Saturday, August 25, 2007

The Smell of Things to Come?

We were talking about ebooks, the other day, and many of you commented that one of the reasons you couldn't see yourself buying them is that you enjoy the physical presence of a "real" book - the weight and feel of it in your hands ... and above all, the smell.

Now this particular technological glitch has been overcome, Reuters announced on Wednesday (discovered via this post from Galley Cat).

Cafe Scribe, a website supplying academic e-books, surveyed 600 college students and found that 43 percent of students identified smell, either a new or old smell, as the quality they most liked about books as physical objects.

Now the company is sending out to every e-textbook purchaser a scratch and sniff sticker with a musty "old book" smell which they can stick to their computer monitors.

This could be the way forward!

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ya.... I will go for smell also. e-book not a thing for me :P

I'm more confuse now, is it ALL kind of research already done??? Book smell research also done already?!

bibliobibuli said...

that book smell research is done. but i think it might be fun to conduct our own!!

Anonymous said...

Well.. I don't do ebooks because I can't read it in bed, while waiting for the bus or whatever, it's not portable. Until that's fixed, there'll be no ebooks for me :) I think eventually books will be a luxury and cost a lot (same as really old books now) and ebooks will be the only things the hoi polloi will be able to afford. One day no one will make books (cos they're expensive) and then the smell and feel and portability will command a premium. Just look at the so many things that were once commonplace but now cost a lot -- carriages, suits, gaslights... :)

Anonymous said...

great, now that's something to pack with the survival gear.

Matthew da Silva said...

Silly, silly, silly, silly.

Saw Die Hard 4 last night. It's got tons of geeks. One's tag is 'Warlock' (!!!!!!).

So nineties...

Anonymous said...

But Dean, didn't Die Hard just blow you away.......be any part of it so nineties or not?

Matthew da Silva said...

Actually, it was a gas. I really loved the nasty 'French' guy who whipped around like an east-African spider money on steroids and ended up sliced and diced in an industrial air-conditioner.