Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/08/14/how-many-books-could-you-read.html
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Bazillions!
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You don’t need the calculator - # of books a year is easy to do in your head!
Average length of book = 365 pages
Average time to read a page = 1 minute
Days in a year = 365
If you accept these numbers, then it’s simple:
Read 1 minute a day: one book a year
Read 10 minutes a day: 10 books a year
Read an hour a day: 60 books a year
Simple !
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Do you guys feel like electronic distractions (all types) have made the basic task of reading more difficult? Unless a book is absolutely riveting, it feels much harder to focus on reading than it was when I was younger.
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I did quit social media, and I read at least 5 a week.
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They used to say the same thing about television. If only there was no television, people would magically read more!
People still read books. They also like to socialize. Social media provides long distance socialization and we tend to conflate the business practices of Facebook and Twitter with the experience of social media. I don’t think popping into Facebook to check out what your cousin is doing is an essentially bad thing. It’s just our era’s version of letter writing/long distance calling and the early panic and dire warnings about telephone use amusingly echo much of the fear of social media today. There’s nothing particularly sacred or better about older media.
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I’m reading a book right now.
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Books will rot your brain. They’re written by people who couldn’t find real jobs.
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I used to read pretty avidly, i need to get back into the habit of doing so. At the very least putting a particular day of the week aside for reading would be nice as i do have a number of books i need to get to.
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No you’re not. You’re commenting on a blog post. We can see it.
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None, but I would get more work done…
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Does BBbbs count as social media?
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It’s not the raw time that’s put into social media and other media-based distractions (e.g. video games, the plethora of quality TV, BBS’s, etc.) that’s the issue. It’s the effect on one’s attention span and powers of concentration that creates difficulties in sitting down with a book or long-form piece. I’ve heard academics I know describing this phenomenon.
These days it’s feast or famine for me with books. I’ll go a while without reading one, then binge one after the other in my queue for a couple of weeks, then go back to the other distractions.
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Not me pal. I’m not on social media so i’m better than you 
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Yes it does. Dammit!
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Yeah, it’s kinda funny that people didn’t talk about ‘social media’ until FB, Twitter, et al, came along, but before that there were topical forums, BBSes, listservs, usenet groups, etc, that had similar functions, if more limited domains. And they could be (still can be) significant time sucks.
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Yes. Attention span ruined.
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Better lock yourself in your safe and get reading.
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I’m probably reading around 20 books a year but I play a lot of video games.
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It’s not so much attention span as effort in my case. Reading a book is slightly more effort than watching a video.
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