Do you still purchase physical books?

[davidfor]

Other for me as well. The only paper books I have bought in the last 10 years have been for other people.

[gmw]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

Really, I probably misphrased option 5; I should've put "No, but I still own physical books."

One of the hazards of creating a poll is that the most appropriate set of choices only becomes obvious AFTER the poll.

[drofgnal]

I voted no, which is mostly true. I did buy one hardback a bit ago. I have a friend who has had books published with Baen. I bought that book and had it signed. That's been it for over 10 years. Before the advent of ebooks, I was traveling a lot for work, at times almost weekly. I'd buy books predominately in the airport. You could buy a book in the airport and turn it in for credit, then buy another used book. So they never built up in the house.

My dad was even thriftier, he'd scour the attic sales in his town in FL and buy books for about a quarter. Read them, then put them in the library in his retirement community.

[Joliet Jake]

I voted #4. I bought a book on British politics that was not available as an ebook in my country a couple of years ago. I was ticked when a year later it became available as an ebook here. (Too late. I already bought and read it!)

Recently I've bought a few very old books (40+ year old books) not available in ebook format, and one new book not available in ebook format anywhere. I wish I was good at digitizing stuff, but those old books tend to be 400+ page hardcovers so even if I knew what I was doing it seems like too much work.

[spacepope]

I only buy paper books if they are truly unavailable in e-book format, OR the book is exorbitantly expensive as an ebook (and the book is rather short).

I have fund I really have little patience for paper books. Yes, they're nice and classic, but I was never a big reader before buying my Kobo because they're terribly inconvenient to carry around. I also have the terrible habit of checking how many pages are left until the next chapter but my Kobo just tells me at the top of the screen.

If I do buy a paper book, it's gonna be secondhand and/or a book I need for reference. Also, non-fiction only. The paper books I own are mostly Japanese reference material, some spiritual reading/bibles, a good amount of photography books (photography ebooks never look as good). And that's about it. Everything else is on the e-reader.

[ekbell]

I prefer paper when buying art books or other larger image heavy 'coffee table' style books.

Otherwise I'll always choose the ebook if I have a choice.

[retiredbiker]

I started with ebooks in about 2008 to make travel easier. Then in 2013 a small basement flood took out most of my paper library. And since then my vision has been going downhill to the point where any paper has to be read with a magnifier. A nice progression to today: reading only ebooks, but have some dormant leftovers.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by retiredbiker

Then in 2013 a small basement flood took out most of my paper library.

Ouch.

[ApK]

I chose other. I'll still buy paper books for art-based books, special editions, and other special purposes that the form is better suited to, and I still have several full bookshelves, but for general reading, it's almost all ebooks. But even that number is fairly low now, since I consume mostly audiobooks.

My 15 year old daughter, however, reads a lot and greatly prefers paper books, despite being otherwise device-addicted and having access to my Kindle. She spends more time in Barnes and Noble and in the library than anyone else I know, and will usually obtain a paper edition even if we already have the ebook in our collection.

[astrangerhere]

I am 100% ebook and my wife is 100% pbook. We have an almost even split in the house - we have around 950 physical books and I have just over 1000 books in Calibre. I selected yes since both still come into the home at a regular clip.

[mrscoach]

Yes, I buy physical books, but not fiction, and fewer than the ebooks I read. I have several health books that I read, reread and loan out. I mostly buy health books in physical form.

[kyrilson]

Originally Posted by tomsem

I am actually reading a physical book for the first time in years. It was unavailable in digital form. I have a couple of others in that category I have bought in last couple of years, for the same reason, but have yet to start reading these.

I’d like to get rid of most of my physical books, but it is very hard to find takers and the idea of carting them to the dump is somehow sacreligious to me.

Just donate them to goodwill or a library.

[kyrilson]

I selected Yes, but less than ebooks. I mostly buy ebooks, but sometimes I will buy the physical book when a book has a lot of sidebars or the layout of the pages are not linear. In this case, an ebook does not handle it well at all. A PDF would, but I've found that eink is pretty terrible with PDFs.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by kyrilson

Just donate them to goodwill or a library.

Easier said than done, and also easier said than should be done, in many cases.

As for the first, I’m pretty sure that my own public library hasn’t started accepting donations again yet.

As for the second, there are too many instances of people passing along the valueless to a charity so the charity has the problem of disposing it. In this particular case, it’s important to remove the “sacred” aspect to the notion of these books and view them for what they are, a commodity. Then evaluate them closely for ones with intrinsic value, i.e., it would be worth it to another to buy/sell/keep it. And then the rest, which realistically will be most of them as used books have very little value in general, really are trash and should be viewed as such and recycled as possible (covers on hardcovers are not recyclable) and the remainder dumped.

In any case, it’s a big job. Books are heavy and bulky - another reason it’s wrong to shift your own deaccession issues onto another entity.

[astrangerhere]

Originally Posted by issybird

Easier said than done, and also easier said than should be done, in many cases.

As for the first, I’m pretty sure that my own public library hasn’t started accepting donations again yet.

As for the second, there are too many instances of people passing along the valueless to a charity so the charity has the problem of disposing it. In this particular case, it’s important to remove the “sacred” aspect to the notion of these books and view them for what they are, a commodity. Then evaluate them closely for ones with intrinsic value, i.e., it would be worth it to another to buy/sell/keep it. And then the rest, which realistically will be most of them as used books have very little value in general, really are trash and should be viewed as such and recycled as possible (covers on hardcovers are not recyclable) and the remainder dumped.

In any case, it’s a big job. Books are heavy and bulky - another reason it’s wrong to shift your own deaccession issues onto another entity.

May I present another option that is not a charity shop? Donate books to prisoners. https://prisonbookprogram.org/prisonbooknetwork/

Prison libraries vary wildly from facility to facility and what each state will allow prisoners to read also varies, but you won't find a more marginalized group with less access to reading material in the US.