Can I read a physical book when I'm running? Can I read a physical book when I'm doing house work? Or throwing pots in my studio? Or knitting? Or cooking? Or driving?
Can I stay focused if I'm just sitting and listening instead of reading? Absolutely not.
There's no 'vs' here. They occupy different spaces. All hail text, whatever form it takes.
> How do you listen to audio books when you're engaged in other activities?
The same way you can probably carry a conversation while walking. As long as the other activity doesn't engage the language processing part of the brain there's no conflict. I can't listen while reading, not even small package labels in a grocery store, but I can easily listen while washing dishes or exercising or eating a meal because different sections of the brain are responsible for them and can be active simultaneously.
The activities are mindless. Cutting grass, shoveling snow, cleaning the house, gardening, painting, and going on a run. Sure, I'll get distracted by something and need to rewind it back in 20 seconds, but that happens in books, and I'll need to re-read a page.
I think it entirely depends on what audiobook you're listening to. If I'm listening to something that's lower complexity or aimed at younger audiences (e.g. The Martian by Andy Weir or The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams), I can miss bits and pieces of the narration without losing too much of the story. As long as you don't lose track of several uninterrupted minutes at a time, you'll probably get most of the relevant context. The same applies if I'm in the mood to listen to a story that's already familiar to me, like Lord of the Rings.
It definitely becomes more difficult to multitask with harder reads; which is where I prefer to have a book in hand. I'll have to rewind several times per chapter to catch everything. Though it's still doable for some, I'm sure.
That's a great question! It comes up for me a lot.
I can walk through my local woods and listen very carefully but I don't think I could read a recipe book and pay attention to an audiobook!
So for me and I guess for most people it depends on the intensity of the activity and on the nature of the book. I have gradually found where the balance is for me and I've learned to hit the pause button or rewind 30 seconds.
I also pick different types of books to read and to listen to. I _love_ having an engrossing story as an audiobook. And popular science is a great listen, e.g. I loved the audiobook of Stolen Focus. But with physical books I tend to choose more involved or complex novels (e.g. Deep Wheel Orcadia), poetry, and for non-fiction books that are more specific to my interests (psychotherapy, ceramics).
It depends on the book and the activity. Not just audiobooks, but I can read a nice fiction book at a busy coffee shop no problem, but I need a controlled quiet environment for a dense, technical read. With audiobooks, I have the mental bandwidth for a fiction book or nontechnical story based non-fiction book. If I’m going for a walk or a light jog, I can listen to a book no problem. If I’m going for a run, I can’t concentrate enough. Vacuuming and other mindless chores are fine, but cooking is too much of a mental load. It isn’t a binary thing, it is just depends on how much mental bandwidth you have vs the book you are consuming.
These type of audio books tends to not be very dense, key points are often re-iterate, the pacing is slow. The type of activities they do are often not very engaging also, e.g.: if they're cooking, it is just a common dish that they already know from memory, not some new recipe they are trying to learn, etc...
Its not cheating, some books can only be read, while others are improved with audio.
I prefer reading books, there is something special about holding a book in your hands, insering a book mark or jotting down something illegible in the margins.
I have read a massive amount of books in my time as a psychotherapist for 25 years.
For me, it is far better to read books to fully understand and examine the theories, concepts and methods illustrated by the authors. Marginalia comes to its fore.
However, I do listen to my fair share of audiobook. My main gripe with audiobooks is the readers voice. I cannot stand the squeeky, high pitched, robotic, nasally, sounds like AI, might well be AI, especially american female voices. Being British, just one paragraph and I am immediately put off and turn them off.
I have recently tried to listen to "Into the Into the Deep Wood 01, The Witch by Polina Volkova". I had to stop listening after a few paragraphs. If only the reader had a british voice.
I find switching back and forth between pages to find something you remember reading a few days ago is too difficult with an audiobook. No marginalia with audiobooks.
Do authors select who reads their books. maybe they do not. They should have readers from different countries and different languages.
My favourite audiobook reader is David Thorpe. I have the entire series of Mark Dawson's; John Milton, Beatrix Rose, Isabella Rose, Group 15, plus the novellas and more recently the Charlie cooper series.
I do not experience the same excitement reading those books.
>My main gripe with audiobooks is the readers voice. I cannot stand the squeeky, high pitched, robotic, nasally, sounds like AI, might well be AI, especially american female voices. Being British, just one paragraph and I am immediately put off and turn them off.
I would say that this could be said about books and the writing style. Whether it is Hemingway's bare bones style or Cormac McCarthy's lack of punctuation, they can put you off the whole book. To be fair, the voice of the narration is in addition to everything in a written book that could put one off.
>Do authors select who reads their books
I am no authority, but as a general rule, authors only have some input in the process, but the publishers are the main and final deciders (unless it is a big name author).
I have issues with voices too sometimes. My favourite audiobooks are the Doctor Who audiobooks that are actually read by David Tennant, because then you get the proper Doctor voice, a nice scottish "narrator" voice, and he does reasonably good impressions of everyone else too. I got The Stone Rose, The Resurrection Casket and The Feast of the Drowned as freebies with the Radio Times when I was very young, and I listened to them so much. I recently found them again on youtube, as well as some others I'd not heard before, and it was a fun experience since I can apparently recite a lot of them from memory now
I like David Thorpe too. George Guidall and John Lee are probably my favorite narrators. Jonathan Cecil narrating the Jeeves books is wonderful. So is Stephen Fry, but he's pretty much amazing in anything.
I feel we're in the golden age where the format matters so much less.
Taking "99% invisible" for instance, the content in the podcast, on the web or in a book are fundamentally the same level of quality and interest.
Then light novels are pushing the boundaries of what novel literature should look like and we get hundred page books formated as SMS conversations or with ASCII art like layout without much issues.
And on the other end interview and reporting shows are becoming way more researched than the bog standard columns in printed magazines.
Patreon is behind a lot of this change, allowing money to flow to creators whatever their medium, and I'm all for it.
I don't understand what's the debate unless you're assigning some higher value to the written form, like people who think reading makes you more disciplined or a better person than others in some way.
If you remove that and realize reading is a form of communication then it doesn't matter how you make it happen. There was a time when stories and knowledge was mostly shared verbally so it's not like reading is "the truest form".
Amazon is trying hard with Audiobooks, but they seem to be extremely expensive to me, maybe that’s their way of making a lot more money than kindle format.
I spend my listening time just trying to catch up with podcasts.
What audio book formats are there, and services. Dare I say it are there any open source ones?
There are many podcast players, are the many audiobook players?
Is there anything really useful in an audiobook player? I guess going through chapters, maybe linking into the actual text.
Free as in paid by our taxes - my local public library system in Santa Clara County has a decent selection via the Libby and Hoopla apps. I'm not sure why they have two apps, but maybe it's to give us more selection - there are differences in what is available in each (more older books, and current TV shows/movies in Hoopla, magazines and new releases in Libby), From what I've read, the library system pays a fee for each item borrowed via Hoopla, and there is very little overlap so I assume there is some exclusive licensing for some reason. VLC can go to chapters in book format audio files and lets you make bookmarks and change playback speed and lets you transfer files from your PC to mobile device pretty easily.
Audiobooks are preposterously expensive. I used the library and (although the BBC is pulling the plug on it outside the UK) BBC Sounds, both of which have audiobooks as well as audio plays.
>Is there anything really useful in an audiobook player?
Over a regular music player, absolutely. Most podcast players treat a podcast as a single file. Audiobooks aren't single file and they become almost unusable without a dedicated player.
Well narrated audio contains an interpretation, a layer of sublexical meaning that transmits value judgement, emphasis and often the narrator's imagination as to the nature of the character's voices. Often desirable, but sometimes we want our own interpretation, unique and uninfluenced by the narrator's biases.
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Can I stay focused if I'm just sitting and listening instead of reading? Absolutely not.
There's no 'vs' here. They occupy different spaces. All hail text, whatever form it takes.
The same way you can probably carry a conversation while walking. As long as the other activity doesn't engage the language processing part of the brain there's no conflict. I can't listen while reading, not even small package labels in a grocery store, but I can easily listen while washing dishes or exercising or eating a meal because different sections of the brain are responsible for them and can be active simultaneously.
It definitely becomes more difficult to multitask with harder reads; which is where I prefer to have a book in hand. I'll have to rewind several times per chapter to catch everything. Though it's still doable for some, I'm sure.
I can walk through my local woods and listen very carefully but I don't think I could read a recipe book and pay attention to an audiobook!
So for me and I guess for most people it depends on the intensity of the activity and on the nature of the book. I have gradually found where the balance is for me and I've learned to hit the pause button or rewind 30 seconds.
I also pick different types of books to read and to listen to. I _love_ having an engrossing story as an audiobook. And popular science is a great listen, e.g. I loved the audiobook of Stolen Focus. But with physical books I tend to choose more involved or complex novels (e.g. Deep Wheel Orcadia), poetry, and for non-fiction books that are more specific to my interests (psychotherapy, ceramics).
I prefer reading books, there is something special about holding a book in your hands, insering a book mark or jotting down something illegible in the margins.
I have read a massive amount of books in my time as a psychotherapist for 25 years.
For me, it is far better to read books to fully understand and examine the theories, concepts and methods illustrated by the authors. Marginalia comes to its fore.
However, I do listen to my fair share of audiobook. My main gripe with audiobooks is the readers voice. I cannot stand the squeeky, high pitched, robotic, nasally, sounds like AI, might well be AI, especially american female voices. Being British, just one paragraph and I am immediately put off and turn them off.
I have recently tried to listen to "Into the Into the Deep Wood 01, The Witch by Polina Volkova". I had to stop listening after a few paragraphs. If only the reader had a british voice.
I find switching back and forth between pages to find something you remember reading a few days ago is too difficult with an audiobook. No marginalia with audiobooks.
Do authors select who reads their books. maybe they do not. They should have readers from different countries and different languages.
My favourite audiobook reader is David Thorpe. I have the entire series of Mark Dawson's; John Milton, Beatrix Rose, Isabella Rose, Group 15, plus the novellas and more recently the Charlie cooper series.
I do not experience the same excitement reading those books.
I would say that this could be said about books and the writing style. Whether it is Hemingway's bare bones style or Cormac McCarthy's lack of punctuation, they can put you off the whole book. To be fair, the voice of the narration is in addition to everything in a written book that could put one off.
>Do authors select who reads their books
I am no authority, but as a general rule, authors only have some input in the process, but the publishers are the main and final deciders (unless it is a big name author).
Douglas Adams did a narration of HHGTTG which holds a very dear place for me too.
Taking "99% invisible" for instance, the content in the podcast, on the web or in a book are fundamentally the same level of quality and interest.
Then light novels are pushing the boundaries of what novel literature should look like and we get hundred page books formated as SMS conversations or with ASCII art like layout without much issues.
And on the other end interview and reporting shows are becoming way more researched than the bog standard columns in printed magazines.
Patreon is behind a lot of this change, allowing money to flow to creators whatever their medium, and I'm all for it.
If you remove that and realize reading is a form of communication then it doesn't matter how you make it happen. There was a time when stories and knowledge was mostly shared verbally so it's not like reading is "the truest form".
Do what you like/works for you.
I spend my listening time just trying to catch up with podcasts.
What audio book formats are there, and services. Dare I say it are there any open source ones?
There are many podcast players, are the many audiobook players?
Is there anything really useful in an audiobook player? I guess going through chapters, maybe linking into the actual text.
Over a regular music player, absolutely. Most podcast players treat a podcast as a single file. Audiobooks aren't single file and they become almost unusable without a dedicated player.
You fall asleep with it on? Better hope you remember the timestamp…
We don't need them to battle it out unless for the clicks.