After months of research and endless internal debate, I bought a Kindle Fire. The act reminded me of a line in one of my books when Matt Jacob thinks that his connection to Jewish ended when the hospital tossed his foreskin into a tray after his birth.
Even though I know it’s not true, it feels as if that one click of “send to shopping cart” severed a connection to hardcover, softcover, coffee table, and every other book in printed form. The Kindle doesn’t and won’t preclude reading any of the above, (I haven’t tossed my vinyl records), but the next step of my evolutionary travel into digital has been taken.
Many friends my age have shied away from e-readers saying they don’t like reading off a screen, they need the feel of a bound book in their hands, and the only time they might ever use one is while traveling.
Not my issues. I spend too many hours at the computer to claim I don’t like reading a screen. I’ve never found myself caressing a leather-bound book, much less a paper one and, I too, think e-readers and their books will make a great traveling companions. So why did I take so long? What’s the big deal?
For me, it’s the feeling that opening up a new door is closing an old one. The image of shoving paperbacks into my rear pocket, the hours under bedroom covers with a small flashlight, the relief books gave me on my boring hour-long bus rides to school, and all the years when the Carteret, N.J. library provided me with a home away from home, replete with its musty smell.
That was then. Now my work life is fully digital. Every penny I earn will come from e-book sales of my original Matt Jacob Mystery Novels (http://zacharykleinonline.com/ matt-jacob-ebooks/) and the new ones in progress. So really, buying the Kindle was anti-climactic; all I did was catch up with myself–and give myself another a tax deduction.
Catching up with myself isn’t easy when it means letting go of what I’ve loved. But I no longer need a home away from home, stuffing books into my back pocket would now give me wallet sciatica, and my days of haunting indie mystery bookstores looking for esoteric authors and titles are over. Hell, Boston no longer has any independent mystery bookstores.
But digital, the Internet, and my turning toward the New Age is much, much larger than Kindles, e-books, and electronic publishing. “The more things change, the more they stay the same” is an old saw that’s often wrong. We live in new technological times which have changed our lives. People debate the better or worse of it; I come out on the “better.” I see the possibility of breaking the corporate stranglehold on what they define as news. I watch information fly around the globe from person to person while governments fail in their attempts to censor because young technologically savvy people find ways around the curtain.
I love the very real probability of developing worldwide communities.
My son has played an international computer game for years. During that time he’s made friends with many people around the globe and learned about their attitudes and cultures–even took a trip to Japan to visit with one of those friends. His do reminds me of my first airplane ride and, I suppose, my purchase of the Kindle. A step into the new.
Given that beasts don’t give up without a fight, it’s way too early to suggest that we live in a “One World” universe, but the glimmer is there. Faint, but there, and that makes the changes we’re going through incredibly worthwhile. Worth letting go of memories or pining for the past. It’s time to take the future–be it a Kindle, online petitions, or reaching large numbers of people with our own personal beliefs in hand to create new memories.
I’d like to believe that my freak flag still flies even though I cut what’s left of my hair and feel pretty good about the look. It is nigh on 2013 after all.
Happy New Year to everyone who has stopped by and I’ll try to keep you thinking, laughing and commenting (and buying some books) all the while I struggle to learn my new machine. Be safe.
“There’s something happening here, what it is ain’t exactly clear…” Buffalo Springfield
You do like toys. (g)
I understand the angst for you in the process regarding “books”, but it’s a brave new world. For me the most frightening aspect of e-books is that I’m again exposed to every book I will never read, but probably should and would probably love. A library without limits! That it is also a library without a reliable card catalog or browse-able shelves is daunting.
I’m glad you dove in head first. Keep swimming!
Bill–Most certainly. I agree about the daunting aspects only wouldn’t limit it to e-books. The technology thing is daunting. As far as swimming–what choice do I now have?
A suggestion: As fast as technology changes and the more those pesky electronics engineers change things on an almost daily basis, I think you’d be wise to take very good care of your new e-book reader. When its time has come and gone, and they’ve developed foldable readers you can wad up and stuff in your back pocket like a handkerchief or transmit text directly onto the inner lens of your glasses, it will someday become a quaint and possibly valuable antique. Save it for some grandchild or beloved youth in your family.
I still have the first desktop I ever purchased. It’s in perfect working order and tucked away safely. 1987 model that was top of the line in its day. Not only does it take the then-standard 5.25 inch floppy disks (that were actually floppy), it was an advanced model that also took the newfangled three megabyte plastic floppies too,
quite a bragging point in those ancient days. It sported a blindingly fast 80-286 processor, had a genuine color monitor, and a titanic thirty meg hard drive. I ordered it with one of those mysterious “phone cards” which allowed me to send text worldwide via my local Bulletin Board System, and anxiously awaited for my BBS systems administrator to make a “mail run” so I could get the latest from my pen pals. My God, people asked me, what are you going to horde inside that thing that will require thirty million bits of information? I also have my original dot-matrix printer that sounds like a lawn mower running on your desk and prints a wonderfully fuzzy text made from dots that are individually visible if you look closely.
This all sounds today like something Thomas Edison would have cobbled together. But imagine what it would have sounded like in 1947…
In less time than it took for my first computer to become ridiculously obsolete, your Kindle will meet the same fate. So keep it in good working order. Some kid in the future will get more for it than you paid new. Antiques are valuable, you know.
There are now “antique” computer shows and swap meets. The old DOS junk we all hunched over with our handmade cheat cheats of DOS commands are bringing higher prices every day. Do that future adult a favor and don’t scratch the screen.
I must confess I’m still a book man. You can’t fold the page over on a Kindle to mark your place. Books do not need batteries or chargers. You can back a pickup truck over a book and still read it. Mostly, though, I think it’s sheer muscle memory, the act of holding a book, turning its pages, annotating the text in the margins, and they’re handier to throw at a cat on the furniture without damage.
I may come around someday. I can see great advantages to memory chips versus hundreds of pounds of books when moving. And your Kindle will never sag the shelves of a decent bookcase, regardless of the age of the Kindle or the case itself.
But as a consumer, if I want to loan a book to a friend we’re now in the legal field of digital rights and other electronic mischief. Can they track your whereabouts with e-readers like they can with cell phones? If you’re suspected of blowing up a statue of Ronald Regan, can they confiscate your Kindle to look for bomb-making books in it? What parts–besides the words–of a digital book do you really own as your personal property? Do you even own the words? Congress has so far shown the technical knowledge of a Myna bird and hordes of lawyers have forever impoverished people for having five old songs on their computers that they had no digital rights for. We can expect this kind of litigation to get worse before it starts to get better. My old dog-eared copies of Robert Heinlein do not have any of these problems.
And books are not effected when you lay them down near a strong electrical field or a heavy magnet. (Remind me to tell you someday about the woman who covered her desktop in cute refrigerator magnets.)
There’s plenty of pro and con, but I agree with you that you just bought another ticket into the 21st Century. Congratulations and may you have many, many hours of reading enjoyment from it. And may you sell quite a few of the books that people will place in their Kindles and other e-readers!
Those of us in the stone huts of the Flyover Zone wish you and everyone at the sprawling Boston penthouse headquarters of “Just Sayin…'” a happy and delightful 2013. May you learn, prosper, and be healthy in the year to come.
Kent
Kent–Thanks for all the good wishes and of course Sue and I return them to you and yours! As far as antique computers go, I still have my old 1970s Kaypros. Their operating system was called CPM. Wrote Still Among The Living on it. So I figger I’ll be set when tupperware becomes valuable. Happy New Year!!!
I live and work all the time with my hands on my computer. I read all the material related to my research on the computer. I buy stuff on the computer. But I play tennis, not virtual tennis on the Wi (or whatever it is called) and I read fiction on paper. Sometimes reality matters.
Happy New Year to All
SFM–Happy New Year to you! And you’re right–sometimes reality *does* matter. Now just to figger out what reality is.
Good one. I love my kindle. Except for text books
Frank–Thanks. I don’t think I have much to worry about regarding textbooks. Happy New Year to Nancy and the entire brood. See you soon!
I too made the leap to e-books, with an earlier Kindle that Cheryl gave me two years ago. Grandaughter Emily got me a Fire for Xmas(Channukah?) so now I go kicking and screaming learning to use the latest version. I actually enjoy the Kindle, although when engrossed in reading I do find myself manually trying to turn the page instead of pushing a button. I haven’t registered the Fire yet, as things are a little busy around here. I’ve got other things on my plate, but when we finally get around to it I’m sure I’ll enjoy it as much as I do the original.
You had a great year, keep up the good work.
Hank–Thanks. So far so good. Good to know you were able to get the machine under control!! Wish me luck. Happy New Year, Cuz and the same to the entire family. Miss you all.
PS Send me a picture of your new haircut!!
Hank–When I get one. Took a little literary license there.
Aw Zack. A Kindle? Really? You really want to be able to buy only in the Amazon universe? Every other ereader let’s you buy from a number of sources, including your local independent bookstore (via Kobo, with millions of titles, and prices comparable to Amazon’s). But Happy New Year anyway.
Carole
Carol–From what I’ve read here’s a way to get the Kindle Fire to work with places other than Amazon. Am reading how. And, of course, Happy New Year to you and Mike.
Beware! The biggest downside I’ve heard of is downloading too many books that you’ll never have time to read. Enjoy.
Cindy–Tell me. I got shelves of unreads next to my bed. And thanks for stopping by. Appreciated.