Essay 10: E-Books – Advantages and Disadvantages
With the rise of e-books comes the decline of paper books. Some people see this as a good step forward while others do not. What are the advantages and disadvantages of this trend?
Over the past decade, technology has revolutionized almost every walk of life. One such innovation has been the e-books that are increasingly becoming popular and replacing paper-based books. Many considered it as a positive development because of the convenience they offer and environment-friendliness; however, there are others who deem the trend negative because of harmful effects on the health and difficulty in maintaining focus for the reader.
The foremost benefit of electronic books is that they are extremely easy to handle and carry. For instance, one can store hundreds of books on his tablet or smartphone, and travel while reading comfortably without facing the hassle of lifting heavy books. In addition to that, these books are contributing to efforts to tackle climate change. Papers that are used in conventional books are made from wood, and have over the years, led to massive deforestation. With digital books becoming popular, a significant drop of 23% in deforestation has been noted over the past decade, as indicated by a report published in Daily Times.
However, there are drawbacks to this trend of using digital copies over paper ones. One major demerit is that such books affect readers’ visual health adversely. That is to say, if a reader is exposed to screen for an extended duration, he may develop eyesight issues because of excessive exposure to ultraviolet radiation. Additionally, it is also a fact that reading a book on a smart gadget, for instance, a smartphone comes with numerous distractions from social media and other applications. On the contrary, paper-based books are neither associated with eyesight issues, nor any distractions.
To conclude, there are few disadvantages of e-books like distractions from social media applications and harmful effects on eyesight; but them being pro-environment and easy to carry, they are attracting more people every passing day.
