Virtual library - the ebook takeover continues

I love libraries. It's impossible for me to run in, grab a book and leave because I get so caught up in... well in the books I guess. My sister actually refuses to go to the library with me if we have something to do after because I will lose her in the stacks of mysteries and YA and true crime books and.... I could go on all day.

There was even a campaign to save one of the two libraries in my town and I don't think I've ever gotten so riled up about something. It wasn't even the library I go to. The second library is closer to my house, bigger and all over better. But you know what? They weren't depriving the kids who were unfortunate enough to live on that side of town. Not on my watch!

There it is. In all it's glory.

Libraries are wonderful things and I've already bookmarked a significant portion of my millions that I'll get when I win the lottery to keeping them open.

Pop Quiz time!

What is one thing standing in the way of everyone who loves books purchasing an e-reader?
(Hint. It's all I've talked about so far)

You got it! It's libraries!

See, the economy is bad (obviously) and there are people who aren't willing to shell out money for every single book when they can just traipse on over to Kennedy and pick a free one off the shelf for two weeks. So the smart people over at Amazon just said, know what? Why the hell not?

Go ahead. Click the link. I'll wait.

I KNOW RIGHT?  Free books? For those of you who didn't want to read the Wired article by @tcarmody (follow him, he's great) Amazon is partnering up with libraries to offer book rentals. From what I understand, it's exactly like a library rental, you use your card and everything. Only catch is that you can do it from the overly crowded train that inexplicably stopped on the tracks due to "train traffic ahead of us" (Don't you guys schedule the trains so there is no traffic??).

It's still not going to be the same as a library, just like an ebook is never going to have the same feel as holding a physical book in your hands and turning the pages. But I'm glad to see that Amazon realized the importance of libraries and teamed up with them instead of stealing their thunder and releasing their own free model. I'm just hoping libraries are making money from this. I'll be really pissed if they all close down before I can give my giant donations once I win the lottery.

Also I love them. SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL LIBRARY

Welcome to the dark side, little bro

You are never too old to discover the magic of reading.

I love to read. I mean, I LOVE it. I always have. By the time I was eleven years old I had read every single Nancy Drew Mystery in my public library system. I say system because my town has two libraries and I devoured the books in both.

I. Loved. Nancy. Drew.

Unfortunately, my siblings did not share my enthusiasm for the written word. Luckily I was bigger and stronger at the time so they kept their puny little mouths shut. It took a few years, but my younger sister finally succumbed to my teachings, though she wasn't as into Nance and her powder blue convertible as I was. I'd take it. My brother... Well at this point I'd considered him a lost cause.

Then something magical happened.

One month and twenty four days shy of his seventeenth birthday, I come into my family's house and see my brother on the couch. At first I was confused. Where were the sounds of idiotic cartoons, fighting men, or other typical boy television? Why was it silent?

"Are you in trouble?" I immediately asked.

"Nope." 

I just stared at him as I noticed what was in his hand. Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone. Aka, a book.  A BOOK! HE WAS VOLUNTARILY READING A BOOK!

I tried to ask him what made him read it but I promptly got shushed before he went outside and posted up in my favorite reading spot on the deck (one that I claimed over a decade ago, thank you very much). 

It must have been a fluke, right? Just some weird mood that he was in.

Lo and behold, a few days later he comes into my room with a question that brought tears to my eyes: "Hey, can I borrow the second Harry Potter?"

Yes, Grasshopper. Yes you may.