An old friend of mine published their poetry and offered physical copies. I had asked about this because I still thought you had to order, for example, a thousand copies and then hope you would sell them all. It is wonderful that this technology has came to be for writers because now you don't have to worry about being left with an excessive amount of copies. This is especially good for people with small followings or who are new to self-publishing. I believe the more accessible things like this become, the more we can hear from voices who can't afford printing thousands of copies.

When I was a teen, a lot of people in my social circles wrote books on free websites. It was very nice, in my opinion. People would write books on their phone when they had free time, and would go home and edit them on a laptop or continue on their phone. During this time, I felt people's vocabulary got better. Although the popularization of this form of writing and publishing books might devalue physical books or purchasable e-books, this accessibility encouraged many to write. As a result of being able to write and access books without payment, people were reading and learning more.

Less than 5% seems like a really small number, but when put into comparison to just how many books have been written and released physically over time, it's actually really impressive that e-books have made a decent dent in the book market. Especially given the short amount of time e-books have been released.

I remember growing up when the tablet or iPad was released, the Kindle was completely forgotten. This might have just been in my community, but they were seen as foolish to buy since all they could do was read books. People would buy a tablet instead since it was able to do more than a Kindle. I do wonder if maybe a Kindle would encourage reading, because most people I knew who bought tablets were not reading on them.

This is very interesting to me. Often times people take to the media and begin fear mongering. In cases like the one mentioned, hearing that "both sides" are bad can be confusing for the consumer to the point where people may abandon all beliefs in anyone. Even with media literacy and the ability to search for the truth yourself, this fear and distortion of reality can be exhausting. Anyone can fall victim to this.

I looked into this for a homework assignment once, almost every advertisement for products on the television was being advertised as "happiness". There were ads about dish soap with the message being flat out "buy this product, your life will be easier, you'll be the happiest person ever". A lot of advertisers goal is to appeal to people struggling with themselves and their emotions, and they do this by claiming their product is happiness.

Media literacy should be taught to toddlers who are old enough to intake information but not old enough to really understand what they are consuming. I have seen many cases of children freaking out because of something scary they saw on the internet and not being able to distinguish whether or not it is real because of how much people grown up on devices don't question what they see.

I feel like books are becoming a forgotten media slowly with time. Books have been revolutionary many times and have helped spread knowledge to even the most inaccessible places. They provide many different perspectives, because they are like a world and a life put on pages. This book for example, criticized slavery in a time where tensions were high. It is wonderful to think just how many minds this book could have opened up.

It is always jarring to see people's opinion on things when it is finally a woman's turn to be herself. Men have for ages acted upon "impure desires" and were able to just be themselves without having it be attached to an expectation. Women have always been tied down to "simplicity" and "modesty" and it should not be that way. A woman should have a choice to be what she wants to be, as well as men who have that choice.

I feel this was a common theme throughout history. In the 18th century, women still had little to no rights. The only thing women could do was be an accessory to a husband, but with books, they were able to be free and retain information freely without a man having to tell her what to think. Even here it is said that the main reason women were able to read was because of their children and because they had more "leisure time". Although it is messed up how it came about, I am glad women were able to get something for themselves, even if it was originally for someone else.