This year I read a lot in print, less so digitally, listened to a lot of radio:
- Lived without cable internet at home for a while. Tethered instead, before I broke my phone.
- Read articles using Instapaper on the Kindle. Maybe five times.
- Subscribed to the New York Times, Sunday edition. Read the Magazine front-to-back, devoured Style’s Modern Love, laughed along Christoph Niemann, followed Mark Bittman recipes, discovered Business’ Gretchen Morgenson and continued reading the columnist regulars. And you can’t forget the Style Wedding section. My favorite as of late has been the new “It’s the Economy” series by Adam Davidson.
- I continued to subscribe to McSweeney’s, The Believer and GOOD. I’m not sure if I’ll re-subscribe though.
- I still check
- Read over twenty books, almost all from the local libraries or my Dad’s shelf.
- Rented a few e-books from the library using OverDrive, just for the heck of it. I didn’t actually read them on the Kindle though. The page turns are just too much.
- I started driving to work, so I started listening to NPR every day, too. Almost like a ritual. I support my local NPR affiliate too.
- I stopped downloading any music (or anything really) illegally. It’s hard to admit, but it seemed to be the de facto standard in school. But when you work in a creative industry that relies on paying subscribers, it doesn’t really make sense.
- I know the schedules of two local public radio stations by heart. That’s how often I listen, not just for news but music too. I hardly ever use iTunes anymore.
On reading books
A family friend gave me a Kindle as a graduation and employment present. I would’ve never gotten one otherwise. To be honest, in school, I only read required assignments and whatever was freshest on Google Reader. Why would I need a Kindle, when required texts weren’t available on ePub anyway?
This year, my first full year out of school, I started reading for fun. I hadn’t done so since high school summers before even required A.P. summer books. Some of my friends were unknowingly huge encouragements and the local library, the biggest enabler. Books aren’t always cheap, collect dust and can be pretty heavy for someone who has moved five times in two years. For that reason, libraries and eBooks are perfect for me.
Next year, I’ll continue to read books, mostly from the library. I always have a few books on hold. (Is that not the best service?) If/when I get a new smartphone though, I’d imagine I’d read books there, too.
On reading foreign languages
I didn’t read a Japanese novel or a Spanish book this year, though I’d like to next year. I’m lucky enough to live near a library with Japanese and Spanish books (and even comics), and used bookstores too. But in a digital-reading world, I’m convinced we could better serve multilingual, multicultural readers.
For anyone who’s learned Japanese, they know it’s possible to not know enough about a word or phrase, to even look it up in the dictionary. A Kindle or iPad feature could:
- Read the phrase for you, aloud. Kindle has this for English. How much would that help learning pronunciation?
- Look up the word, within the app. Allow you to save that word in a vocabulary list.
- For Japanese, automatically show all furagana
- Read side-by-side page translations. If you’ve ever read poetry in translation, the book probably had English on one side, original language on the other.
From the perspective of an English-reading American, it’s easy to think that tech (and now media) companies like Amazon, Apple, Google, Netflix are drastically replacing book stores, record shops and Blockbusters. But it’s really only in the English-language market for now. Kindle is not available in Japan. Sure, iTunes has a store of Japanese music, but only accessible with those with Japanese credit cards.
It’s not easy for someone like Amazon or Spotify to expand into a new countries – disrupting not just the market, but the dominance of publishers, the long-established habits of off-line reading (and in Japan, reading in bookstore aisles). Not to mention a new language and culture.
I’d like to see in the future, even next year, though, not just a digitized English and American media library and market, but an international one. I’d like to see mobile and tablet apps that help multilingual language learners read and build their language skills.
On reading magazines, newspapers online
I subscribe to a newspaper and three magazines in print. After reading them, I carefully pile them up and archive them in my closet – which of course, is not infinitely big enough to sustain my publication-pack rat tendencies. I very seriously considered getting an iPad, so I could subscribe to more papers, fewer physical space and trees necessary. Is it cheaper though? Or even the same price?
In the case of the New York Times, it’s still cheaper to get the Sunday edition (with free digital subscription) than just the digital subscription. Same with The New Yorker. Of course it makes no sense when publications charge nothing for most readers online, yet charge their iPad readers even more than their print readers. Logical.
I don’t know if I’ll be persuaded enough to buy an iPad next year. Maybe if I commuted by train, bus or any other way that allowed me to read-on-the-go. Maybe if magazines come up with better iPad subscription pricing.
On supporting artists, writers, shows you love
If you want your favorite band, television show, etc. to thrive, survive and not get cancelled or “sell out” – why do it? Why? That’s how I feel about it nowadays. In a similar vein, that’s how I feel about subscribing to the dead trees that arrive on my doorstep every Sunday.
Non sequitur
I don’t have a television or even want one. But I still fancy a projector with a surround-sound speaker system. Then you’d really never need to go to the theater.
If you want to sell back your books, magazines, CDs or DVDs for the greatest monetary return, the best place in Southern California is Book Off, a popular Japanese used media store. Otherwise, I’d suggest Libros Schmibros or your local library book sale store.
