Two years after doing a signing at truck stops for her highway-themed novel The Line Painter, author Claire Cameron decided to revisit the truck stops and ask whether truckers preferred paper or e-book versions of her book.
Spoiler: the truckers she spoke to unanimously preferred printed books.
At first it came as a bit of a surprise to me, considering how little room there is in a truck, which serves as its drivers’ home during long journeys on the road. The similarly-space-constrained Japanese have gone gadget-crazy, But on the other hand, most of the truckers she spoke to were of an older generation, and while many of those people are getting into Kindles, far more of them are not. And it’s easier for truckers to pass a paper book hand to hand to other truckers after they’ve read it, I guess.
” it’s easier for truckers to pass a paper book hand to hand to other truckers after they’ve read it, I guess.”
What a perfect and unintentionally damning indictment of the state of Ebook readers. In the 21st century it’s easier (thanks to defective by design junk hardware) to actually *drive* a hunk of paper thousands of miles and meet up at a truck stop to deliver it than it is to send the atoms whizzing over the ether to your friend so he can read your book.
Nice work guys, you’re officially screwing with our future.
Truckers can’t read on the go because their job requires them to keep their eyes on the road. I know, I’ve broken that rule twice in my life. In junior high, I tried to read while riding my bike home. I ended up sprawled across the hood of a car–fortunately one that was parked. Years later, I tried to read while driving across East Texas on I-20. It runs due east for miles and exits are far apart, so I thought I could read for maybe ten seconds, look up to check for traffic ahead, and read another ten seconds. That didn’t work. The book was good enough, I found myself flying down the highway for a mile or more without looking up. I abandoned that idea.
Truckers might be more interested in Kindles if they were shown its text-to-speech feature.
Truckers prefer paper ….. shock !
My brother is a truck driver. He is away from home Monday through Friday, and only comes home over the weekend. Obviously he has to sleep at some point, and they get government-mandated hours of downtime. He has a TV/DVD combo thing in his truck and a CB radio, of course. He likes to read but so far sticks with paper, though he’s interested by my devices. But they certainly do have downtime while on the road and are seeking entertainment during that time.