ENTERTAINMENT

Books vs. Computers

By Joanna, age 20, South Wales, United Kingdom
Sweet Designs Featured Writer


Featured Gold Star Writer Bio

So, this is the new-age millennium, where we are supposedly more technologically advanced than ever. That's supposed to be brilliant. Computers can think like us, spell for us, and do all kinds of things that make our lives easier, and that's got to be great. Hasn't it?

Call me old fashioned, but I don't believe that it has to be or is such a great thing after all. I'm a firm believer in old-fashioned pen and paper, real books that you can hold in your hand, and other such things that are now considered to be from centuries past.

What's so good about the old ways that I treasure? Well, take pen and paper as my first example. Whilst typing is efficient, especially if you can do it without looking at your keyboard which most people nowadays can, but pen and paper is much more personal and individual. It has a character that I feel is lost when converted to technology. No two individuals hold their pens in exactly the same way, and no two individual's script looks exactly the same. We lose part of our identities, that which defines us, when all we know of our words are typed letters, the formation of which we have no control over.

My argument for tangible books is similar. You can take a book anywhere with you, and whilst it can be argued that yes, a laptop can also be transported, the convenience of a book is a very strong counter argument. Think of holidays spent by the pool with a book, holidays spent with your little brother or your best friend or lover splashing you from the pool. With a book, it will live through this, but a laptop may not.

Another reason that draws me to books is the way they look. I know, I know, "don't judge a book by its cover," but we all do, don't we? No one picks an ugly looking book from a shelf and decides to spend their next week delving in to its pages. People look for interesting books, books whose spines excite them, and without a spine, that attraction is lost. That extra facet to the personality of the book is lost; as is the way the book feels in your hand and the smell of the book.

I buy most of my books second hand and I often wonder what journey they have been on, whose hands last held them, and what mind the story last went into. I believe that books can be influential and even sometimes life changing, or at least perception altering, and it's interesting to ponder about whose life might have been changed by the same words that I now cast my eyes over. Although e-books technically are the same words, they are not from the same page and there is no sense of journey in the same respect.



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February & March Magazine Issues

March 15, 2012

The February and March issues of Sweet Designs Magazine are now online, featuring a combined 53 new articles and features!!

- Cover: Stephanie Lynn reflects on 5 years
- Cover: India (of Darn-licious knitwear)
- Life in the dumps (moving in with my bf)
- The difference between men and women
- Angels among us (parts 1 and 2)
- Arts graduates & the dark night of the soul
- Triple threat (how I survived my teen yrs)
- Dating isn't easy (my true story)
- How to turn not-so-great gifts ... (fashion)
- Ten reasons to love being single
- Taking the big leap (college)
- Valentine's Day (not what you'd expect!)
- The last of the cold (hopefully) (fashion)
- A month full of love
- Ten tips for successful airline travel
- Reasons I love writing for SDM
- Who needs love?
- They're not all the same
- The life I'm glad I don't have (fiction)
- Professional dress/ finding Fendi (fashion)
- An airport anniversary: a true story
- Inappropriate Facebook photos
- The perks of a big city (college)
- A night(mare) to forget (part 2)
- The Anita Blake series (book review)
- Saving June by Hannah Harrington (book)
- Under the Mesquite by GG McCall (book)
- The Lullaby by Sarah Dessen (book)
- If I Stay by Gayle Foreman (book review)
- My sweetheart (original poetry)
- Isn't it funny (original poetry)
- The stranger (original poetry)
- A winter wonderland (original poetry)
- One night valentine
- The thick envelopes (college acceptance)
- Southern love
- Healthy hair and vitamins
- It's a date (dating idea alternatives)
- The 30 hour famine
- School's out forever!
- Marching right back into spring? (fashion)
- Dear John
- When TV shows depict your life
- 3 Fun ways to rock spring's hottest trends
- Neglected teeth
- Starting something new
- Guy movies
- To hesitate or dive in?
- Deadly, by Julie Chibbaro (book review)
- Beastly, by Alex Flinn (book review)
- I don't care (poetry)
- Together, alone (poetry)

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