Now we shall talk of many things

..no longer talks of many things.

1/18/2005

bookflix

No blog tonight, working on the template and watching an old Clint Eastwood movie. To mend this terrible wrong, I offer sacrifice. A site, netflix.com for books. 40 thousand titles, free shipping, and you keep the books till you're done. The cheapest plan they have is a 7.99 monthly fee and lets you have two books out at a time.

Interesting, but books should be pored over, examined slowly. You should read them through and then leave them around to poke your mind every once in a while, then come back to them in a few weeks to see what you missed. That's why I don't like libraries, you have to take them back. Bookflix doesn't change my opinion much; even if I get to keep them as long as I want, I still end up paying 8 dollars a month for it. If I'm going to keep it for a month or two, I might as well buy the thing.

With movies I don't care. For an hour or two you get a nice, self contained set of ideas with a predetermined ending. All you have to do is go along for the ride; boo the villain, cheer the hero, ogle the heroine. Simple, and then you get to walk away. Marx was wrong, movies are the opium.

Books are different though, at least the ones I read. They're meant to fit into the way the world is, serve as a holding place for information -- always offering a different perspective.

Still, the site will probably succeed, judging by the crap stuff people are reading for quick fun. Anyway, that was a bit more than I planned to write.

posted by john at 1/18/2005 05:19:00 PM | 0 Comments | |

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