Reading traditional “narrative” books, articles, for information is extremely inefficient and almost entirely a waste of time. I have read hundreds of books in my life, and yet if you asked me to give a dozen facts from one I read a few months ago (for example, a biography of Rockefeller)…I can’t do it. I could tell you the rough outlines of his life, but I’ve forgotten the details. I put maybe twenty hours into reading this book and my return on that time seems to be minimal at best.
What’s the alternative? I’m a big believer in SRS/Anki and have found it to work almost flawlessly. And so I think a better alternative to reading for information may be to make a list of discrete facts from a book and put those into an SRS system.
Side note: I’m distinguishing reading for information from reading for enjoyment. I assume most people don’t read business nonfiction books for enjoyment and mostly just want to learn the information inside.