Call me old-fashioned, but I love books and everything about them.

I love their musty smell, crisp fonts, and the weight of the paper as I turn the pages. I also love being able to make notes in the margin, fold down the corner to bookmark my page, and crack it open until a crease appears along its spine. I like poking around my friends' bookshelves. I like browsing through bookstores so I can judge them by their covers.

So I'm not exactly thrilled by the news that e-readers might soon emerge as the next new must-have gadgets. While I appreciate that e-books will save our forests by cutting back on our paper usage [0], I'm not sure I'm ready to curl up with a mug of hot tea and the latest trendy new gadget.

Nonetheless, business forecasters [1] predict that e-readers could reshape the way we read, much like iPods and MP3 players changed how we listen to music.

E-readers are similar to iPods and MP3 players in lots of ways. They're light, portable, and can hold entire libraries. You can buy the book you want online and download it to your e-reader. Sony's new Portable Reader [2]sells for $350, and it is currently on back-order. Their store already has more than 10,000 titles and they plan to sell each book for about 25 percent less than it would cost at the bookstore.

Years ago, a techie friend explained the concept to me, and we laughed about how there was no way that people would go for it. Too hard on the eyes, we decided. Too cold, too sterile, too high-tech, too slick and modern when you just want to settle into the world of Jane Austen, Harry Potter, or Stephen King.

The screen issue seems to be solved by some cool new technology that insures an easy-to-use, easy-on-eyes display that has impressed the critics. [3] And thanks to iPods, most of us now appreciate the charms of having an entire library at our disposal.

I'm not sure that it'll be enough to sway all diehard book lovers. But if the price drops, the prospect of helping the environment might convince me to give an e-reader a whirl, especially if I'm buying books about helping the environment [3].

How about you?