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By David Rothman

imageNot so coincidentally, the guy behind The E-book Skeptic site is co-owner of The Regulator Bookshop in Durham, North Carolina. His name is Tom Campell, and actually he makes some great points—citing, for example, the Kindle fiasco at Princeton University.

Look, I’ve been talking up e-books since the early 1990s and yet I myself would shudder at the prospect of using current Kindles as textbook replacements. The low contrast of the E Ink would interfere with my absorption of the material, even if I didn’t suffer from Robert Kingett’s vision problems. I’d also hate the ability not to print out material of special interest to me. To give another example, I remain disappointed at the valuable Project Gutenberg’s techno-snobbery toward Kindle owners—at PG’s failure so far to accommodate Kindle-weak browsers on its main site. Words before tech!

imagePoint is, there’s a big difference between being an Alan Kaufman—comparing e-books to book-burning—and raising some reasonable questions. In many ways I’m a skeptic.

Encouragingly, albeit a skeptic, Campbell is at least open-minded enough to point to IndieBound’s eBook offerings. While I don’t agree with Campbell’s big conclusion—I myself think that e-book tech can improve comprehension, if you adjust to the needs of individual users and give them up-to-date hardware which they like—he’s a long way from a Lud as you’ll see if you drop by his well-done bookstore site.

Image credit: Creative Commons-licensed photo from Nickd.

Update, 8:19 a.m.—about Project Gutenberg: PG founder Michael Hart has attacked me and others calling for the PG site to accommodate Kindle-style devices better than it does now.  A more reasonable statement has just come from his CEO, Greg Newby, who notes plans for improving the site. The problem is priorities. When Michael angrily disses dedicated e-readers, that is not exactly the way to fire up volunteers for the job. I’m going to ask Greg and his Webmaster, Marcello Perathoner—a hero to me for including the ePub format as a PG-site downloading option—about the exact skill sets they want for a site upgrade that could help Kindle owners and other stuck with puny browsers, including cellphone users. Then I can help spread the word about the precise needs.

(Big thanks to Donald Smith, Apple Distinguished educator and TeleRead community member, for the pointer to the Skeptic site.)

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