I was reading an article, Bargain Hunting for Books, and Feeling Sheepish About It, at New York Times today and it made me sad. According to the piece, bookstores are slowly losing revenue and some are even closing due to the easy of buying and reselling books online.

“In other words, it’s all the fault of people like myself, who increasingly use the Internet both to buy books and later, after their value to us is gone, sell them.”

In some ways, the Internet has made it easier to read more books, making lesser known and rarer books available, especially the classics and out-of-print books that are now hard to find in some stores. On the other hand, though, it cuts into profits for both bookstore, publishing companies, and authors, because when people like me or you sell or trade books with each other, the three entities mentioned above don’t get a single cent out of our transaction.

I’ll admit that I’m one of those guilty of using the Internet (and libraries because they’re free!) a lot more than bookstores when it comes to acquiring new books. Lately, I’ve been using Swaptree.com, which allows you to list all the old books, dvds, and CDs that you don’t want anymore, create a wishlist of items that you do want, and then uses a system to match you up with someone who can trade with you so that everyone ends up happy. Neat, right? So far, I’ve gotten an almost brand-new copy of Kung Fu Panda, Pirates of the Caribbean, and the book The Queen’s Fool in exchange for old books I didn’t read anymore. Someone else’s trash is another person’s treasure, right? And what’s wrong with spreading the love of books all around?

I do love going to Barnes and Nobles, but just looking at the price tags on some of the books makes me cringe. Why should I pay $20 for a hardcover copy of Jodi Picoult’s Nineteen Minutes when I can get the same book, used but in almost new condition, for around $5 or less online? Or pay $200 for a new textbook when I can find the same thing for $100 on Half.com? I think what the publishing companies and bookstores need to do is capitalize on the advantages that the Internet offers. E-books are quickly becoming popular, and it’s an area they should look further into. Otherwise, they have to find other means of luring customers into stores or face a slow death of the industry :(

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People seriously need to learn how to use the APC (Automated Postal Center) at their post office. It’s so unbelievably easy to use, it walks through you through every single step, and it saves you sooo much time. No more waiting in line for 30-40 minutes just so the postal clerk can weigh a single package and stick a stamp on there. Gah, I remember so many lunches during my senior year of high school that I spent waiting in the horribly long and slow-moving line, just so I could mail off college applications and financial aid forms. It was a huge pain in the butt.

Say hello to the new APC! I think they’ve had them in place since 2005 or 2006; I don’t know if you can find them in every single post office but they definitely have one in the post office near my house and I’m so incredibly glad, especially since I’ve been mailing off so many orders and trades for Laundro and Soompi lately. I remember last week walking inside with five big packages and two letter-sized envelopes stuffed into my tote bag; taking those through the line would have cost me at least an hour But thanks to the APC, I weighed those packages, swiped my credit card, and out pops the stamps, all in less than 15 minutes.

The only bad thing is that the APC won’t do transactions less than $1, which I found out today when I was trying to mail a $0.76 envelope to someone who bought a mini memo grabbie from me on Soompi. The stupid thing made me buy the $0.76 stamp along with a regular $0.42 stamp to make the total $1.18 Oh well, I had to mail another letter to my aunt in Oklahoma anyways, so it’s not like the stamp went unused.

But seriously, I love strolling past all the suckers in line, waiting for the slooow postal clerks to get to them, and plopping my packages on the APC and getting what I need done in like 10 minutes flat. People always stare, probably thinking, why the hell do I have to stay in line and that girl just walks over to the machine? Haha. I actually had two people get out of line last week and come over to me and ask what I was doing. It was really funny to me, because they weren’t old or anything – they looked like they were in their twenties or thirties – but they had no clue what the APC was for (but to their credit, once I explained what it was, they quickly figured out how to use it). Come on, everything is automated or self-serve these days – the grocery store, gas station, etc – I’m just waiting for automated restaurants or something one day.

Gotta love technology :)

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