The Kindle War: …Or Not to Buy

By RACHEL BOLTON
Staff Writer

A companion article to The Kindle War: To Buy

I could never forget the first time I read a book out loud to my family at bed time. It was a Bert and Ernie book that I had been read to for years. But this time, I was the one reading. I remember the feeling of magic as I was able to recognize the words on the page and was able to say them correctly. I remember finishing Louis Sachar’s Holes in third grade and being proud of the fact that I had read such a large book. I remember at the age of eight finally getting my hands on a copy of the popular book, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone.  I remember all the times my Mom took my sister and I to the library. I loved exploring the shelves and finding a new book to read.

These are some of my fondest literary memories. All of them would have been very different if someone had handed me a Kindle instead of a “Flesh and Blood” book. I will be honest, I do not like Kindles, Nooks, or e-Readers; and for the sake of simplicity, I will be referring to them as a Kindle. I know that many people find them convenient to use, but I feel that there is something big missing from them. Gone is the excitement of getting a new book in your hands and flipping through it. Gone is the happiness you get from looking at your full bookshelves.

I have used one before; I try not to hate on something without experiencing it first. I read a book on my aunt’s kindle. It worked well for me and I was able to read the story without any issues, but the experience did not win me over. I do not need another piece of technology to carry around with me. I already have to worry about losing or damaging my cell phone, iPod, and laptop. Books should be the least of my worries. If I lose a book, it’s sad, but they are easy and cheap to replace. If you lose a kindle, there goes well over a hundred dollars.

I think the convenience of a Kindle is greatly exaggerated. They have a large memory space, but who needs to have 2,000 books at their disposal? Nobody reads that many books at once, so why dream of carrying them around with you? I do not mind carrying a book around in my bag to read. They do not run out of battery life and need to be recharged.

One of the issues that I have with the Kindle is that it could turn into a money pit. After purchasing a Kindle, which costs over a hundred dollars, you have to spend money to fill your digital library. If you have a Kindle, what is the point of buying physical books? To further your investment, you buy digital books. Before you know it, you have spent another hundred dollars. Instead of accumulating books over your lifetime, a person would have to buy digital copies of all their old favorites in order to have them in the Kindle.

I do not want to ever own a Kindle and I would not use one if a friend or family member got me one. I do not have the personality type for a digital book. I love sitting around with a book and a cup of tea. I would miss the adventure of searching for a book in a library or bookstore. I love the feeling of being surrounded by shelves of physical books. The internet cannot recreate that environment.

In my opinion, the people who should own a Kindles are they traveling types. If you are traveling for great lengths of time and live out of a suitcase, get a Kindle. You do not have the room to have a lot of books. But for everyone else, stick with books. They have been around for hundreds of years. They are hard to improve upon. To me, books have been an escape, a friend, and a source for insight and inspiration. I would never abandon them for a slab of plastic.