This is the sort of question that keeps me up all night. Should I shop online or at a local store? Does the packaging used in shipping from Amazon outweigh driving three miles in a biodiesel car? What if I can bike to a big-box store (like Border's) but have to drive to a local store?--which one should I shop at then? How many friends do I need to bring in my car to make the longer trip worthwhile?
At last, good old Umbra at The Grist is addressing this question. Except that he's not really answering: apparently there's no scientific consensus on whether online or in-person shopping is better for the environment. And considering all the factors that go into that decision, it may well be one that always has to be made on a case-by-case basis.
In the meantime, I'll try not to lose sleep over it. Because if I stay up all night reading, then I'll just have to buy more books sooner. Which I really should just be getting as ebooks anyway instead of using all that paper. Oh, dear...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
I just can't read ebooks. It's terribly limiting: I can't carry a .pdf into the bathroom, for instance. And, besides, there's just something you lose when you no longer flip pages. Nah, my solution to using too much paper would be to try and find some way to make people stop publishing crappy books. That'd cut down on, like, 90% of the paper usage for books.
I mean, those Harry Potter hardbacks...that's a lot of paper that could be used for something good, like Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth series... ;-)
I was going to go on about supporting local book culture, with the admission of hypocrisy in that I love Amazon.com, but decided that could be a blog post in itself. Expect to see that on my blog...um...whenever I get time and inclination to write about it...
I carry .pdfs in my bathroom. That's the real reason why I have a laptop.
I'm not even going to rise to the jibe about Harry Potter and Terry Goodkind. Feel free to enjoy your mistaken opinion. :-)
I need my own laptop...
Even when I get one, though, I'll still prefer paper books. There's just something aesthetic about it.
And I propose that the reason you refuse to "rise to the jibe" about Harry Potter is that the years spent reading that quality of writing has dulled your wit to the extent that you know you wouldn't be able to keep up.
I propose a healthy dose of Terry Pratchett's Discworld series.
(Hey, if you can't troll your friends, who can you troll?) ;-)
keep trolling like that and you won't be my friend any more...!
Post a Comment