No matter where you may look on campus you will see people reading. No surprise there, correct? But it is what they are reading, or more to the point, how they are reading that surprises some of us. You are just as apt to see people gazing into the screen of an electronic device, perhaps a lap top computer,
as rustling through the pages of a paper newspaper.
Older students, like myself, who have only known paper books in the past, may find this new way of reading… difficult or perhaps challenging. But for anyone who grew up with computers, laptops, and now electronic tablets as nearly all of today’s students have the choice is becoming obvious–they’d rather go digital.
But what will the digital books of the future look like? Will they be as they are now, stripped down to only words in most cases, and thrust upon a screen or will they be more interactive? Will they become an entirely new way to gain information?
When this happens will we lose all of those wonderful things called books, with paper pages, torn, dog-eared, and with covers worn from many readings? Will they only be found in museums to turn to dust? This writer hopes they are not lost to future generations… not to lose that feel of a wonder in your hands, to touch, to feel, to learn, but most of all I think, to dream.