Streaming is about to get very expensive

Are they making Project Gutenberg titles available in e-reader format now?

Back in the day, it was all plaintext.
Some older books are scanned in PDF only, but most other books are usually offered in several formats. Here's just one example:

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They'll still have newspapers and magazines too, but that's not really all that current if part of your entertainment involves following sports or regional topics. Reading news coverage is not the same thing as witnessing things for yourself.

Periodicals are not carried much anymore by many libraries.

Fairfax County lets you check out an ebook for 21 days. If there’s no waiting list, you can renew it for another 21 days.

Who takes more than 21 days to read a book?


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I'm not all that concerned about it as there is so much free stuff. Much of what we pay for on satellite and cable, seems to have more free apps. Add to that services like Pluto, Xumo, STIRR, that are totally free. Many people pay a lot of money for satellite/cable just to get a few channels they like. With streaming, the customer can sub to what they want. Add the that, with streaming we have access to stuff not available on satellite/cable. Disney+, the new HBO/Cinemax/WB app coming. The cable industry just wants to scare everyone. Read that back when satellite was coming in. We knew where that went. Cable/satellite is losing tons of subs and they do not like it. They are fighting back with everything they have.
 
Ok, math time

These are the services i have right now
You Tube TV -$50 a month/ $40 is what I pay right now ( i just stocked up on Google Play Gift Cards when on sale for 20% off a month ago)
Hulu-$11.99 / $7.19 ( stocked up for a years worth of Gift Cards last xmas time when they where 40% off)
Netflix-$15.99 / $9.59 ( stocked up for a years worth of Gift Cards last xmas time when they where 40% off)

Total-$77.98 / $56.78 a month

Now if I had Dish Network only
Top 200 ( to match what I get from You Tube TV, BBC America for example) with 3 boxes-$89.99 a month for 2 years

But I would still need Netflix and Hulu for shows like Stranger Things, Handmaid's Tale, etc so that adds another $27.98 /$16.78 to the Dish Total which makes it $117.97 / $106.77 a month

Now if I dropped live TV per the article ( which I could do but my wife is unsure ) and just went streaming services only and added the new ones coming and CBS ( guessing at the prices)
Hulu-$11.99 / $7.19
Netflix-$15.99 / $9.59
Disney-$6.99 ( I will prepay for the year at $69.99 so that discounts it to 5.83 a month )
ATT/Warner/ HBO-$17 ( I doubt I would subscribe to it, no interest as of now )
CBS-$9.99 ( I will prepay for the year at $99.99 so that discounts it to $8.33 a month )
Universal-$8.99 ( I doubt I would subscribe to it, no interest as of now )

So that makes it $70.95 ( discount price $56.93 ), that before discount price is still less then Dish only-$19.04 which leaves extra money towards a sports streaming service ( if you want it ) if one pops up, Fox Sports or real ESPN for example ( i have no interest in sports anymore) , that is a lot of content streaming only that I would not have time for, much like now.

I did not include Amazon, I do have it but only because of the shipping

So if i added Disney to what I have now $84.97 / 62.61 and that pre discount price is still less then Dish by $5.

And before the naysayers come in and say prices will go up for streaming, you are correct, they will go up, but they will also go up for Dish, Direct,Comcast etc.

Streaming is still a lot less expensive.

Totally agree and it is YOUR choice on what you sub to, not cable/satellite. I know people that love their Roku/Fire TVs that only watch what is free.
 
How do you return a ebook late?.. on older kindles you would disable wifi...book would delete once you turned wifi back on...dunno if that still works
Periodicals are not carried much anymore by many libraries.

Fairfax County lets you check out an ebook for 21 days. If there’s no waiting list, you can renew it for another 21 days.

Who takes more than 21 days to read a book?


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Progressive lenses are evil.

I tried them last year. I still haven't quite recovered. I am looking at having to haul around both distance and reading glasses all the time in the long run, unless I get lasik or the like. Then I will only need reading glasses. My brother however, loves his progressive lenses.
 
How do you return a ebook late?.. on older kindles you would disable wifi...book would delete once you turned wifi back on...dunno if that still works

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It's easy to convert library, Kindle Unlimited, etc., books to a permanent format that don't need to be returned using a popular ebook management program plus some readily available add-ons. The process does get into some copyright grey areas though.
 
It's easy to convert library, Kindle Unlimited, etc., books to a permanent format that don't need to be returned using a popular ebook management program plus some readily available add-ons. The process does get into some copyright grey areas though.
If your library uses Overdrive, the PC app lets you convert audio books into MP3 format and save them onto an external device thereby making expiration dates moot. That's better for me as I only listen to audio books during certain times.
 
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I tried them last year. I still haven't quite recovered.

The first pair of progressives I bought were so awful, I ripped them off while driving down the interstate and put my old single-focus lenses back on. The issue I had was that I could not look side to side without encountering the reading portion of the lens. That is the wrong style and one I think should be banned from existence. I don't know why anybody would ever invent such a thing. My second pair were fantastic, and I can look side to side without altering the correction.
 
The first pair of progressives I bought were so awful, I ripped them off while driving down the interstate and put my old single-focus lenses back on. The issue I had was that I could not look side to side without encountering the reading portion of the lens. That is the wrong style and one I think should be banned from existence. I don't know why it exists! My second pair were fantastic, and I can look side to side without altering the correction.

I just felt like I could never get properly focused for whatever activity I was doing, whether it was driving, reading, working on computer or phone. They rechecked my prescription twice to make sure it wasn't a mistake at the lab. I got the best "digital" Zeiss lenses that were available. Eventually, they told me I probably wasn't going to adapt if I hadn't so far. I can try traditional bifocals when I have to. Right now, I am just coping with reading issues like an old person. Luckily I have long arms. ;)
 
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I just felt like I could never get properly focused for whatever activity I was doing, whether it was driving, reading, working on computer or phone.

I maintain the transition was not placed correctly in the vertical dimension, or you would not have this issue. That's if you have the right style lens. If you have the 1st style I described above, it was atrocious and I understand your difficulty completely. You can't adapt to those damn things!
 
Even defeating DRM for personal use has not been tested as far as I know.
Maybe the DMCA hasn't been thoroughly challenged in the e-pub world, but it has been exhaustively tested in the digital audio and digital video and it remains unassailable there. There are some "safe harbors" for ISPs and others who might otherwise temporarily cache content and some latitude granted for fair use but none of these narrow exceptions apply to personal use.

Where DMCA isn't the rule of law, over 200 countries have signed WIPO treaties.
 
I maintain the transition was not placed correctly in the vertical dimension, or you would not have this issue. That's if you have the right style lens. If you have the 1st style I described above, it was atrocious and I understand your difficulty completely. You can't adapt to those damn things!

I didn't experience the side-to-side issues you describe. I did have horrible headaches from pushing my head down to try to get a better focus for distance. It didn't help, but I couldn't stop myself. They took the prescription minus the magnification for reading to make me new lenses, and everything was fine aside from reading. I must have gone back for adjustments a dozen times over a few months, trying to get it to work. Everything I read on the topic says some people just can't adapt, and I expect that is the case with me.
 
I didn't experience the side-to-side issues you describe. I did have horrible headaches from pushing my head down to try to get a better focus for distance.

As I suspected. The transition was set way too high. If you care to try again some day, just warn them that you hold your head back and not to measure where your pupils are based on you staring straight ahead.
Many have trouble to adapting to the process of having to turn their head to face what they are looking at and that shouldn't be downplayed.

I'm most certainly not downplaying that. In fact, that is the precise problem I described above. They should not make progressive lenses in that style, period. You should be able to use your eyeballs to scan side to side without encountering a different prescription.
 
Maybe the DMCA hasn't been thoroughly challenged in the e-pub world, but it has been exhaustively tested in the digital audio and digital video and it remains unassailable there. There are some "safe harbors" for ISPs and others who might otherwise temporarily cache content and some latitude granted for fair use but none of these narrow exceptions apply to personal use.
Many ebooks I buy or check out from the library have the notice: "At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied." I assume that notice is provided to signal that the buyer/user has some flexibility in how they access the content (much like the flexibility I'm provided by my library to convert audiobooks into MP3 files on an external device, which I noted above). This flexibility helps address accessibility and technology disparities for users (for example, for those who don't have a smart phone).


All I know is progressives make it possible for me to comfortably read an ebook while keeping an eye on whatever sporting event is on my TV (to bring the two lines of off-topic discussion together ;)).
 
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For those thinking 5G will fix the rural broadband gap

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