Books I Haven't Read Yet... Because of the Kindle

Written by JBMoney Friday, 07 October 2011 14:38

Lately, I've been boxing up some books for a few reasons: to keep Fianna from destroying the nice hardbacks, to make room for other "stuff", and the expectation that we'll move soon and have to do so anyway.

In an indicator of how pampered modern life has become (not just me), I'm running across several books that I planned to read but never did... because I bought a Kindle roughly two years ago. With an ereader on hand, the prospect of prying open poorly binded books to read all the text comfortably, squinting at small type, or propping up a one-pound hardback for extended periods... sort of... lost its appeal.

In the past, students, researchers, clergy and others would travel far and wide for access to great libraries of books, risking their lives in the pursuit of knowledge. Comfort while reading was also a luxury few could afford... having to read large, poorly printed tomes by candlelight or worse... and good luck finding a worthy translation of some works. Many people in the world still face poor access to books. Yet, I was putting aside books because... they were inconvenient? Oof.

What's more, if I already own the book in print, I feel it a matter of principle to NOT buy an ereader version. I already bought the damn thing! The transition to ereaders has many in that boat, looking at library of books carefully collected over the years and thinking, "no way I'm paying to duplicate that digitally, however, if I happen to find them for free..." I'm with you on that one. Unfortunately, unless it was a bestseller, you probably won't be able to find a "pirated" copy.

After getting through a hundred or so books on the Kindle (Philip K Dick's almost complete works being the most recent), I am finally getting back to some of these bulky things laying about in piles on my desk and nightstand. For example:

Empire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic (1789-1815) and What Hath God Wrought: The Tranformation of America (1815-1848): Two huge books from the Oxford History of America. The first, The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution (1763-1789), was the last book I was reading when I acquired the Kindle. It is also the only book where I paid for a print and digital version. I was halfway through and wanted to finish, the book probably weighs a pound, so I sucked it up and paid twice for the same thing (the way I see it).

American Ceasar: Douglas MacArthur (William Manchester) - Manchester rocks!

The Inimitable Jeeves & Stiff Upper Lip Jeeves (P.G. Wodehouse) - Cody sent me these from Japan. I don't know where he got them but they must be some indication of the Japanese love of western culture. The lenghty Jeeves series started in the 1920's and has been brought to the small and big screen since. They are comedies and P.G. Wodehouse was a genius at capturing and satirizing upper-crust English culture at the end of the Empire's heyday.

20th Century Boys - A graphic novel from Japan, also from Cody. Very Japanese, in fact, I need to start reading it from the last page... or first.. ehh, what?

Voyaging Down The Thames (Clyde Eddy) - I have a yen for reading OLD travelogues. You know, back before there were a couple thousand travel blogs and TV shows, and when only the most priveleged could afford to travel anywhere except domestically. This book was written in 1938 by an American who went to England with some notepads and a camera, got himself a canoe and traced the entire route of the Thames. Interesting because he provides a detailed history of some of the most mundane sites (by our standards) through the ages... Celts, Romans, Danes, Normans,Saxons, etc. It's also a good peek at British life between the World Wars.

China Marches West: The Qing Conquest of Central Eurasia - One of many Chinese history books I have. Made it all the easier to skip the huge hardback.

The Great Shark Hunt (Hunter Thompson) - I think I only half finished this, but I'm not positive. Another big tome.

..and some other stuff that got packed away.

External Data Storage: a snapshot in time

Written by JBMoney Monday, 02 August 2010 00:00

I've been tossing out PC-related junk over the last year.... obsolete keybords, mice, cords, etc. Anyone who's worked with PC hardware over the years has tales of the unbelievably inadequate hardware they used to work with... at least by today's standards.

External Data storage is one the most easily quantifiable areas of change with which to bring home how far things have come. When I started playing with TRS-80s at school we had cassette tapes and 5 1/4 inch floppy drives. There were also 8 inch floppies around. After that, the 3.5 inch floppy reigned supreme for many years, mostly available with 1.4MB of storage. Eventually the re-recordable CD became the standard with 600MB or more, then re-recordable DVDs with 4GB (4000MB) or more, and now any number of USB & Firewire devices are cheaply available. For less than $30, I can now carry around 32GB on a drive no larger than my thumbnail.

There was a short point in time though (1999ish),  between the dominance of the 3.5 inch floppy and the re-recordable CD, where the next big thing was not so clear. There were a series of portable external drives that were quite popular. In fact, some PC manufacturers (like Dell) bet on the Iomega Zip drive and let folks configure new PCs with an internal version (I have one of these). 

Pictured here are three drives Buffy and I went through during that time, the Iomega Zip (100MB), the Syquest SyJet (scsi 1.5GB) and the Iomega Jaz (scsi 2GB).  I don't miss them or the two pounds of cabling and power cables that you needed to carry around with them.

The Original Dazed and Confused? Holmes sues Zeppelin.

Written by JBMoney Wednesday, 30 June 2010 00:00

Jake Holmes, an American Folk-Pop singer dating back to the 60's, is sueing Led Zeppelin. Holmes claims to have written Dazed and Confused. In fact, he released the song on his 1967 album. Also in 1967, Holmes played the song when opening for the Yardbirds in Greenwich village. Yardbirds being the group Jimmy Page was in before Zeppelin. Page has always taken credit as the sole songwriter on Dazed.

After a listen, it sounds like Holmes has a rock-solid case but  I can't imagine letting something like this eat at you for 40 years.... and it obviously had. Page commented on Holmes' grousing in a 1990 interview.

10 years and a life spent mostly in alcoholism and bitterness... maybe... I mean we've all been there right? But 40 YEARS!?!

If successfull, the statute of limitations restricts Homes from recovering anything except royalties for the last three years. Still a tidy sum... but probably a scrap of what he could have been due.

Personal Radar, July 2010

Written by JBMoney Tuesday, 29 June 2010 00:00

My Kindle Charging Station

Written by JBMoney Sunday, 30 May 2010 10:58