July 15, 2025, 12:29pm

Last week a Silicon Valley startup announced a new kind of e-reader that you can wear on your face. The company Sol Reader, is creating books that are glasses, described as “a wearable e-reading device that resembles a pair of blacked-out sunglasses, with a pair of e-ink screens embedded where the lenses might be.” Maybe it’s because I don’t often want to read while lying fully flat on my back with my arms at my side, but I don’t see a ton of utility for these book goggles. Like a lot of tech stuff lately, this seems like a solution in search of a problem.

How do these new glasses stack up against all the other technology we already have to access text? Here is my definitive ranking of ways to get text into your brain.

Carved into a Slab of Wood
The word “book” comes from the proto-Germanic word for “beech,” so it’s not a stretch to imagine that some of our earliest writing was carved into wood. It’s undeniably metal to carve words into things, but it’s not a great way to read or write. It’s pretty good for letting park visitors know that “J” has a crush on “K,” but I’m not going to start blogging on a board anytime soon.

Smartphone
Too small and too bright. I see a lot of people reading the news on their phone on the subway, and it seems to make them unhappy. I also see a lot of people reading on their phones in movie theaters, things like “guy in that one episode of SVU brown hair” and “are F1 cars really real,” and it seems to make everyone else in the theater unhappy. Reading on smartphones: practical, maybe, but enjoyable, no.

Sol Glasses
I’m not sure I understand why tech companies are continuing to try glasses-as-tech when every previous version has flopped so hard. Plus I personally don’t need a new way to crash into stuff around the home while reading and walking—I can do that just fine analog, thank you very much.

Laptop
There’s too much going on with the laptop. My work’s on here, my favorite movies are on here, all of my real life friends and foes are here. Reading on a laptop is like trying to relax in the middle of a public pool.

Tablet (Digital)
A little better than the phone or laptop, but there’s something undignified about having to insistently tap on glass to get to the next page. It always makes me feel like I’m trying to get the tablet’s attention while stuck inside a glass vestibule like a character in Uncut Gems.

Tablet (Wax)
Bees, among Earth’s strongest and most talented creatures, worked so hard to make the wax for these tablets, and for that we owe this tech our respect. I salute you, Bees, and may all your little dreams come true.

Tablet (Those Scribbly, Erasable, Etch-A-Sketch Style Ones Kids Use)
The best kind of tablet by far. I haven’t read anything good on one of these yet, but I’m sure my nieces and nephew are cooking up something revelatory as we speak.

Scroll
A tough reading technology to get into, not least of which because not a lot of new work is being published on scrolls these days. I have one comic that’s printed as a sort-of scroll and it’s gorgeous but very difficult to bookmark.

It’s a shame that the scroll got co-opted as jargon meaning to endlessly flip through crap. “Scrolling” should mean reading with dedication and focus, because you know you will lose your spot.

E-Reader
The digital paper screens they got on these things are pretty good, but I find the small frictions that crop up when moving from a paper book to an e-reader to be a little too annoying. Even a slight lag when you’re flipping a page can feel like an eternity when compared to flipping an actual page.

Braille Device
These things are so great—a wonderful electro-mechanical reading technology. If you’ve never seen one of these in real life, ask your librarian if you can check one out. They’re very cool.

Word and Letter Fridge Magnets
As a way to write something in the kitchen that freaks out your roommate’s boyfriend, fridge magnets can’t be topped.

Quipu
Two of humanity’s greatest inventions, language and knots, united in common purpose. Sorry to those embossed and deckle-edged romantasy hardcovers, but the quipu is easily the most beautiful reading tech.

Newspaper
Big, foldable, disposable, and gets the text to you without much fuss. Newsprint is so accessible that it feels almost contagious—fitting that it’s one of the few forms of publishing that literally leaves marks on your hands. And newsprint has a long afterlife. Good luck trying to make paper mache with your 300 dpi e-paper—you’re in for a disappointing piñata.

‘Zine
One of the top formats, perhaps a little too ephemeral or niche to rank higher, but definitely on my Mt. Rushmore of Reading Tech. One of the most flexible and accessible formats: if you have paper and a pen within your line of site right now, you can make a ‘zine. Amazing.

Audiobook
If you’re looking for a hands-free reading technology to fit the busy modern lifestyle, nothing has yet topped the audiobook. Listening to an old classic or some poems while you wash another dish or fold another shirt is an innovation that I’m thankful exists. Because while I’m a big proponent of boredom, sometimes I’m the last person I want to be stuck doing chores with.

Codex
This is why we’re all here folks, individual spokes orbiting the hub of literature, the art form that has become synonymous with its technology. The book, the codex, that gorgeous bound rectangle. A handheld, portable, flexible technology that can spread information, create community, and spark debate? Silicon Valley can only dream of inventing something so successful and iconic. It’s a life-changing, world-shaking technology, the tyrant’s foe and the people’s friend, folks get on your feet and make some noise for that text transporter we love so well.

But it’s not my top tech. That honor goes to…

Being Read Aloud To
The only thing that can top a book for me is someone reading a book to you. Sharing a book with someone by reading it aloud is intimate and communal, and just a lovely way to spend time with someone. As a technology, it’s responsive and attentive, and adds new layers and interpretive possibilities to texts you may have read a thousand times. Whether its poetry at a bar, or a holy work in a church, or a fairy tale in bed, you can’t beat hearing someone read to you.