The Shrine

viewtopic.php?t=10455 (the old thread)

This was something I speculated back in May with the release of brain age (which has a literary reading section). Here we are 6 months later with this now becoming a reality.

"The Genesis of the Shadow is the first of the titles to be released, hitting download services on the 27th of November, and is a prequel novella to The Lord of Darkness and Shadow. At least three more titles are in the pipeline, including Two Wizards: A Chronicle of the Shadow Prequel, Xevicom Forever (a graphic novel) and a yet unnamed title. Expect these to hit your console of choice over the next few months."

-IGN

Although this is not much to begin with, it is a good start. I was looking towards something more along the lines of classic literary works such as the works of Orwell, Tolkien, Godwin, Nietzsche, and many others (even guys like Pope, Coleridge, Rosetti, etc...). I am interested to see where this goes next. It would be quite convenient having a bunch of my favourite books on little DS cards or flash memory, and not have to worry about lugging around the actual books. With the DS touch screen, navigation through these books can be quite simplistic.

eBooks and eReaders have never really taken off, but maybe because it is pointless to carry around an electronic device dedicated to books when you could just carry a book... a video game system and eReader is interesting, but i dont think i'll ever not carry a paperback around.

Yeah, unless they get to be as sweet as the kind from Star Trek, I'm not sure they'll take off.

Still, there's something nice about flipping through a real book, moving the pages, etc, that you just can't duplicate digitally.

They may be unpopular right now because portable devices may have not yet reached the general reading public. Either way, this might be a good test to see how interested people are.

What do you think about encyclopedias?

How I am thinking is that you could fit a DS Lite with Lord of the Rings, and a number of other books into your pocket, but this can't be done with traditional books as they are both too fragile and too bulky.

Palm organizers have had e-readers for years and those are probably even more popular than gaming devices... especially for travelling professionals who could benefit from a book. I just think it will never be popular.