Kobo Books & Audiobooks

After seeing Ryder’s original video years ago, I started using the bullet journal method and did so for several years. Recently, I’ve come to realize that I missed a lot of the intention behind it. I missed the forest for the trees. I missed the point. To me, it was just a planner. A flexible one for sure, but it was just a planner. I developed systems to keep from rewriting things. I tracked habits. I broke down tasks. But I wasn’t really engaging with it later. Now I think it finally clicked for me. Using it as journal (in addition to it being a planner) and getting myself a pocket sized notebook that I can carry with me everywhere has completely changed the game. My bullet journal has significantly increased its role and value in my life. Seeing my thoughts and feelings on paper let me engage with my core motivations and values. It’s something I didn’t know I needed until I tried it. This book describes the process of bullet journaling very well. Understanding the intent behind the core concepts really opened the door for me to a whole new world. I can’t recommend this book enough. While it’s certainly not a prerequisite, understanding the ideas on a deeper level can really answer a lot of those questions that come up.

I’ve used kobo for years and it worked perfectly for my needs until they messed with the programming. What I like the least is that the screen no longer dims for reading at night with the lights off. At the dimmest setting on the new app the light is so bright it will burn your retinas. That is a shame because the old app could dim down quite nicely and that made it way better than kindle—although, I haven’t looked at kindle in a decade so maybe they have added that feature. More recently, an update to kobo made it so that the last few words at the end of a chapter would drop off. These words can be retrieved by adjusting the font size, but it disrupts the flow of being immersed in what one is reading. And there’s the issue of the app not retaining the reader’s place in the book. That seems to have improved some in the last couple days. Now the app doesn’t retain the book, but once you reopen the book it opens pretty close to where you left off reading. I’ve noticed several changes in just the last 7 days so hopefully, they will soon get things back to how they were before they improved the app. Fingers crossed that they fix the dimming option too.

First of all- I love Kobo and have a Kobo Glo e-reader too. 😘 I just read that some problems with the App may really be problems between iPhone and the Kobo App..which makes sense. Just to report on the App itself as per my own experience, I have some real difficulties. The most important is that I can't close and set as finished an e-book- not in any of the three supposed ways listed on the App! Also while much less troublesome than years past, I too notice that occasionally the book I tap- is not what opens..and I mean even when I try *very* carefully. Some other parts of the App are dysfunctional too, such as the section entitled "Manage Downloads". I have a great many Kobo e-books-yet only about 6-7 are listed here and I can't seem to do anything with them anyway, except perhaps delete them. Secondly, I've read on the App several times, that we should be able to sync what we're reading from our Kobo E-readers, to Kobo on our desktops, to our Kobo Apps and back exactly- so whatever page we are on in an e-book- will open exactly the same for us on whichever device we choose at a given time. However, at least on this particular update, so far, this piece of the App doesn't work for me. I still love that I have the Kobo App, and I use it. I liked the old "themes" and I like the new ones. It would be *great* though, if it worked fully in all the stated ways.