How do you read Pros stories?

[starlite876.livejournal.com]

With the imminent release of Amazon's new Kindle, I was wondering what is everyone's preferred format/method when reading Pros stories. Do you prefer reading the Pros stories online, as printed copies/zines, or downloaded to ebook readers / iPads?

I started reading Pros stories online when I first joined the Pros fandom, but found that I needed to print out the longer (novel length) stories for reading.  Then I discovered the published zines and loved this format because most of these zines had gorgeous artwork, and you can take a copy with you almost anywhere.

As I spent about two hours each day on the train travelling to and from work, I am considering purchasing an ebook reader for reading Pros stories (main priority) and for reading other ebooks.

Do you have a particular preference to how you read Pros stories?

And for those who do use an ebook reader to read Pros stories – which ebook reader do you have?

Comments

[hambelandjemima.livejournal.com]

I read online or save the longer stories to my laptop so that I can read them at any time. I like the idea of an ereader of some sort, but don't feel I can justify the expense. If I was travelling on the train for a couple of hours every day, though, I'm sure that I could! *g*

[starlite876.livejournal.com]

I'm trying to find reasons to buy one, but the main problem is that ereaders are only just started to get popular here and they are very expensive. Plus we do not have many bookshops which actually have ereaders for sale.

And of course each bookshop have their own ereaders locked to a particular format, so it makes choosing one very difficult.

I think I will just have to stick with the printed format a little bit longer!

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

I'm a paper girl all the way - I somehow read differently when I'm just reading things on a computer screen, paper is more... there's more depth to it, the words are more solid, the lads are more there... *g* If there's a new story by one of my favourite writers, or something I'm looking forward to, or an old favourite that I adore, I have to have it printed out... So sorry, can't help about the e-reader thingie, though lots of people seem to adore them, and I imagine I might be tempted if I had a long commute like yours...

[starlite876.livejournal.com]

Actually I print out stories from my favourite writers as well.

I started to take some of the original published zines on the train with me to read but found that I had to quickly turned the page when a 'revealing' artwork appeared .... now I just take the zines with no artwork with me *g*

Half way through your holiday ... ENJOY!

[squeeful.livejournal.com]

I read them online. Much as I love books, print zines are too unwieldy a size and uncomfortable to hold. Me and my laptop and its trackpad, however, have a long and non-discomfort-inducing love affair.

[solosundance.livejournal.com]

I'm an onliner with occasional paper fetish. Actually I have hardly any zines or print-outs because my kids are damn nosy. I'm hoping to use my lovely new iPad to read fic. Unfortunately at the moment my Mac just looks supercilious and says stuff like so you think you can just attach that piece of fluff to me and expect me to deal with it? Ha! Jump through hoops, missy! That sort of thing :) If I had a commute I'd definitely be tempted by the new Kindle should one fall out of the sky into my lap. Let us know what you decide, I'd be interested to hear.

[przed.livejournal.com]

I bought an iPod Touch for other reasons, but got an ereader program for it pretty much exclusively for reading longer Pros stories. The Touch has a small screen, but the advantage is I can easily read it with one hand on a crowded training during my daily commute. And it does so much more than a dedicated ereader. (I've got Pros episodes loaded onto it, for a start.)

[starlite876.livejournal.com]

That's a good point - maybe I should consider looking at other devices other than a dedicated ereader.

I have an iRiver B30 device which I use to listen to music/radio. It has a basic function to read .txt document and it can play video in a number of formats. But trying to watch a video or read a document on a 4cm x 6cm (1.6 inch x 2.4 inch) screen is pretty painful!

[przed.livejournal.com]

The iPod screen is just about within the limits of what my forty-something eyes can handle, but I'm probably going to need to haul out the reading glasses for it some time in the next few years.

But have a device that can do other things than read books is definitely a bonus. (It's saved us on car trips when my daughter's bored, and me on long layovers in airports.)

[snailbones.livejournal.com]

I'm strictly an online/hard disk reader - but given just the teeniest itty bitty excuse for buying one, and I'd so be reading everything on an iPad. *g* Would stubbing my toe be a good excuse?

[solosundance.livejournal.com]

Would stubbing my toe be a good excuse? Definitely. That or splitting a fingernail.

[miwahni.livejournal.com]

Depending on the situation and the story length. Short stuff I read online; longer stories I often print out for convenience, and I have an ongoing love affair with zines. I have a Kindle but I tend to save my favourite stories to it, for re-reading when a zine or printout is too obvious (like your commute for instance) and a netbook too bulky.
Sorry, that probably doesn't help you much!

[sc-fossil.livejournal.com]

I don't like reading on line so I prefer paper. I don't ever print out stories and in ten years in fandom I've printed out maybe half a dozen. Generally it's cheaper to buy a zine (if the story if in it) than waste my ink and time and paper, then end up with a bunch of loose pages or worse, put them into a three ring binder. Ick. *beg*

I love my ereader and if you notice, the prices are dropping like stones in a pond. On slickdeals.com, there have been sales below 80 dollars (US) on several ereaders. Now not all are great, but they all do the basic functions.

Unless you want fancy bells and whistles, get one with "eink" technology which looks like a page from a book. I liked it a lot, it was easy to see, no backlight to bug you. It's like having a book so if it's dark, you need a booklite.

I had a Cybook Gen3 which unfortunately I broke (my fault!) but it was "drag and drop" for almost all files. (Think mp3 player only with text, docs. PDFs and jpgs.) Unlike say a Kindle, it's not proprietary, meaning it doesn't have to use any specific source like Amazon. I'm getting a new ereader when I feel I've punished myself enough and I'll consider getting the same brand if the price drops. It did tend to freeze up and need reset so I'm also considering something else entirely, but so far, I'm playing the waiting game waiting for the Christmas buying season when stuff goes on big sales.

I put the entire ProsLib CD on my ereader in one file and viola! It's all there easy to get to. *g*

[m31andy.livejournal.com]

When I first got into Pros I pored through the Circuit Archive and Hatstand online. *Then* I got the Pros Lib CD.

I've been reading ebooks on a device since 2001, when I bought my first PDA (a Psion Revo), and I've used Mobipocket almost exclusively ever since. It's stuck with me through the Revo, the Palm Life Drive and three different (Nokia) phones. At the moment, it's my phone with its teeny-tiny screen that I do most of my reading on. I've been working backwards (by fic) through the PLCD for months now and (hurrah) I've finally got to the "G"s - not too much to go now!

Mind you, I'm so tempted by the new Kindle (the ereading software is basically Mobipocket, so I won't lose any of my paid-for ebooks). Pity there's now a waiting list. *sigh*

[saintvic.livejournal.com]

I am strictly an online girl for fanfiction stories, I read them at home on my laptop and sometimes during lunch at work on my work PC. I've never actually printed out a story or bought a paper zine but then I am a fast reader and tend to be online in fixed rather than mobile locations.

I am not sold on e-book readers or ipads as I buy a vast amount of paper books and currently prefer my books in that format. However I am prepared to be persauded otherwise as more books are made available in an e-book format and as the e-book readers are consolidated for file types and the reader's experience improves.

[msmoat.livejournal.com]

My preferences change with my needs. *g* For sheer sensory fun, and the best reading experience, there's no beating ink on paper. For me, zines are worth every penny. However, I now own both a Kindle and an iPad (ahem!), and I do love the convenience of having my stories on one (or two) devices, especially for travel. When I first got my Kindle I found I was using it to read even at home, but that might have been the whole "in love" phase. *g* The Kindle is great because the screen isn't backlit and so it doesn't wear your eyes out in the same way a laptop (or iPad) does. And I love being able to bump up the text size. On the other hand, navigating through the story is a bit of a pain (it is page by page, with a very limited search function). So if you just want to read parts of a story, you're much better off in print or on the computer. An iPad, or other device that connects is good because you can have the story in either e-reader format, or just go to the web sites. If I had a commute like yours I'd definitely go for an e-reader. Probably a Kindle.

Having said all that, I still love print best, followed by e-reader, followed by computer. Yet I probably actually read the most stories at the moment on computer, as they are posted.... *g*

[rosie55.livejournal.com]

I have a good collection of zines and love them. I read a lot online on my laptop. But I also have a Kindle and wouldn't be without it. It lives in my handbag and I can be reading Pros in seconds if I am waiting for something. I have added about 200 stories so far. Also very comfortable for reading in bed, as it is so light, much less bulky than a traditional book and much lighter than a laptop.

I have a Palm, too, a couple of years older but the screen is smaller so more scrolling required. So the Palm doesn't get used for this purpose much any more, though I know when siskiou stayed with me recently she said she uses a Palm and didn't feel the Kindle offered much advantage!

I'm in the UK, had to buy my Kindle cover from the US because there simply weren't any suppliers in the UK when I got mine but I think some are available now. But there is a much better selection in the US. Mine is a Javoedge one, in a pretty fabric which wasn't too expensive. I think a cover is worth having, as it protects the Kindle in my bag and makes it easier to shield the screen from nosy people if the need arises.

The Kindle is especially useful for travelling, and the long battery life is great. Unless I have the wireless turned on, it only needs re-charging about once a month. So I only turn on the wireless if I need to download something which I don't do a lot of, mostly loading stories straight from the laptop via usb. While I am transferring stories, it is charging so that works pretty well to keep it topped up.

And I have some ordinary books on there, too. And there are loads of classics which are available from various sites foc.
Hope that helps!

[emmamydog11.livejournal.com]

I use an iPad in fact I am now. Since buying the iPad I've become lazy and just read stories online.
prior to the iPad I used an iPod touch with the Goodreader app. I would copy an online story and paste into word, the save as a pdf and then transfer to the iPod and read on the iPod. This also works well with the iPad. The added advantage is that the story is saved. With regards to cost if I was to add up the cost of ink cartridges and paper that I went through before I transferred to the iPad the capital cost is or will be recovered.

[callistosh65.livejournal.com]

An on-line reader mostly. Though I do have a small number of Pros zines I treasure (about 20). I am patiently waiting for the larger screen Kindle to come waaaaaay down in price.

[ancastar.livejournal.com]

I've had my Kindle for nearly a year and I honestly don't know what I ever did without it. I don't think I've read anything longer than 10K on my computer since buying the Kindle.

That said, PDFs don't help me. Kindles destroy them. I need a Word doc I can convert to a Filtered Web Page and then to a .mobi (or any of those steps along the way). In the recent Supernatural/J2 Big Bang everyone was offering PDFs and I wanted to whine--this doesn't help me!

However, I'm pretty sure the Barnes & Noble Nooks read PDFs just fine (that based on comments I've seen).

[sineala.livejournal.com]

I was going to comment separately, but this is everything I would have said. Yay Kindle! Boo pdfs!

[m31andy.livejournal.com]

PDFs don't help me. Kindles destroy them.

Really? Oh, that's bad news. Amazon were really pushing the "reads pdfs" on the new Kindle launch.

Mind you, the Mobipocket software can convert pdfs to .mobi, which is good.

[ancastar.livejournal.com]

You know...I just saw the info on the new Kindle, and they may well have made changes in that regard. As I said, I've had mine for nearly a year. So I've got an earlier version, which massacres PDFs. In every other way, I love it.

[m31andy.livejournal.com]

I'll keep my fingers crossed! How else is one going to read M Fae Glasgow's fics??!

[tears-of-nienna.livejournal.com]

I mostly read things online, because I tend to put paper books down and wander away for a drink or a snack. That could be kind of embarrassing if someone else in the house found it. (Except former-housemate Jon, who used to ask me whether Bodie or Doyle topped.)

That being said, I do love zines. I just have to be a little bit careful where I'm reading them. ;)

[starlite876.livejournal.com]

I totally understand... I took the Never Far Apart zine to read on the train with me (and completely forgot about the lovely artwork), and then found that I had to quickly turn the pages when I reached the "revealing" pictures. *g*

[moth2fic.livejournal.com]

I download onto my laptop then if I love a story I save it to disc for re-reading. I never read directly online except for drabbles. I looked at palm tops, kindles etc. and decided they weren't adequate - I read very fast and need biggish print size so their pages are too small and they irritate me. I bought a tiny eeePC as a kind of in-between choice for travelling (which I do a lot of) and justified the price because it also had wireless then the wireless bit broke - grrr.

I love printed books (not A4 zine format!) but have far too many and most of them are currently in limbo in boxes while we move so I just make do with the library which doesn't, for some unknown reason, deal in fanfic...

I buy a lot of ebooks, because they don't add to the book mountain, and I like pdf format.

[runriggers.livejournal.com]

Definitely an e-reader version of the stories .... don't want to sit at the computer all day long, since I do that at work; and paper gets expensive and overruns the home.

I have a Sony e-reader and an eBookman

[the-other-sandy.livejournal.com]

I'm fairly egalitarian with my reading.

Zines -- I have tons and will continue to collect them as long as they're published. No matter how old my zines get, I've never opened one up and gotten a 404 File Not Found error.

Online -- I read online a lot, but sometimes when I'm busy or the story is really long it's not convenient.

Ebook reader -- I have a Sony PRS-505 that I bought used on eBay. It was in excellent condition and works just fine. I use it for really long fics (so I can read them in bed or on the couch or during lunch at work) and for fics I want to keep and reread later.

PDA -- I have an elderly HP iPaq with Mobipocket that I used to read fic before I got the Sony Reader. I don't read fic on it as much since I got the Sony, but because the screen is backlit, I still use it to read in places with bad lighting like movie theaters while I'm waiting for the movie to start, some restaurants, and some convention ballrooms. I'll probably be using it between panels at the con I'm attending this weekend (Creation has a lot of dead time between panels and there's rarely enough light to read by in the ballroom).

[krisserci5.livejournal.com]

I love hard copy best, printed circuit or zines. I have an HP- iPac ( more like a palm pilot and it takes an SD card where I keep all stories I have scanned. I use it for traveling. At home I like to curl up with a zine. Of course I will read online but not for long periods of time.

How do I read Pros

[(Anonymous)]

I, too, started reading fan fiction on the net and saved to my hard drive. In my first two fandoms I printed out boxes and boxes of stories. When I got into Starsky & Hutch I started buying zines and loved them. I still read posted stories and save to my hard drive in all my fandoms (3). I collected all of the Pros zines I could get my hands on and that is still my favourite format. I bought a Sony Reader (love the fact that it is so small) and downloaded all my saved stories from first fandom and read my way through them - loved it. So handy for waiting rooms. When I finished reading my way through them the first time I went back and started again and am half way through. Soon as I complete the second reading I shall load all my Pros stories and do the same and when I finish them all I shall go back and reread all my Pros zines. I am so grateful to all the writers who post their stories which enables me to save and download and read anywhere. Zines are wonderful but they are expensive and not as convenient as Sony. I still buy them, however, because it is the format I actually prefer.
I am on LiveJournal but would you believe I forgot my password. Karen-Leigh

Re: How do I read Pros

[starlite876.livejournal.com]

I love zines as a reading format as well .... which is a complete change for me from when I first started reading Pros stories via the net. Because there are so many stories online, I never imagined I would ever need to purchase and read the zines. Plus the zines are so expensive when posting outside US or UK (depending on where the zines are published).

What file format do you save your Pros stories to for reading on the Sony? As PDFs, or as Word documents?

[starlite876.livejournal.com]

Thank you to everyone who posted comments on how they read Pros stories and for their advice on ereaders.

I am waiting for the reviews on the Kindles (in particular on how they handle PDFs), and am looking at the iPads at the moment.

I read with interest that Sony has just announced several new ereaders, and will be expanding the sales of the ereaders to Italy, Spain, Australia, Japan and China, and that the company would be "working with local bookstores to ensure content is compatible, relevant and in the appropriate language for each market".