All Tech Considered on NPR
There has been plenty of buzz about eReaders at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES). There will even be an entire section of the Las Vegas Convention center dedicated to them.
But, I think the trick may be in the software.
………
One more tidbit I find exciting: When you buy a book you can store it online — in the cloud — and that will make it possible to access it from any Internet connected device that works with Blio. You can also download the books so you can read them when the Internet isn’t available. If you lose the device with your download, no worries. You have your own online locker and you can download them again. (If only the music business would follow along on this one.)
“The” future: Wrong at the start
Hey, THE present of radio is mindless repetitive top-40 programming. Or, to get fancier, THE present of talk radio is rightwing babble.
So where does that leave NPR?
Oh, wait, maybe there’s more than one possibility? Maybe “the future” for books could combine print books, pure-reading ebooks, multimedia devices and more?
Ah, but that’s a more complicated story…and we have Ray Kurzweil, who’s always right about everything, assuring us that we want the One Device to Rule Us All. So, you know, there it is.
[Note for irony-challenged readers: Look at Kurzweil’s general predictions and his track records, and note that I don’t use emoticons. Kurzweil’s done some great things, but that no more makes him a reliable futurist than Dean Kamen’s marvelous inventions made the Segway an overwhelming smash hit.]