Yoshitaka Haba, who works as a book curator (!) and started a private library and cafe, Donkou / Kissa Fang, says:

“There are lots of things I’m worried about, but the thing I’m most worried about is that the competition for our time is too intense. Right now, it’s possible to surprise, entertain, and impress people with a few hundred words or a film that’s thirty seconds long. But there’s no such thing as a book you can read in thirty seconds. Reading takes time. The more time you spend, the deeper you can dive in. But everyone says they don’t have enough time, so the time they spend with books is decorative, a bit like going to the gym. What I mean by that is, exercise is something you can do at home, but people go out of their way to pay for an expensive membership so they can go work out. Gyms aren’t really about working out. They create a system so that you set aside time to exercise. Maybe reading is going to become a bit like that. Maybe you will pay for a membership to read in a certain place, just to ensure that you set aside time for reading.”