# Underlining in new books?



## hhanover (Nov 5, 2010)

Three months ago I bought a new Kindle.  I just bought In the Heart of the Sea and it came with underlining in it.  What's up with that?  As an aside, it cost more than the paper version.


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## hhanover (Nov 5, 2010)

Okay, never mind.  It's the "popular highlighting" feature.  Like, if you really want to know what some other reader thought was nifty and underlined it so that you, who have no trace of an original thought in your head, can have surrogate insights, you can see these thoughts of others.  Pass.


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## TheKindleWorm (Sep 11, 2010)

Ha ha, yes not everyone likes the "popular highlighting" in fact so much so that you might call it unpopular highlighting.

For those who find it irritating and want to turn this feature off do the following:

1) Press the home button on your Kindle
2) Press the menu button
3) Select Settings
4) Press the next page button so you are on page 2 of 3
5) At the bottom of this page where it says Popular Highlights, select "turn off"


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## arshield (Nov 17, 2008)

I think it is potentially a good research tool (not for those students that don't want to read) but for people studying how people read and consume information.

No idea if anyone will start using it that way.  I find it interesting to see what others think about a book.


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## RJ Keller (Mar 9, 2009)

Yeah, I turn that on when I've finished a book, to see what other people found "highlight worthy", but it would drive me nuts to have things pre-highlighted as I'm trying to read.


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## history_lover (Aug 9, 2010)

hhanover said:


> Okay, never mind. It's the "popular highlighting" feature. Like, if you really want to know what some other reader thought was nifty and underlined it so that you, who have no trace of an original thought in your head, can have surrogate insights, you can see these thoughts of others. Pass.


How does wanting to know what other people find interesting mean one does not have an original thought? Taking other people's interests into consideration does not mean I follow what they think - I make my own highlights unrelated to the popular ones and I don't always agree with the popular highlights. I'm just naturally curious about what other people find interesting - some would say that shows social intelligence.

It's no different from sharing famous or popular quotes. Goodreads, for example, has book and author quotes which people can add, share and "favorite". Fair enough if you don't want this kind of feature interrupting your reading flow in the middle of a book but I fail to see how it means we don't have an original thought of our own. Have you never quoted anyone, ever?


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## hhanover (Nov 5, 2010)

History_lover, I take your point.  However, having just read every single word in the book I am unlikely to have overlooked a quote which appeals to me.  I do, indeed, quote others.  In fact, I am going to start using the phrase "social intelligence", a direct quote from you but, alas, in my perfidy I will use it without attribution.  The juxtaposition of "social" with "intelligence" is a brain squeezer of sublime innuendo.  I found Karl Albrecht's book of that name and was delighted by his chapter name, "A New Kind of IQ".  God knows I could use that.


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## history_lover (Aug 9, 2010)

hhanover said:


> History_lover, I take your point. However, having just read every single word in the book I am unlikely to have overlooked a quote which appeals to me.


It's not about finding quotes which appeal to you. It's about learning what other people find interesting, to gain insight into _other people_, not necessarily the quote itself. I understand if that is not something that interests everyone (particularly because the other people you're gaining insight into are anonymous) but it does interest me.


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