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1. 

   firedome said, about 23 hours ago

   not in today’s world, it ain’t…
2. 

   KenTheCoffinDweller said, about 23 hours ago

   My biggest problem with books today is they have lost the ability to transport me to wherever I’m reading about so that I can watch the action first hand. Books sure have degraded over the last nearly 60 years.
3. 

   Nabuquduriuzhur said, about 21 hours ago

   re: the big publishers sure have. I quit reading fiction when it became formulaic in the 1990s. But we still have more than 3000 new books published per day. You just won’t find them in bookstores.
   .
   I was actually told by one publisher that I needed to rewrite a book to the 6th grade level, despite books at that level generally not doing well. No one would have bought it if I had.
   .
   20 years ago, most publishers had staffs who would go through the manuscripts submitted by writers, looking for what they thought might sell. Most would publish what they wanted to see in a book. They would do a test market of a book and if it sold well, they would do another run and sell it nationally. Then they went to the agent system, which meant that good manuscripts would never reach them.
   .
   The sad fact is that agents don’t seem to know a good book from a bad one. Today, you take your livelihood in your hands by trying to find an agent because many are dishonest. Indeed, there isn’t much point in an agent today.
   .
   Most writers today publish their own. The downside is they don’t have an organization that advertises the books. The upside is that one generally doesn’t see the mediocre trash put out by the large publishers.
   .
   A writer is much better off taking business law and learning how to sell his/her books than to mess with the dying large publishing industry. It wasn’t long ago that the industry wanted to do away with royalties. The idea of paying a writer for his/her work is just about gone.
4. 

   purpledog39 said, about 19 hours ago

   Like they say about Linux, it is user friendly, but it’s choosy about who its friends are.
5. 

   masterskrain said, about 17 hours ago

   Wow.
   R.J. sounds like a huge percentage of the kids under 18 nowadays… it’s sad, so sad!
6. 

   russell5419 said, about 17 hours ago

   Books Rock !! I have the kindle light made only for reading and I can’t put it down, reading is so much better than seeing the movie, there is just no comparison between the two, reading takes you on a journey and watching it on tv makes your brain lazy.
7. 

   kea said, about 17 hours ago

   I like books and slide rules – neither is ever unusable due to dead batteries
8. 

   TheTrustedMechanic said, about 16 hours ago

   @Nabuquduriuzhur

   “… it became formulaic in the 1990s. But we still have more than 3000 new books published per day. You just won’t find them in bookstores. "
   Too bad it seems that 2999 of those books are memoirs. From truly great people who did sincerely great things for all of humanity I can see a memoir. But every Tom, Dick and Harry, Jill, Jane and Mardi, really? The medical professional who wrote about her awareness during her stroke, yeah that might be interesting, but I would think more so in a clinical setting, not a table top read. Has this “everybody’s special” mentality really gotten that far? Yeah, everybody is special in their own way, to their own circle, but nationwide memoir? Nah, not worth my money or my time.
   .
   But nonetheless, thank you for your assessment of the literary world. I enjoyed reading your insight.
9. 

   TheTrustedMechanic said, about 16 hours ago

   @kea

   Not to mention undamaged by spilled morning coffee or afternoon tea, or evening warm milk.
10. 

    bubbareb said, about 15 hours ago

    My granddaughter has a friend where everyone in that family is “connected”. There isn’t a book in the entire house except for the telephone directory, and they use that as a mat for a potted plant. I don’t think any of them have actually talked to each other in years. Even the three year old has a smart phone, a device which will be one heck of a lot smarter than that child will ever be.

    Now educators are even discussing the merits of whether or not to teach kids to write. What the hell do they think is going to happen when the aliens show up and blast all of the satellites out of the sky?
11. 

    ypoons7666 said, about 15 hours ago

    @bubbareb

    Good story – but you lost me with that last line.
    I’m open-minded and fully acknowledge the possibility of what you ask in the final line of your comments. But, I think it far more likely that the enemies of our western culture will blast the satellites out of the sky … The dependency that is evolving is shocking an’ very disturbing…your comment that “the smart phone is smarter than the three year old will every be” is spot on…
    We are training our brains to be slaves of the electronic culture, an’ we are not teaching our children to know how to acquire information an’ knowledge other than to “Google it.”
    If the devices suddenly stop working (i.e., their vast supporting network is crippled), our society will be as helpless as babies in a nursery with the lights out…
    It’s a frightening realization, but largely being ignored. But ask yourself, dear reader, how helpless do you feel when the power goes out unexpectedly, especially during the night? Self-reliance is a dying characteristic…
12. 

    DutchUncle said, about 14 hours ago

    Did the books become formulaic, or did your growing personal experience and wider familiarity with literature give you more things to compare against? My son used to think the Animaniacs were the newest thing, so I made him watch every Marx Brothers movie I could find. After he got over the shock of a movie in black and white, he realized why I saw the Animaniacs as derivative – clever derivative, good derivative, but still derivative.

    Technology changes, contexts change, but when it comes to human nature, there is nothing new under the sun. (And yes, multiple people have said that, too.)
13. 

    JR6019 said, about 13 hours ago

    God love the Marx Brothers! They were just great. Even as a child, I liked the stooges, but loved the Marx Brothers. The Stooges had great physical comedy, but the Marx Brothers had subversive wit, wild inventiveness, verbal wit, and a Harp! And a piano (gotta love Chico).
14. 

    Veteran said, about 13 hours ago

    @DutchUncle

    You got that right.
    I was listening to some old 60’s “acid” rock on my CD. Two kids thought it was some new group. What is old will soon be new. Mod clothing once all the rage is slowly making a come back. My old green Nehru jacket will soon be back in style.
    Now if I could just get it back on!!!!!
15. 

    Veteran said, about 13 hours ago

    @ypoons7666

    When the lights go out I fall back on an old saying.
    When it is dark, light a candle.
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