Just for fun, I have to rant about the Kindle after seeing another ad on how well Kindle works in the bright sunshine on the beach.
Who are all these people reading at the beach? How about everywhere else where real people spend most of their time? Is the terrific benefit of reading at the beach some excuse for not including a light in the original design?
The design itself is quite modern for 1997. My first Palm Pilot had a similar style. Does anyone really use that ridiculous and barely functional keyboard? And, thank you for the loud click every time I turn the page… that has led to the Kindle being banned from my bedroom after my wife falls asleep (which is okay, since there is no light).
Also, ordering a book in 60 seconds is cool, but it takes me 1-2 months to read a book so I could handle waiting an extra minute or two. Still, I guess when your design is less than terrific, the keyboard doesn’t work and serves no useful purpose, and there is no light, you hang your hat on the novelty of fast book delivery and beach reading.
Thank you Amazon for solving two problems that I did not have. I’m going to drop my Kindle accidentally so I have an excuse to buy an iPad like the cool kids or maybe I’ll sell it to a speed reading beach dweller.
(P.S. I do almost all of my shopping at Amazon, and I think it’s an amazing company… But, no company is perfect.)
The Kindle is the Epcot Center version of the future…..a future that already feels behind.
I’d be happy if they would just add the ability to create folders!
I just ordered for my husband the Sony version with the touch screen. Seen them? how are they? Mannn….I hope I didn’t order a bad thing (he loves to read, in bed, in the car, etc)
Love my Kindle, but… I love books. I think that is the big difference.
The Kindle isn’t an iPad. It wasn’t designed to be a browser. It wasn’t designed to check e-mail. It was designed to be an electronic book. The keyboard only exists to order books.
I too have an iPad — and I love it more and more as I use it, but I would never read a book on it. (I should note: I read a lot more then six books a year, so… I’m probably not the typical person.)
The Kindle was built to be a book. A back light strains the eye, so Jeff Bezos has said that he won’t add one until it can be designed to be “easy on the eyes.”
The one change I would make: The touch screen. It is nice to “turn” the pages.
The other change… DRM books. I can pass along a printed book to a friend to read. I can’t do that with my e-book. So they either should charge significantly less — they don’t have the printing and delivery costs, so… Or when one buys a book, you ought to be able to give it away.
@Nichole: The Sony eReader just doesn’t compare IMHO bc it isn’t wireless — the ability to download books is absolutely delightful. Also I don’t believe that Sony has nearly the selection of books available. Amazon has the relationship with publishers.
Thanks, Christopher! I appreciate the insight!
My Nook beats the Kindle in every way. Built on the Android OS, easy to read screen, great connectivity, and even comes with a decent browser and a good chess program. In fact, the first site I browsed on the Nook was Govloop and it was better than I expected.
And the coming Droid pad will demolish the iPad. I like open source, I like the ability to hack my stuff, and I like not being subject to the closed mind of Steve Jobs. Free the apps!
I haven’t made the technological jump to e-books yet. I’m guess I’m waiting for a multi-functional device, like the iPad or DroidPad (when and if). As a college student, I used to work in a used bookstore. I have… MANY books. Some first editions and some signed collectibles. E-books lack the romance of books and the musty smell of the stacks. I may be on the fence over this for a while.
Ouch! Weird as much as I love gadgets, I have no interest in getting a eboook reader as I think there is noting better than reading a ‘real’ book. Why? Things that I do not like about ebook readers and the way it has been implemented…
* I cannot share an ebook with a friend like.
* DRM. Who cares if I have purchased a Kindle and want to read it with iBooks?
* No library function yet. Being able to check out a library book,via the Kindle for example, would be close to reading nirvana!
* Can’t resell ebook
* Can’t buy used ebook
I love my nook! I thought I would never give up the “real thing,” but the convenience and reliability of the nook changed my mind (and I never have to worry about losing my place if a bookmarker falls out!). When housebound during the last snowstorm, I finished a book and just downloaded another…it was great! And, you can share your books with another nook reader, even if only for 14 days.
Thanks for all of the great comments. I had not looked at the the Nook and need to check it out. Also, I am currently helping our City Library system with its strategic plan and now plan to get GovLooper feedback on that as soon as I have time as I think we can take this topic further.
Chris: I was hoping that someone I know spends a lot of time on the beach would be the first to chime in on behalf of the Kindle… I know that’s not you.
I do have to clarify, that I read 6-12 books per year, not just 6 🙂 and that I love books… I’m just a dreadfully slow reader. I also do have to give credit to Amazon for three things: 1) I read more now that I have the Kindle 2) Ebooks needed to go mainstream after years on the fringes and they did it 3) The iphone Kindle app allows me to catch up on reading at odd times, and I love it.
I would love to get a e-book reader…thing is, i hate DRM. The sheer ‘i’m gonna control what you read’ aspect of it bugs me. I refuse to use ITunes and other such things for just that reason. I will never buy another movie with a ‘digital copy’ because of the DRM…I’ll rip the dvd instead and put it on whatever machine i want and watch it as many times as i want thank you so much. 🙂
What I’d love to find is a generic version of the IPad. Something I can check e-mail and lightly browse on. And something I can read books on, but not necessarily the proprietary formats, but also .doc, .rtf, .txt etc. I have tons of downloaded fanfic I’d love to have handy to read, but I gotta have them in normal document formats.
I too like the feel of a book. The fact that I don’t have to worry about a battery running down or getting it wet (at least it being destroyed if it gets wet), or being jarred and buggered up. I love hitting a used book store and not being at the mercy of ‘sorry, didn’t sell enough, so it’s out of print now’. Or the horror stories of amazon or sony deleting books off peoples devices.
I like the format of the IPad, just not the ‘gadget for the price’ aspect of it. (knock about 200 dollars off each version and i’d probably have one) Nor do I like its limited memory. I wanna dump some movies and music and fic on it once and not have to continually fiddle with only having a few gig and zero ability for plugging in a memory card. (at least not without an expensive adapter that’ll stick out from the device)
I think my perfect gadget would be a morphing of an e-book reader, tablet pc and IPad, with enough power to play a movie and music and surf, enough memory to hold my music, movie and book/fic library and the touch screen of a reader so i’m not chained to a keyboard and screen combo while still keeping under that 1-2 pound weight limit.
I don’t want much 🙂
I love my Nook!
I love my Nook too!