Vaccine Dilemma
I went to the center four times and was turned back. I got frustrated and thought I’d wait it out. Now, the government has changed their strategy and I’m no longer eligible for a vaccine. I will have to wait. I don’t mind really because I’m not all that keen to go out and about. I’m quite happy to be living in my little bubble, until such time comes that I’m allowed to take the vaccine.
To Newsletter or Not to Newsletter
Newsletters seem to be making a very popular comeback. I suppose it just makes sense since people have very little time to actually visit various websites and many don’t want to be on aggregators like Medium, because they don’t feel they own their content. The newsletter revival is making so much noise that Twitter already bought a newsletter company and Facebook is considering it as a feature.
I thought about it when I was building out my finance website. I gave Substack some serious consideration, but in the end I decided against it. Why? Because I didn’t know how regular I could be. Newsletters only make sense if they are fairly regular. I also feel that newsletters have a higher bar when it comes to quality. Inbox space is precious these days and you only give it away to a select few. Plus, if you can’t maintain the standard people will eventually not open your emails and will end up unsubscribing. I know a blog needs to have quality content to grow as well but in my mind, the pressure isn’t the same. With a blog, a person can skip a few posts and still come back. But, when’s the last time you actually re-subscribed to a newsletter?
The bottom line – I’m still thinking about it.
Digital Reading
I have to read a lot of documents for work. They are long and I don’t like printing them. But, they’re also quite complicated and I feel that I can’t always get through them very easily reading them on the computer. It’s so much easier to read them on paper.
So I looked it up – whether reading on a digital medium is actually worse than reading on paper. Turns out, it’s not. However, it depends on the way we read. Apparently we’ve become accustomed to skim through material when we read online. Whereas when we read something on paper, we give it much more consideration. The touch and feel of paper is also a factor in absorption but that’s purely psychological.
One article mentioned conducting a comprehension test. Since the test takers knew that they were going to be tested, they read the online material just as carefully and answered just as well as those who read the material on paper.
So the conclusion is that reading on the computer isn’t any different. It’s all in our heads.
Happy Thursday All and Stay Safe!
Looking through a frosty window... 