Steven Johnson of The Wall Street Journal posted this article today on how the e-book might fundamentally change the process of reading and writing (therefore changing us). I disagree that Amazon’s Kindle will be what brings e-books mass acceptance. It reminds me of a BlackBerry. Too clunky and ugly. Plus there’s the DRM issue which will hopefully go the way of iTunes DRM. Remember, e-books have been around in one form or another for a while now and have so far managed to be far from revolutionary. That said, once you can combine a DRM-free Amazon with a better e-reader, like the one being developed by Plastic Logic (still not the ideal e-reader, in my opinion, but getting close), then I think we just might start seeing people carrying their libraries around with them… but, as Johnson suggests, it will be more than that:
Think of it as a permanent, global book club. As you read, you will know that at any given moment, a conversation is available about the paragraph or even sentence you are reading. Nobody will read alone anymore. Reading books will go from being a fundamentally private activity — a direct exchange between author and reader — to a community event, with every isolated paragraph the launching pad for a conversation with strangers around the world.