The Changing Face of Reading

[Aberzanzorax]

I think he means that his fingers know where in this stack of pages the needed info sticks. Add in the traces of wear in the binding and you're able to quickly find the wanted page even in a 300-pages book.

Exactly.

 

[Aus_Snow]

I don't think that catering to / encouraging the (arguably) current trend of attention spans becoming more gnat-like year by year, could ever be considered a good thing. Or, more to the point, it shouldn't be.

As for digital book formats, see here if you are in any doubt regarding the way of not only the future, but the present too. And this is only the beginning, truly.

Bite-size chunks, though? Eh. Leave those where they should be, thanks all the same.

And who says people are walking away from TTRPGs anyway? Evidence, please. If none can be provided, I'll continue my disbelief, kthx.

 

[tenkar]

I don't think that catering to / encouraging the (arguably) current trend of attention spans becoming more gnat-like year by year, could ever be considered a good thing. Or, more to the point, it shouldn't be.

I don't see that being argued at all. Trying to find different / more efficient uses of the electronic medium is a good thing. Maybe 99% of the attempted changes are major fails, but that 1% could change the world of digital publishing.

Again, just using electronic media to replicate printed media is a huge waste of potential.

 

[ThirdWizard]

I don't think that catering to / encouraging the (arguably) current trend of attention spans becoming more gnat-like year by year, could ever be considered a good thing. Or, more to the point, it shouldn't be.

Think of it less as reading and more as disseminating information. Text Book approach is becoming outdated as link and sorting based information availability are faster and more easily used. How we learn can become more streamlined.

 

[Krensky]

Again, just using electronic media to replicate printed media is a huge waste of potential.

So was continuing to use the QWERTY keyboard layout after the demise of upswing printarm typewriters.

Yet everyone still uses it.

 

[tenkar]

keyword is "just".

Sure, use electronic media to replicate print, but also push it further from that.

Have your cake and eat it too

 

[GregChristopher]

Kerensky, that's bs and you know it. Qwerty is a physical technology, thus serving as a boundary to change purely as an issue of fixed implementation. Nobody has to give up their poorly designed PDFs to get better ones, you would have to physically change keyboards.

False analogy

 

[Viking Bastard]

I don't think delivering crunch electronically is difficult. Video games (especially CRPGs/MMORPGs) have already explored how to present mechanical options and such to players.

I think the big problem is fluff. How do you weave in fluff?

 

[GregChristopher]

I don't think delivering crunch electronically is difficult. Video games (especially CRPGs/MMORPGs) have already explored how to present mechanical options and such to players.

I think the big problem is fluff. How do you weave in fluff?

Could you take a page from the Elder Scrolls folks and just build it into the gameplay?

 

[Krensky]

Kerensky, that's bs and you know it. Qwerty is a physical technology, thus serving as a boundary to change purely as an issue of fixed implementation. Nobody has to give up their poorly designed PDFs to get better ones, you would have to physically change keyboards.

False analogy

No, there hasn't been a meaningful physical barrier to abandoning QWERTY since, oh, the IBM Selectric typewriter and it's imitators replaced swing arm hammers with balls, daisy wheels, dot matrixes, etc. Doubly so since computers replaced typewriters.

If you want to use another keyboard layout, it's a software and labeling change.

The barrier to changing is the same as in PDF production. People who do it day in and day out know method X and see nothing wrong with method X, and changing to method Y would require an investment in time and effort they don't consider worth it.

But thank you for playing.