Phone Books
By Jess D'Amico in Arts & Entertainment on Apr 17, 2007 5:52PM
Chicagoist loves our commute to work. We get to sit on the bus or train and listen to music, people watch, put on makeup, knit, or just relax. Most often we read books, although sometimes we get carried away reading and miss our stop.
We also love distractions on our cell phones. We remember Snake back in the day and how mad we were when mom called right as we were reaching the high score. Now we can sufficiently ignore calls as we beat Tetris, but a book, on our phones? Sure we text message like it’s going out of style but even then reading the tiny type is hard on our eyes, much less a full book.
Moka, “your personal Mobile Knowledge Assistant,” just released 76 books to be emailed or SMSed in daily chunks of 160 characters or less. We weren’t sure how prose so carefully plucked by authors was going to sound chopped into snippets, but the first month was free and we were curious. We bought Plato's Phaedo because we’re pretentious, and Dan Millman's Way of the Peaceful Warrior because we’d been wondering what that movie was about. We scheduled Millman for 9 a.m. and Plato for 5 p.m., to start and end our day with some SMS wisdom.
The first text we receive says, “In matters of this sort philosophers, above all other men, may be observed in every sort of way to dissever the soul from the communion of the body,” from Plato. Sure, it sounds classy, but is otherwise incomprehensible to anyone who’s never read Phaedo or, like us, haven’t since high school. We waited to see if Millman would be more accessible.
The next morning, getting ready for the day, our phone buzzed. “What we perceive reflects our personal/subjective reality filtered through our beliefs. So consider: What is truth? What is reality?” While it makes more sense than Phaedo, it’s not exactly the sort of uplifting, quick morsel of spirituality we wanted. Frankly, we don’t have the time or brainpower to have any idea what truth or reality is before our morning cup of coffee.
We appreciate the effort, and maybe when phones become easier to read or allow for longer passages Moka could be workable. Until then, we’ll pack an actual book for the train.
image via smussyolay