I want to follow up with the Kindle highlights. I’ve done some digging at Amazon and in Kindle forums. The highlights are “popular” highlights and to be a “popular” highlight and therefore appear on Kindles that have the view other reader’s highlights feature turned on, a passage must be highlighted at least three times. So there could be all kinds of other passages highlighted but they don’t show up because there are less than three readers who highlighted them. I suppose this makes sense because if all the highlights of readers appeared in popular books the entire book could potentially be highlighted.
That makes that one odd highlight even odder to me then. Before reader number four could highlight it, it had to have been highlighted by three other people independently. As one mystery is solved, another is created. Why did those first three people highlight that short, half-sentence?
I do feel better knowing that highlights start out as independent. I still wonder though if after they begin appearing in the book whether subsequent readers are more likely to highlight them.
On a side note, on the Kindle forum I was digging through, a large number of people were freaked out at the prospect of their highlights showing up in the books of others. One poster noted that personal information is not attached to one’s highlights making it not much different than if you had underlined passages in a print book and then sold it to a used bookstore. Nonetheless, there was so much freaking out about invasion of privacy that a vigorous debate broke out with several individuals very upset that Amazon looked over their shoulders while they read. But as one clear-headed person pointed out, if you didn’t read the privacy policy when buying your Kindle, it is your own fault and you have no right to be upset. While I agree, I also understand not reading the fine print. After all it is written in the most boring legalese that will put off all put the most intrepid or paranoid reader.
Enough of Kindle highlights. While we are on the topic of e-books, did you see the piece in the Guardian today with Jonathan Franzen warning that ebooks are corroding values? He pretty much says that serious readers only read print books. Guess I’m not a serious reader. It is clear that Franzen learned nothing from the Oprah debacle which means the most fun part about the article is the comments where the snark flies fast and furious. Enjoy.
I actually appreciate when I read a Kindle book that has a few passages highlighted. It makes me think more about the significance of the passage as I read. (Kinda the same way a book discussion group does). I always highlight tons of passages as well, so hope others are reacting in a similar fashion..LOL
I see his point, but come on. Lots of ways to read a book. I don’t think (I hope!!) print will ever die. I love real books. Sometimes you want the book, and sometimes you just want the words. I haven’t made the leap to an e-reader yet but I assume I will at some point. And I’m still a serious reader.
It’s baffling that so many people keep insisting on an either/or mentality when it comes to e-books and print books. Why can’t they coexist?
Diane, I like to see other people’s highlights too but I was noticing some strange things recently that made me want to know how the Kindle highlight sharing worked.
wherethereisjoy, when you eventually get that e-reader, your values will have been worn away and you will no longer be a serious reader
Nymeth, it is baffling isn’t it? i just don’t understand it either. Just when I think things are settling down, someone like Franzen comes along and says stupid things to stir it all up again.
Franzen’s yammering on about e-books doesn’t make much sense to me. Don’t get me wrong, I’d rather read a physical book, but my Kindle makes it possible for me to have something to read at all times. It’s a convenience. Like a microwave. I might not use the microwave to make Christmas dinner, but it’s nice to have when all I want to do is warm up soup. He’s being just a little too precious. P.S. I find the highlights feature on my Kindle annoying, so I turn it off. I’d rather write down a passage I like in a little journal I carry in my purse. (Oh, and I use a fountain pen…they aren’t dead either despite the roller ball and mechanical pencil).
Nobody has quibbles with audio books co-existing with paper books. Why the problem with e-books? (I’ve got my own now though admittedly I haven’t used it much yet. Plan to for trips, though! It only seems like an advantage.)
Much as ebooks don’t really appeal to me, I struggle to see how they will interfere with the system of justice and good self-government. Lol! Making grandiose claims for one’s argument is a certain route to undermining it.
Grad, it’s all yammering isn’t it? I like your microwave example. And you and I have to talk about fountain pens sometime. I have several that range from a glass dipping pen to my workhorse of a Parker Sonnet. I also have enough bottles of ink to last me a lifetime but I am always looking for a new and interesting color!
Jeane, Franzen doesn’t make much sense in his argument. He writes his books on a computer and though he keeps it unplugged from the internet while writing, he doesn’t complain computers have ruined reading. He just lives in his own little world.
Litlove, it’s a weird argument, isn’t it? At first I thought he must be joking but he’s not so I’ve concluded he is somehow completely clueless.
I agree with the yammering viewpoint too … get over it I say. I don’t agree that literature is somehow fixed on a static page. After all, it started as an oral tradition didn’t it? Lovers of literature will I think follow the changes as they come – at different paces perhaps – but follow it we will.
I do however like his closing sentence: “Seriously, the world is changing so quickly that if you had any more than 80 years of change I don’t see how you could stand it psychologically.” That’s a bit overly dramatic perhaps, but keeping up is certainly a challenge.
whisperinggums, exactly! I don’t know what Franzen or anyone else who claims ebooks will ruin reading and literature are trying to accomplish other than setting themselves up as being somehow better because they don’t read ebooks. If you are an author, that is no way to win fans. While his final sentence is full of hyperbole, I agree the pace of change is difficult to keep up with. I bet every generation feels that way to a certain extent though. I mean can you imagine what it must have been like to get electricity and then a telephone and then cars and radios and moving pictures and then talking pictures?
I read the JF article. He has a real knack for creating controversy, doesn’t he. I can’t decide whether to admire him for not giving in to new trends or think he is hopelessly behind the times. You’d think there would be a way to keep working how he likes to yet allowing for new ways of doing things and new medias.
Danielle, somehow I got the impression that he spends too much time in his own little world and doesn’t consider that there are other people who might think differently about things than he does. Plus he lacks tact. I try to keep the writer separate from the book but with Franzen it is getting more and more difficult.