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My browser is a key part of my working life - for searching, learning and organising. I'm a FireFox user. I have been since it started outperforming Opera a few years ago.

I love Firefox. I love the way it allows me to save my bookmarks and access them from any Firefox browser on any computer (yes, I know all about Delicio.us, but I just never ever fell in love with the site). I love the way I can can customise Firefox with lots of widgets. I love the way it remembers all my passwords and information. I love the way I know loads of shortcuts. I love the way it makes my work easier.

However, I use Firefox on both my netbook and my Macbook Pro. And while Firefox's performance on the Macbook Pro is good (although not as fast as Safari), it's woeful on my Netbook. It just gobbles up any available memory until my netbook is strangled. Tabs take forever to open and the whole browser just isn't responsive.

I've tried Internet Explorer again. But it's a joke - I really don't understand how Microsoft with all the resources they have, can produce a browser that just Doesn't Work.

I've downloaded Safari for PC. Yes it's faster. It doesn't gobble memory. It's quick and easy to use. But it doesn't seem to me that I can customise it. E.g. I can't bring my Firefox bookmarks with me (and I don't want to hear a 'serves you right for not using Delicio.us). Last time I looked, it didn't support Alexa. Like a lot of mac stuff, it seems hard to 'add anything'. And I just don't feel comfortable using Safari. Not even on my macbook pro where it somehow feels 'unnatural' to use Firefox.

Whatever about using Firefox on my macbook pro, I can't stick with Firefox on my netbook. It's just Not Working. So. Has anyone got any hints on how to pimp my safari browser? Or should I work with Google Chrome for a bit (seeing as they're releasing a Chrome OS shortly)?

I love books. I studied English Literature at Trinity College Dublin, and did an MPhil in Publishing Studies in Stirling, Scotland. I've just written and published my first novel on www.lulu.com. And perhaps because of my great love of books, I've steered clear of experimenting with e-book readers.

However, I've just finished reading Victor Hugo's Les Misérables. It's a book I've always meant to get around to reading, but just somehow never managed to pick it up and get through it. Perhaps the size put me off. Les Misérables is a hefty tome. Big fat 300 pager. It's difficult to slip that into your handbag.

But the size of the book didn't put me off this time. Because I read it on my iPhone. Shortly after discovering I could download the entire works of Shakespeare with the Shakespeare app, I discovered the Stanza app.

Stanza enables anyone to download a range of reading material - from over 25,000 FREE books from the Project Gutenberg to the latest geek reads from O'Reilly.

I'm not sure why I started with Les Misérables. Perhaps it was its length. I didn't find it all that surprising that I would enjoy re-reading Shakespeare on the iPhone, but reading a huge long old novel? A definite challenge

But no. It wasn't. The challenge I found was to stop myself from slipping out of everyday life and into Les Misérables at every possible moment. I don't usually carry around the books I'm reading - they're stuck by my bed, on the sofa, wherever. Both fortunately and unfortunately, my iPhone goes everywhere with me - bed, beach, plane, dinner table and bar. I found myself addicted. Les Misérables is a wonderful novel. I was dipping into it constantly.

I had thought I'd dislike the fact that I can't 'feel' the book and 'know' how far along I am. Stanza feels like a phone. I like how my phone feels - not a problem. Stanza tells me to 2 decimal points, how far into my novel I am. And the strange thing is, I very quickly learned to 'know' where I was in the book, after just a few flicks in and out of Stanza's tracking bar.

I did find it difficult to track the characters in the book, however. In a printed book, if I find myself forgetting any of the novel, I'll flick back to a previous point, refresh my memory and move on. It's hard to 'flick' in Stanza, although you can select words for definition etc.

After finishing Les Misérables, I downloaded and read Jack London's Call of the Wild one Saturday morning in bed. Then I went a bit crazy and downloaded 20 more titles. I haven't paid for any content yet, although I'm curious to see how usable a tech book will be on the iPhone.

When reading from Stanza I couldn't help but think back to my childhood, where by the age of ten I'd read every book my parents owned and every book I was allowed to read in the local library (I wasn't allowed an 'adult' ticket until I turned 16). When I turned sixteen, I was able to fill my mind with the best my local library could offer - rows and rows of Catherine Cookson and Stephen King.

I can't help but wonder how I would've turned out if I'd had an e-book reader as a child. I would've had a world library at my finger tips. Thousands upon thousands of books. Maybe I would've read everything Stephen King had ever published by the time I'd turned 17, but maybe I would've also been able to read Lord of the Rings, Little Women, and countless other titles as well.

But e-book readers not only have a ridiculous name, they're expensive. And they're not made for sharing. So although my parents could manage a system whereby all six of us kids could share the computer we had, I couldn't picture them getting 6 kids to share an e-book reader? Every child needs their own device.

But what a difference one e-book reader per child could make to a child's self and directed education.

I've just read 2 great articles (and one OK article written as a response).

First read Nicholas Carr's Is Google Making Us Stupid?

Then read Jamais Cascio's Get Smarter (Is Google actually making us smarter?)

Finally, if you're mad keen, read Andrew Brown's response - Google isn't making us dumb - or smart. That's the problem.

I read and enjoyed all three articles. And after reading them I got to think about what I learned drinking tea. I drink yogi tea. It's strong, spicy stuff, that takes 7 minutes to brew. I usually manage to squeeze a couple of cups from each bag.

There's a label attached to each yogi teabag. Each label is printed with a short saying, designed to enlighten the casual tea drinker. I've always read my teabag and meditated briefly over the sayings - they repeat so you get to know them. Then one day I read the following saying for about the hundredth time:

"We are spiritual beings having a human experience."

And suddenly, like a punch to my gut, I got it. I was breathless for a few moments. I realised just what that saying meant. I got right inside the skin of it. It wasn't something the teabag taught me - it was something I understood. Something I felt. It changed something inside me.

You can know or learn facts. Google will always know a lot more facts than you, and be better at distributing them.

You can host knowledge. Google will always host more knowledge than you. But there's an outside chance you might be better at passing your knowledge directly on to an individual.

But so far, where Google fails, is in understanding. For now, only we can do this.

What will happen the day that Google begins to understand?

"I am a digital being having a human experience."

That'll be really something.