An Auto-Gizmography

I have absolutely never considered myself to be a “tech” guy. I’ve never been into gadgets or gizmos, not bothered to investigate what makes my magical computer-box tick, and had no plans to find out what sort of nerd-devilry powers the Internet. It’s not that I wasn’t curious or interested in technology; I’ve just always been focused on other stuff. However, since working at Coming of Age (CoA), an environment that seeks out the tech savvy, my interests and leisure pursuits have been completely up-ended.

For CoA, I’ve been tasked with a variety of social and online media tasks. The beginning of my term here also happened to coincide perfectly with the introduction of my first truly superfluous tech device. Knowing that I tend to read (slowly, granted) up to a dozen or so books at a time, my mother gave me an Amazon Kindle as a graduation present. This was apparently the perfect storm for me. Pretty soon I was badgering my computer programmer buddy with techie questions, chain-subscribing to gadgety e-newsletter lists, and gleefully rampaging through the Android App Store on a new phone that I hadn’t even made a call with yet.

This leads me to my central point: despite pitifully baseline knowledge of this kind of thing, I’ve had a blast learning about and using technology. Most recently, I’ve found myself supporting the online publication process for our brand new E-Book, The Age for Change. Web-wizard Sam Cohen did an awesome job setting up comingofage.org/ebook, and I’ve been fortunate enough to help out.

After putting the book’s contents on comingofage.org/ebook, I sold the rest of the team on the idea of having e-reader formats available. I can now confidently say that I know 100% more about e-reader files than I ever dreamed that I would, and have The Age for Change: An E-Book for People 50+ on no fewer than four different electronic book-reading devices. I’m up to my ears in gizmos, and I’m super stoked about it. I’m hoping to hear from those of you who are actually reading the e-book on one of these newfangled devices. As a convert, I like hearing from the choir.