, however, downloaded one as a free KSO offer from Audibles.com. I will reserve my feelings on this until after I have actually experienced an audio book.

So unless you missed that part, nothing has been decided.

[sun surfer]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

(IMHO) If audiobooks are going to be allowed to count, I do think only unabridged ones should count.

Originally Posted by JSWolf

As far as abridged goes, I do think abridged should not be allowed. If it's abridged, it's not the complete book. So you did not actually read the entire book.

Originally Posted by orlok

I do agree that unabridged versions are the only appropriate version - imagine skipping through a paper book missing out random sections!

Originally Posted by Nyssa

Abridged vs unabridged: If I were keeping score, abridged would not count, or at the very least, it would lose marks. Unabridged is definitely preferred because, by definition, it is the author's "complete" work.

Boy, you all are a judgmental lot!

I say abridged are legitimate books, and if someone wants to count them in their list, then they should. If I read an abridged book, I'd count it in a heartbeat. Whatever gets a person to read and enjoy what they're reading is the important thing.

[Loosheesh]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Yes, she was very clear hence...



So unless you missed that part, nothing has been decided.

Oh, but you missed that she prefaced it with ... "As to my personal opinions ..."

I like Nyssa, but I don't intend her opinions (or anyone else's) to dictate my reading choices, not that she's even remotely trying to do this. If I want to go against my own personal tastes, and read abridged works, I'll do so ... and think of you with a smile while doing it

[JSWolf]

Anyway, I look forward to the 2012 reading challenge. I think I'll do better even if I don't reach 100.

[sakura-panda]

Originally Posted by sun surfer

Perhaps, but either is a way of processing information, and in the case of books, the same information. You can learn by listening or looking (or touching; i.e. Braille).



I don't think that the comparison is similar. In the case of going to a live performance versus watching a video of the exact same live performance, the way of processing the information is the same.

Of course it's often nicer to go to the theatre, but that's because of the environment and scale. Live, everything is all around and in the moment, while on video you're focused on a small screen.

I don't see a similar difference in reading text versus listening to someone speaking the text.

There are books that I never would have read if I had not listened to the audio book -- the Harry Potter and Millenium series, for example. I'm thinking of getting The Hunger Games series from Audible because I'm not interested in reading the books themselves, but would like to know the story.

Since the overall goal is to hear the words the way the author has assembled them, I don't see a difference between using either my voice in my head or someone else's. I am getting the same story in the end (and maybe slightly more of the story since I am not able to skim over any bits when I'm listening rather than reading.)

Having read abridged books before I even knew that such a thing existed, I think they are just as much a book as any other one is but that they should *not* be considered the same book as the original.

I haven't listened to any abridged audio, because I had sworn off abridged books long before I began listening to them, but I don't think any of us are in a position to tell anyone else that they can not include an abridged book in their lists. I would recommend noting that versions are abridged when including them on lists, but I would not say they could not be included. (My own list specifies when a book is an audio version.)

Thanks for taking this on, Nyssa! I look forward to seeing how we all do next year.

[Xanthe]

Originally Posted by CWatkinsNash

The only people who should get to decide if audiobooks "count", regardless of abridged or unabridged, are those that are listening to them, especially since some people listen to them because it's the only way they can enjoy the book. If you don't think they should count, then don't count the ones YOU listen to.

/end rant

Hear, hear!

I tend to listen to unabridged audiobooks when I am driving, or at times when my eyes are bothering me and it is too tiring to focus on written pages.

Although looking at the printed page with your eyes and understanding the symbols there is probably the official definition of "reading", given current technology "listening" to an audiobook is also a legitimate way of "reading" a book today. One is not more "active" or more "passive" than another - one uses the eyes as a means of conveying the information to the brain, the other uses the ears, but it is the brain itself that processes the information. To say that one input method is superior to another makes no sense to me. That's like saying reading a Braille book is not actually reading because you have to use your fingers instead of your eyes.

As has already been mentioned, this reading challenge is a personal challenge. Each of us is choosing what we want to read. Some people are choosing "serious" literature as their reading material of choice. Looking at my list, one can see that I've been mainly reading urban fantasy, mysteries and romances - which many people don't consider to be "serious" at all. I don't consider my choices as somehow being less valid than anyone else's, so I'm not going to consider anyone's decision to listen to audiobooks as a means of gaining the author's words as somehow being less legitimate.

I would even say that listening to an audiobook version of an author's work can even be a truer "reading" experience, because you are listening to every single word that the author wrote. You cannot subconsciously skip of bits and pieces of the story that might not interest you (overly-long setting descriptions, overly-involved sex scenes). You are a captive to the author's words.

[orlok]

Originally Posted by sun surfer

Boy, you all are a judgmental lot!

I say abridged are legitimate books, and if someone wants to count them in their list, then they should. If I read an abridged book, I'd count it in a heartbeat. Whatever gets a person to read and enjoy what they're reading is the important thing.

I was only stating my personal view - I loathe abridged books because I hate to think of what I am missing. It's certainly not what the author intended me to read/listen to, IMO.

That said, as I posted earlier, it's entirely up to each individual as to what counts, and if abridged books do it for you, go for it .

[Ron.]

I might, I guess it depends on finding good books to read. I am at 91 right now, a couple months ago I read a few books in a row that I did not enjoy and it turned me off reading for awhile. I went almost two months without reading anything at all, only now am I starting back up. either way I have read more this year then all the years of my life combined before hand, so it is a win either way.