m@adie

I first read Neuromancer in 1990, and I’ve been a William Gibson fan ever since.  In fact, I once wrote luddite leaning  essay on it for one of my courses at UWO (1991).  It’s strange to think that I once had such a strong distaste for computers and visceral distrust of the effects of technology on society.  I also find it funny that “cyberpunk” (including Gibson) has framed my transition from luddite to sysadmin…

There are blocks of time when I have not read Gibson, and there are books by him that I have not yet read at all (namely All Tomorrow’s Parties). For some reason the bridge trilogy petered out for me at All Tomorrow’s Parties, but I suspect that that’s more due to my mood at the time than due to the novel itself.  I must add that I do intend to read this novel; I own it and I do not intend to let it go to waste.

I am currently really enjoying Spook Country,  and I have loved the two novels preceding it in the “Blue Ant” trilogy (if indeed it’s meant to be perceived as a trilogy).  I’m not sure what it is about these books that I find so exciting, but at it’s simplest, these are stories I wish I were in.

I own a Sony Reader Pocket Edition (I used to own an earlier slightly larger model but it was stolen), and I’ve realized that I actually prefer it over physical books.

I actually find it more comfortable to hold than a book.  The E Ink is also a huge plus because it’s no different from reading a printed page, and it’s much more comfortable on the eyes than an LCD… I spend more than half my day staring at screens and I find the E Ink display to be a relief…  For this reason I sincerely hope that tablets (like the iPad) never take over the e-book reader market.

There are many e-book readers available on the market with the Kindle being the most popular.  If I were in the market for an e-book reader today I might choose a Kindle… HOWEVER, the Kindle only supports closed formats,  and since I’m a big proponent of open standards I would still probably choose to to throw my support behind the EPUB format and the readers that support it.

At some point in the near future I’ll probably buy a larger format e-book reader, and at the moment my product of choice (not yet released) would be the  Asus DR-950.

Hopefully they’ll have a cheaper version of it available without 3G (something I have little use for in an e-reader).

I also wish that they would reduce the cost of e-books… without the paper, the printing, the binding, the shipping, the storage… blah blah blah… a $10 price tag is ridiculous, especially when it’s the publisher making most of that profit.  I hope that one day I’ll be the norm to deal with the Author themselves and cut the publisher out of the equation.  In this respect Cory Doctorow should be commended…