I never want to buy another "e" book from Amazon or Apple again. Don't mistake my intentions. I have an iPad. I love it. I have a Kindle DX. I love it as well (although I'm falling out of love with it because I do most of my Kindle reading on my iPad or iPhone or Asus eee netbook or Macbook Pro). However, this post (essay) summarizes the rising tension I've felt in my heart and brain the last two years as I've began the slow and admittedly painful process of digitizing my own cumbersome library (this profile in serious need of updating):

In Defense of The Memory Theater | Open Letters Monthly - an Arts and Literature Review: "Until these companies take seriously the needs and, above all, the rights of readers (the human beings, not the machines), they deserve ruthless suspicion. Just because the Kindle and iPad might seem to work relatively reliably now, and because Google tells itself ‘don’t be evil,’ we shouldn’t keep from entertaining darker, more paranoid, even Orwellian fantasies."

Well reasoned luddite ranting aside, the essay is full of inspiration for those of us looking to creatively resist the commercialization and commoditization of our own personal data. I'm off to rearrange my bookshelves. I've neglected my own Memory Theater for far too long in exchange for the ease of a googled life.