Thumb Thing helps you keep books open

Frequent Boing Boing and Make contributor Charles Platt is guest editing Kevin Kelly's Cool Tools newsletter, and his picks are wonderful.

Picture 2-46 When I was a teenager I remember reading a science-fiction story which predicted that by the 21st century, information would be piped directly into the brain. In the story, a character encountered that most archaic object, an old-fashioned book, and felt appalled that people in the 20th century had been forced to endure so much physical discomfort, holding books and turning their pages manually–or trying to prevent the pages from turning if there was a breeze.

Well, here we are in 2006, and the science-fiction prediction has failed to pan out. While we're waiting for wetware implants, we'll just have to make do with a stopgap solution: A plastic thumb aid.

It costs $3. Link