I’ve got a editorial in the March edition of Locus Magazine, “You Do Like Reading Off Screens,” that tries to explain why people who read off screens all day say that they won’t buy ebooks because they “don’t like reading off screens.”

“I don’t like reading off a computer screen” — it’s a cliché of the e-book world. It means “I don’t read novels off of computer screens” (or phones, or PDAs, or dedicated e-book readers), and often as not the person who says it is someone who, in fact, spends every hour that Cthulhu sends reading off a computer screen. It’s like watching someone shovel Mars Bars into his gob while telling you how much he hates chocolate…

The problem, then, isn’t that screens aren’t sharp enough to read novels off of. The problem is that novels aren’t screeny enough to warrant protracted, regular reading on screens.

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This is the most incredible accolade I’ve ever received: I have been honored with the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Pioneer Award, which “recognizes individuals and organizations that have made significant and influential contributions to the development of computer-mediated communications and to the empowerment of individuals in using computers and the Internet.” I join the ranks of previous winners, including Tim Berners-Lee, Mitch Kapor, Jimmy Wales, Bruce Sterling, and Linus Torvalds. My fellow winners this year are Yochai Benkler and Bruce Schneier. Talk about exalted company! The awards will be given out at a ceremony chaired by Marc Cuban, at the Emerging Tech conference in San Diego later this month. I’m incredibly thankful to EFF for this honor.

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My latest InfoWeek column is online, “The Web Can Humiliate Dumb Companies. Can It Make Them Smarter?”

Dysfunctional consumer companies know only two modes of customer service: Abusive contempt, or slobbering, cringing remorse. Cory Doctorow describes how broken companies can make good customer service the standard.

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