When I was a child I felt odd when visiting a friend's house if there were no books on the shelves, as well as the books being missing I wondered if their education was missing. I felt much happier in places where the walls were lined with books. Particularly notable were the places where video cassettes adorned the walls, I never really knew what to make of that - did they just watch the TV screen all day?
Nowadays I don't have books on shelves at all, whatsoever, under any circumstances. The books I have to buy because they are not available in a digital format tend to be really good and I end up giving them away, for them to not need to be returned. I really do not see a long term future for printed books, there is no need for them, except in museum-libraries.
What would be cool is if you could buy books for people in a digital format on a 'sale or return basis'. They would get the book from you, then, if they actually read past the first few pages, your account get charged. In this way you could give out books to people for birthdays, Christmas and so on without them feeling obliged to read through whatever it is that you have sent them. Equally you could be more generous with gifting as there would be a fair likelihood that some of the books gifted would not be read.
Nowadays I don't have books on shelves at all, whatsoever, under any circumstances. The books I have to buy because they are not available in a digital format tend to be really good and I end up giving them away, for them to not need to be returned. I really do not see a long term future for printed books, there is no need for them, except in museum-libraries.
What would be cool is if you could buy books for people in a digital format on a 'sale or return basis'. They would get the book from you, then, if they actually read past the first few pages, your account get charged. In this way you could give out books to people for birthdays, Christmas and so on without them feeling obliged to read through whatever it is that you have sent them. Equally you could be more generous with gifting as there would be a fair likelihood that some of the books gifted would not be read.