Reading is becoming more and more important in the new knowledge economy and remains the most effective human activity for transforming information into knowledge.
If top readers read at speeds of above 1000 words per minute (wpm) with near 85% comprehension, they only represent 1% of readers.
Average readers are the majority and only reach around 200 wpm with a typical comprehension of 60%.
This seems surprising since most readers, actively reading work documents, newspapers, magazines, books or the contents of a computer display are practicing daily for at least one hour.
Every computer-user who is also a slow typist is aware of the benefits he could obtain with a typing course, but nearly no one suspects the much higher profits he could reach by improving his reading comprehension and speed.
The rapid improvement of voice recognition may gradually make typing virtuosity obsolete since a good typist performs well under the speed of speech.
On the other hand, human or computer speaking, with an average speed of 150 wpm, will always remain many times slower than a good reader, without any consideration of the skimming and skipping possibilities.
