From: Jim O'Donnell <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Sun, 11 Dec 2011 21:51:01 -0500
Listreaders may recall that I have before reported on the proportions
of codex books and "devices" being read on Amtrak trains on the
northeast corridor of a Sunday afternoon. On 8 June 2010, 44 printed
volumes outnumber 7 e-readers on an Acela. Today on a Regional, there
were 117 codices to 32 e-readers. But MANY cautions in thinking about
that.
1. "Devices" are ubiquitous. On a train a month ago after dark, we
lost power for two hours. But looking back the length of the car I
sat in, *every* seat had a glow in it -- phone, tablet, reader,
laptop, *something* to absorb the attention as long as the batteries
survived.
2. What I am not controlling for in my count is the basic decision to
"read" or not. I was struck today that essentially every non-sleeper
was up to something, and many laptops were open -- I did not count
them as "reading" unless a look at their screen made it look like
something other than mail/facebook/browsing. (I did count intention
as act: if sleeping with book or e-reader in hand, I counted the
choice.) I was also struck that *many* people were thumbing
phone-sized devices, and surely some of them were even reading
extensive texts, but I counted none of them either way.
So what I would want to think more about is whether the choice to
"read" on the train biases towards codex-users. That is, if I am on a
train for a couple of hours and bored, what shall I do? Twenty years
ago, the choices were read or sleep. Then it was read, sleep, or
type. Now it's read, sleep, type, or divert yourself with video
(numerous tablets doing that) or facebook or texting or twittering or
. . . . One hypothesis would be then that devices are leading people
away from a historic choice of reading; and with device in hand, your
choice may well be the video rather than the Kindle book it holds.
And so if the "readers" are people who are defined as resiliently
reading because reading is what makes them feel alive (that would be
me), then a bias in favor of the traditional material may represent a
majority choice in a (dwindling?) minority.
Jim O'Donnell
Georgetown U.
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