I like books—I like the look of them, the feel, the smell—and regardless of whatever “hoverboards” and “electronic pods” this oft-rumored “future” brings, you’ll have to pry my hard copies of books and newspapers and magazines and comics from my cold, dead hands. (Heh. So claims the kid typing a blog post, who just updated his Goodreads page.)

All that said, the Bits blog at the Times has an fascinating post on Amazon’s acquisition of Audible—and what it could mean for the Kindle reading device, and reading in general.

Steve Jobs said earlier this month that Amazon’s Kindle e-book reader was dead on arrival, since Americans have largely abandoned reading.

“It doesn’t matter how good or bad the product is, the fact is that people don’t read anymore,” he said. “Forty percent of the people in the U.S. read one book or less last year. The whole conception is flawed at the top because people don’t read anymore.”

Now Amazon wants the naysayers like Mr. Jobs to listen up–-literally.

On Thursday it said that it had agreed to buy Audible, the Web’s largest provider of downloadable audiobooks, for $300 million. Amazon isn’t saying much about what it will do with the company, but bringing audiobooks directly to its Web site and to the Kindle is the obvious first step.

What comes after that? How about a service that allows you to seamlessly switch from reading a book on your digital device to listening to the same book read aloud as you get in the car, or if your eyes are tired, or if you simply want to hear a crucial scene acted out? And then to switch back to the printed page?

Full entry here.