alt Hacker NewsThe Hobbit was specifically written to be read out loud, if I remember correctly.
Would you also suggest to the families in the 30s & 40s that listening to the popular radio shows while sitting in the living room could have been a better experience if they had just read the transcript, instead? Or that they should have been multitasking during the shows, else it was a waste of their time?
Or for most of human history for that matter, stories have been listened to rather than read. It might be fun to participate in this tradition.