Print vs. e-books: Which do you prefer?

Shalangwa added: “When I buy a printed book, for instance, it serves as my personal copy, which I can keep for reference. That’s not the same for electronic copies which can get damaged by viruses or even be removed from the internet site where you accessed it.” But for Chucks Emmanuel, 47, both electronic and […]

Shalangwa added: “When I buy a printed book, for instance, it serves as my personal copy, which I can keep for reference. That’s not the same for electronic copies which can get damaged by viruses or even be removed from the internet site where you accessed it.”

But for Chucks Emmanuel, 47, both electronic and print books are fine by him. “On Sundays and Saturdays, when I don’t want come out of my house to buy newspapers and books, I browse and read the news on the internet. But from Mondays to Fridays, I buy papers when going to the office,” the Abuja-based businessman said.

Cordelia Uffoh, 28, said she prefers to read electronically, especially online. “My iPad is portable and I can carry it anywhere I am going. I can always browse the internet, download, share and read stuff. I log on to any of the online newspaper outlets of my choice, click on the news and you see everything on the screen. I also have other e-books.” The civil servant also said it not only saves her time, “But also gives me the right to add my comment on news, review the books as well as get updates on latest news and information. With the print book, that is next to impossible.”

But Abdul-Aziz Dauda, a 24-year-old graduating student of Mass Communication, who lives in Lagos, said he prefers hard copies of books or newspapers. Like in the case of newspapers, he said, it eliminates the problem of connectivity and can easily be referred to. In contrast, Jimaada Muhammad, 22, a student of Economics at the Bayero University Kano, said reading online “offers variety.”

Muhammad added: “I can log onto the site of any newspaper I feel like or read any e-book of my choice. All I need to do is to open multiple pages and then read them one by one. But if it is the print copy, you can only buy the papers separate which is very costly compared to the online version, when you multiply N150 by 30 days, you get N4,500 per month.”

But reading as a whole is going down, said one Mrs. Blessing Thankgod, a civil servant, said reading generally is going down. She added that the government should enforce laws to encourage people to read. “It is very unfortunate that most Nigerians don’t even know how to read the print books and newspapers, let alone going online to read e-books.”