Printed Books vs Screen Reading

Hooray!

Time to celebrate: after some resistance, I’ve finally finished reading my first digital book and am reading a second one already!

For me it’s definitely an improvement, a step forward, which has taken place because I had no more physical books to read and love reading in bed. It was, therefore, a kind of last resort but, ok, I’m glad it happened and now I feel it was just a question of time. Besides it wasn’t that bad really.

As you all know, I am a huge fan of Gutenberg and his invention and am going to let him down. I don’t even own an e-reader (and don’t plan to buy one!) and the digital reading I’ve been doing is free. I’m not ready to pay for a digital file, a “book”, I can’t actually touch – at least not yet. What I did was therefore look for public domain ebooks across different platforms (some tips and links here and here from slide 34 onwards), chose the format and downloaded 2 ebooks I've been meaning to read for ages. Right now, I'm proud to "announce" that I've managed to read The Secret Garden from cover to cover, and am reading Room with a View .

I can't deny I' enjoying it. I am! At night, when when my eyes feel strained, I change to font size 36, the brightness of the monitor and / or lettering and keep reading for some more time. What about you, have you had a similar experience?

Though much has already been said about screen and paper reading, I’d like to butt in too once I’ve just had the experience. Quite clearly, both have advantages and disadvantages and ultimately it’s up to each one of us to evaluate our needs and decide.

Here is what I’ve come up with. I’m sure I haven’t covered all aspects and that’s exactly why I would like to ask for your contributions with comments. 

Please consider audiobooks, for example, from here, this link, and/or a recent publication by UNESCO "Reading in the mobile era" you can download  http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0022/002274/227436e.pdf 

Thank you!
Happy holidays and happy readings, too.

Read... DRACULA

Today's Google Doodle celebrates Bram Stoker's 165th birthday, the Irish author best known for his vampiric creation, the gothic novel Dracula.
As I have often suggested in former blogposts, one doesn't need to spend money to read - that can only be considered an excuse (and a bad one) once there are different sites where you can get ebooks as these - public domain - legally and freely.
Again and again, Project Gutenberg offers over 40,00 ebooks you can download and here is Dracula, by Bram Stoker: 1. Choose format 2. click on download link 3. Done!!! You can read it any time anywhere.
Another possibility is http://dailylit.com/, a fantastic website I haven't mentioned before, where you can get installments of books and decide HOW, WHEN and WHERE to receive them! You browse books (by title, author, category) or enter search terms. In this case, Dracula is entirely free and has 176 installments - click here to check it and try it out for yourself! Weekend is coming, why not choose to start reading an installment on Saturday evening and another one on Sunday? Register and decide whether to receive these 176 short installments by email or RSS, the days you feel you can / want to read, the time... everything really is in (y)our hands. Have a go and let me know.
Happy Reading :=)

eBooks for Holidays

SOURCE: goodreads.com

It’s no secret I’m all for the printed word, for real books both for academic and recreational readings – they don’t need electricity, I can freely underline, mark… However, I have to admit that digital books also have advantages and, right now, besides the environmental issue, the economic reasons top my list (and maybe yours as well!). Having said that and taking into account that what really matters is that we / our kids / our students read and not how we / they do it, why not share some links so that we all read something during the summer break?

So, with no excuses, read free and legal ebooks anywhere, any time.

Try these links and choose for yourselves:

http://www.planetebook.com/ - the home of free classic literature

http://www.intechopen.com/books - over 1800 scientific books

http://www.openculture.com/free_textbooks - all the 150 books can be viewed for free and most can be downloaded for free as well. The titles in the collection are appropriate as supplemental books, more for mathematics and science than for the humanities.

http://books.google.com/advanced_book_search - google hosts thousands of books that are in the public domain; many of them can be viewed and downloaded in their entirety for free.

http://www.gutenberg.org/ - Project Gutenberg has over 40,000 free ebooks in English and there are also over 500 in Portuguese at http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/PT_Principal check Os Lusiadas at http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/27236  

The next one is also a very good source for ebooks in English or in Portuguese

http://www.dominiopublico.gov.br/pesquisa/PesquisaObraForm.jsp and at  http://www.dominiopublico.gov.br/download/texto/pe000004.pdf  - you can check Mensagem de Fernando Pessoa

Strange enough is this link http://purl.pt/index/geral/aut/PT/index.html  but worth visiting, Biblioteca Nacional Digital, from where one can also download Mensagem, de Fernando Pessoa http://purl.pt/13966
Besides the titles already mentioned above that many of our sts will need to read for next schoolyear, check the next link where you can find 1900 free and legal ebooks - by Portuguese authors as well as, among others, some plays by W. Shakespeare but in Portuguese:
http://utilnet.blogspot.pt/2009/03/1990-livros-para-download-gratuito.html 

For those who for any reason don't / can't read, don't give up, because there are audiobooks! Please check AudioLiterate where you can select either from the featured audiobooks or by category. Just stream it; it's free!

Well? Any suggestions?

There are many more, but the ones above have just been checked thinking about the holidays as well as a kind of preparation for next school year :D

I’m sure we all want our students to read. According to them, in the age of digital devices, books are old fashioned, outdated and some may even fear being teased by their peers. Why not give or send them links for free (and legal) ebooks they can read on their smartphones / tablets / PCs?

Enjoy… Enjoy your holidays and your Readings!