That’s right. As you’re reading this, let me be the first to tell you, you’re hopelessly out of touch with the world according to Steve Jobs:
“It doesn’t matter how good or bad the product is, the fact is that people don’t read anymore. 40% percent of the people in the U.S. read one book or less last year. The whole conception is flawed at the top because people don’t read anymore.”
That fresh from Macworld. The comments came from a quick dismissal of the Amazon Kindle book reader.
I have to admit I don’t get the logic of Kindle, but apparently a lot of people do. This article in Ad Age indicates the Kindle has a long waiting list. The same article states that reading of good, old fashioned books, the kind printed on (gasp) paper, seems to be very much alive and well, thank you. I would think that J.K. Rowling, Malcolm Gladwell and dozens of other best selling authors would tend to agree.
I actually carry 5 or 6 books at a time on my PDA, but I have to say, I still love the sensual attraction of a book. I love the heft, the texture, the sound and the smell. Sure, it can be inconvenient carrying them around, when the same bulk and size as one book gives you an entire virtual library. Not to mention the trees that needlessly give their lives so that I might swim upstream against the technological current. But in this case, I’m afraid I’m a hopeless Luddite.
Actually, I’ve pretty much ignored the TV in the past 6 months and taken up reading again in a big way. And I’m very thankful for it. If anything has to die, please God, let it be reality TV.
Jobs is a smart guy with his finger usually unerringly on the pulse of pop culture, but in this case, I think Steve’s out to lunch.
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