Founded 1983: Liberal Mindset; Conservative Morality

January 11, 2026

The Page Isn’t Dead, Your Attention Is Under Siege

Every few years we are invited to attend the same funeral. Someone declares that nobody reads anymore, that the printed page is finished, that books are an aging technology destined to become a museum object while the living culture migrates to earbuds and short video. It is a tempting story because it flatters our sense that we are witnessing a clean break with the past, a decisive turn of the wheel.

Continue reading → The Page Isn’t Dead, Your Attention Is Under Siege

January 28, 2010January 21, 2013

iPad or iPlop?

Yesterday’s announcement of the iPad left me feeling disappointed. There’s no built-in camera at all — let alone a forward-facing one for doing live iChats — and the thing doesn’t do voice and it doesn’t multitask and it doesn’t have a lot of storage. “An iPlop in the toilet bowl,” was my first thought in the flushing.

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July 23, 2009

Can Plastic Logic Free Us from Amazon Imprisonment?

I used to be a big fan of the Kindle — until the betraying release of the Kindle DX by Amazon a couple of months after my purchase of the Kindle 2.
What great news it was to read this week that Plastic Logic teamed up with Barnes and Noble and at&t to bring their eReader to life.

Continue reading → Can Plastic Logic Free Us from Amazon Imprisonment?

February 25, 2009

Killer Kindle 2 Review

A little over a year ago, I wrote my first Kindle review, and now it’s time for me to review the new Kindle 2 from Amazon. I am amazed at some of the lousy reviews I’ve read so far of the Kindle 2 — not that the authors don’t like the device, they do — but rather because it’s obvious they have never really used a Kindle every single day as part of their information dissemination system. I use my Kindle all day every day. I pay my own way buying Kindles and content. I apologize upfront for the awful iPhone 3G images of my Kindle — that’s the price we pay for quickness and speed in getting this review online. You can still tell the differences between the first Kindle and the Next Generation, though. The most obvious, and welcome, change in the Kindle 2 is the information bar is now at the top of the screen where it belongs so you can see, upfront, how your Whispernet internet signal is doing and the status of your battery! Images on the Kindle 2 are also deeper and richer than the first iteration.