Category — Opinion

Amazon.com recently released the Kindle, their device for reading ebooks. Michael Hyatt, President and CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishers, has a positive (but not fawning) first impression review of the Kindle here.

Robert Scoble, a professional tech blogger, has a very negative review of the Kindle here. If you watch the video (and let me warn you: there’s a few bad words in there), you will see that two of the many complaints he has are:

1. Highlighting: Scoble says at first that you can’t do it. Then he figures it out, right there on the video. I was surprised when he said you couldn’t highlight, because I remember that being one of the features mentioned in Steven Levy’s way-over-the-top story about the Kindle in Newsweek. But then Scoble discovered that feature, though it still looks hard to use.
2. Page numbers: Scoble has it right. How on earth are you supposed to refer anyone to a passage in an ebook if the page numbers don’t correspond in any way to the pages on the real-life dead trees version of the book? Without consistency in page numbers (or some other way to accurately cite written works) regardless of the media on which they are read, the usability of books is diminished, not enhanced. Technology must enhance our experience, not diminish it; otherwise, the technology will be ignored by the market.

I mentioned both of these things in my recent iPhone bookreader wishlist for Apple. Additionally, I still want to be able to copy out sections from an ebook so that I can quote an author, then give him or her proper credit in a footnote.

Let me repeat: I should not have to retype the quote! It is standard, praiseworthy behavior to quote and credit other authors in non-fiction works. The more academically-oriented the writing, the more important this is. I am certain this is not possible on the Kindle, because books on the Kindle are protected by DRM.

But think this through, ebook writers and manufacturers of ebook readers. Who reads more than anyone else? Professors, authors, and students. This is your market! If these people quote your writings, it will inevitably lead to more sales for your writings. Making it as easy as possible to quote you and give you credit is in your best interest. Don’t let your fears of privacy and plagiarism lead you to irrationally excessive protection. Done right, ebooks could be a stimulus for sales rather than an easy way to steal.

One more thing: I have no interest in owning any kind of ebook reader; not the Kindle, not the Sony Reader. (though, if you must buy me one, send it here. I’ll sell it and buy an iPhone instead). I do not need another device to carry. This is why I think the iPhone, or something like it, is the perfect device for this technology. You have your phone, your music, your video, and your books all in one device, plus the Internet. Like your music and videos, you should be able to read the books on your Mac (or PeeCee) and manage them all through iTunes. Include the ebook features iRecommend above, and you can’t go wrong.

The Kindle cannot hold a Kandle to this kind of flexibility and portability.

Update (12/1): Andy Inhatko, who loves the Kindle, has done a side-by-side comparison of the Kindle and the iPhone as book readers. He writes:

I downloaded a free book from the Project Gutenberg site, and spent an hour on my sofa reading chapters on the Kindle and then on my iPhone. I can’t say that the Kindle was a superior experience. I preferred the Kindle’s larger display and its page-turning buttons, but I had the usual gripes about the screen’s E-Ink technology. It’s black text on a gray, non-backlit background, so you don’t get the same crisp, black-on-white contrast of the iPhone’s backlit screen.

Read Andy’s entire review here.

Update #2 (12/11): Daniel Eran Dilger has a nice, long review of the Kindle at AppleInsider. He compares reading documents on the Kindle to reading them on the iPod Touch, which is very similar to the iPhone. He writes:

Unlike typical ebook readers using E Ink displays, the LCD display of Apple’s iPhone and iPod Touch can zoom in and out of documents, skirting the limitations of PDF or heavily formatted Word documents that commonly confound Kindle and the Sony Reader. The iPhone can also handle other documents, from Excel files to full color graphics and fluid video.

While the iPhone’s display is significantly smaller–about half the visual area of the Kindle and roughly a quarter the resolution (320×480 vs. 600×800)–it’s just as sharp (160 pixels per inch vs the Kindle’s 167 ppi), it’s backlit for reading in the dark, it’s full color, and most importantly it has no slow refresh cycle. The downside is that the iPhone doesn’t last nearly as long on a charge, particularly if you’re actively using it to read documents or browse the web.

Despite the larger screen size and resolution of the Kindle, both show about the same amount of content, even when the iPhone is zoomed in for reading text and the Kindle is set at its smallest text size to show the most content possible (below). The Kindle can only show a small set view of the page, while the iPhone can zoom out to see the entire page overall.

Read the paragraph quoted above in context here. The whole article begins here.

In his weekly press conference this week, Detroit Lions head coach Rod Marinelli said:

I’ve repeatedly talked to them about, when we come in on Wednesday, it’s preparation. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, we prepare and then the test on Sunday is easy. The test should be just fun if you’ve prepared. The worst thing is to not prepare. Then the test is not good, because you don’t know the answers. When you don’t know the answers, you don’t play well. So I keep working to try to sell them the preparation, every single day. Then we can go out and have a ball, let our talent go.

This is how I feel about Sundays, too, but my feelings relate to church, not football. When I have a good week preparing to preach, the Sunday that follows is almost always the most enjoyable day of the week. I find that delivering a sermon is the best, most enjoyable part of the process. I enjoy preparation, too, but that’s the part that feels like work. Preparation feels like work; delivery feels like fun.

When you’re preparing to preach, nobody sees it. Nobody knows how much time you spent reading your text, thinking about its meaning, asking interpretive questions of the text and researching their answers, praying for yourself and your people to receive and obey the truth, and working on how that truth applies here where we live. Nobody knows how much time you spent preparing; they only know if the sermon was “good.”

Or, not so good.

The things that make a sermon good—that it truthfully explains the message of scripture, is clear about how that scripture speaks to life as we live it, and is interesting—these are all completely decided in the study, not on the stage. When I wake up on Sunday morning and have the answers to these questions, then I can relax and enjoy Sunday because usually the sermon delivers itself.

If I don’t have the answers, then I have no right to feel good about anything. I haven’t done my job and therefore I deserve to be exposed.

Sure, sometimes you’re well prepared but things go bad—you feel ill, your voice goes hoarse, there is some technical problem, or interruption from the congregation—but those are rare. Usually the preacher’s problems in preaching are self-inflicted. At least mine are. A well-prepared preacher is the number one ingredient necessary for a good Sunday sermon.

In my first pastorate out of seminary, Sundays were hard. I did the same things to prepare that I do today, but I had not learned to trust God to use that preparation on Sunday morning. Therefore I was anxious, irritable, fearful, and uncaring. These words are not ones that describe the fruit of the Spirit, are they?

At some point, and I don’t know when this was, I learned a lesson similar to the one coach Marinelli preached to the media this week. Preparation is power. Have faith in it.

My study is the place where God speaks to me through the text of scripture. When I faithfully do the things associated with listening to his voice in the Bible, he faithfully prepares me to speak to his people. Then, unless I welcome sin into my life or God allows some test of faith to interrupt our worship, Sundays are a foregone conclusion. I expect God’s spirit to work through me, so I just try to stay out of the way.

I can honestly say now that Sundays are my favorite day of the week. I’m always tired at the end, but there is joy throughout the day. I get to spend time with my spiritual family. We put aside all our stuff and just focus on the only one that really matters—the Lord God who communicated to us in his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ and his word, the Bible. This makes Sunday my most fun day.

I’ll see you then.

This is a question of situational ethics.

Say that a physician or EMT walks into a public restroom because he or she really HAS GOT TO GO.

Right.
Now.

(Number one or number two? That’s your call. It doesn’t really matter, as long as it is completely urgent, reaching the breaking point, as it were.)

Upon entering this public restroom, the life-saving-ready person sees another person (of the same sex, let’s not complicate this) passing out on the floor. Instantly, this person’s medically-tuned spidey senses start tingling. He or she can see that the person on the floor is not breathing. The victim needs immediate life-saving intervention or s/he will die. It is an emergency.

But, it was an emergency of a different sort that caused the doctor, nurse, EMT, whatever to walk into the bathroom in the first place. So, what’s the next move?

Should you save the life and pee your pants or relieve yourself first so that you can be 100% focused on reviving this person. Then the victim will be able to get up again and wash his or her hands.

I turn to you, reader. You read my little posts all the time, but most of you never utter a peep in comments. Get over yourselves, click on that comment link and tell me what the right thing to do is. A life is (theoretically) at stake here.

[Note: although I know people in medicine, this is a completely fictional situation, one inspired by..., well, you don't want to know that. But don't project my wife into this. She has nothing to do with this story, except to be disgusted with me when she reads it.]

On this week’s edition of This Week in Tech, science fiction writer Jerry Pournelle commented that the iPhone might be the device that kills the paperback book industry.

I couldn’t be happier to hear this. It won’t happen until Apple either releases a book reading application for the iPhone or Apple allows third parties to develop applications for the iPhone, but since Apple has announced their intention to do the latter, you can see this future on the horizon. The iPhone can already read pdf files and Word files, but lack of access to the iPhone’s file system plus a way to organize your ebooks limits the iPhone as a book reader, at least in its current form.

Although it is true that paper and ink have higher resolution than any electronic device, the convenience of having a portable book reader right on your iPhone would, I think, overcome the loss of readability.

Portability > Readability, as long as the readability is Good Enough®.

This is better news for readers of fiction than for those of us who read non-fiction. As someone who reads primarily non-fiction works, I want to be able to highlight important passages and select and copy text from the ebook so that I can paste it directly into another document. Then, as I always do, I can footnote the source.

The ability to highlight a passage in an ebook and save that highlighting will probably come soon enough. But the twin fears of plagiarism and illegal re-distribution will probably prevent readers from copying out text and pasting it to other documents (e.g. Microsoft Word documents).

If I’m right about this, it is too bad. eBooks would be a perfect way to speed up the process of research and writing non-fiction, but the copy/paste limitation will probably prevent this for a long time.

The other limitation of ebooks for research and writing is the issue of page numbers. Without pages and page numbers, as we have in real paper books, how do you cite a book (e.g. How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth, p. 64)? A good book reader will solve this problem by visually representing pages that correspond exactly to their real-life book counterparts. Sony’s Reader already appears to do this. Apple’s iPhone book reader, when it happens, will hopefully do this too. In my opinion, the best way to render ebooks on the iPhone would be to allow the reader to see the whole page and page number in portrait mode just as it appears in print. Then the reader can turn the iPhone on its side to get the largest screen possible from left to right, then use the iPhone’s pinch and expand gesture to enlarge the text to a readable size.

This is a review of Burger King’s attempt to do iced mocha.

The good: It tastes great! Much better than McDonald’s iced mocha which, by the way is free on Wednesday.

The bad: According to the dude in the drive thru, Mocha BK Joe iced coffee is made with chocolate shake mix; therefore, it is loaded with fat and calories.

Conclusion: A great occasional treat; not an everyday drink.

Or, why it turns out badly when we do try to preach stories.

Alternative title: The Butterball Sermon.

My friend Larry Rogier has asked an important question on his blog. I started to answer in his comments, then decided to just answer it here on my own blog. He’s a friend, yes, but why give him free content when my little blog here is withering from disuse? Also, people go to his blog to read him, not me; and I think Larry knows how I would answer this anyway.

Larry’s question is: “…if almost half the Bible is narrative (think most of Genesis-Esther, Matthew-Acts), why aren’t narrative texts more prominent in our preaching?”

I told you it was a good question. Here’s how I would answer it:

Preaching narrative is tough for several reasons. First, narrative is tough to interpret. It is not difficult to know what the text says in narrative. In fact, that’s easy when compared to other biblical literary types. The narrative tells a story and it is unusual to have the meaning of a story depend on what one word or phrase in the original Hebrew or Greek means. So knowledge of biblical language, grammar, and syntax are less essential in interpreting biblical stories than they are interpreting other types of biblical literature, like say Paul’s letters.

No, when preaching Bible stories, the hard part is to abstract a truth from the story that is consistent with authorial intent and valid for believers in our time. Both of these (authorial intent & ongoing validity) are spots where the preacher can fall into a deep pit that causes him to fall short of truly preaching God’s word. The authorial intent misstep is the one that I see most frequently. Preachers find a biblically sound truth, but it is not the truth that the original human author had in mind to communicate. In other words, it is the old “right doctrine, wrong text” problem.

A second reason why (I think) preachers avoid preaching narrative is that they do not know how to structure a message from a biblical story. Even if they get the story right in their intepretation, they don’t know how to communicate it clearly and interestingly. This is because they usually try to use a deductive structure: big idea first, three points (usually, but it can be more or fewer), conclusion. That structure works well in the NT epistles and it can work well in the OT prophets, some OT poetry and occasionally in the Law and the Gospels, but it feels funny in a story. The preacher carves up the story like a turkey breast on Thanksgiving day, presenting the meat of the Word (maybe), but not in a way that resembles the original turkey. The sermon looks like mystery meat—a turkey roll, or a Butterball—rather than a beautifully baked bird. To preach a biblical story well, the preacher must learn to structure his sermon in a way that follows the structure of the text. Usually this means using pure induction, meaning that the big idea of the story/sermon is not clearly revealed until the end of the sermon. In this approach, the sermon carries the reader along using the story to hold his or her interest just as a screenwriter does in a good movie or TV drama or a writer does in a good novel. In my experience, most seminaries do not teach this kind of inductive preaching structure in their classes on preaching. It is a shame, too, because the stories of the Bible are better written than the kind of fiction we read/see in popular culture. We have better material (artistically and theologically) but our lack of training in dealing with it spoils the Sunday product/experience for our listeners.

A semi-inductive structure, where the big idea of the message becomes clear in the middle or toward the end of the message can also work with stories. This is a pretty easy structure to learn, too: Roman numeral one (I.) of the outline is the Big Idea of the Story. Roman numeral two (II.) of the outline is the continuing theological truth of the story—the truth that is taught in the text that applies to the original audience and to us equally. Roman numeral three of the outline is application: the big idea of the sermon stated in terms that a modern Christian can apply to his or her life.

For preachers to do well preaching narrative, we need better training. Laws of interpretation (as taught in a seminary class in hermeneutics) need to be reviewed in preaching classes (aka homiletics). Students need to be drilled and corrected in class on how to use these laws to interpret stories. Then they need to be taught inductive and semi-inductive sermon structures.