> It comes down to speed: show me the simulated, high-res book with pages I can handle and access exactly as fast as the real physical book in my real physical hands, and we can begin the conversation. The video game players will want to say “easy, no problem”, but a moment’s reflection — how do I hold a book in my hands? What do I do with it? What kind of physical feedback does that require? — reveals that it is, in fact, a huge problem.That's a part of the equation for sure.
The other one that I keep coming back to is how the object captures your attention, and what it does/doesn't do to steer it, and what affordances it offers for it to flit to something else.
On a digital general purpose device, you are always one swipe, one notification banner away, from jumping into whatever other activity you want. Closing a book, putting it away, grabbing the TV remote, turning on the TV inherently has much more friction than swiping right on the home bar out of a reader app and straight into Tiktok.
This is why single purpose devices like eReaders are compelling - while they do not address this first half of the equation the author mentions, they do address the second half.
(but of course a beautiful object of a book will always command attention more effectively than the exact same book, but in PDF form on a tablet)
To try and and attempt an analogy, it's like trying to cook a healthy meal when you have a fridge only stocked with veggies/fish, vs one that maybe has some veggies at the back but also tons of snacks and instant food at the front.
We like to think we are masters of our attention and willpower, but as many already know it's really the environment does a large chunk of the deciding for us. If you want to make more intentional decisions, your first order of business should be to shape your environment (a hack monks have known for millenia).