A few years ago, I borrowed a book from my local library: Yu Si-min's Reading World History Backwards.
I was reading a chapter about the Dreyfus Affair when I noticed a small sticky note attached beside a passage. A previous reader had written a brief reflection on what that passage had meant to them.
For some reason, I felt compelled to respond. So I added another sticky note beneath it and left a reply of my own.
A few weeks later, I returned to the same library and found the same book again. When I opened it, I discovered that someone else had read both notes and left a small heart beside the notes.
That moment stayed with me.
We didn't know each other. We weren't reading together. We may never have met. And yet, through a single passage in a book, we had shared a small conversation across time.
What stayed with me wasn't only the book itself. It was the feeling of sharing a thought with strangers who had paused at the same sentence.
Years later, I started wondering why most reading platforms rarely capture that experience.