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Kindle Versus The iPhone
Bernie Campbell writes "Forbes takes a look at the recently announced Kindle ebook from Amazon, and considers the possibility that Apple may have beaten them to the punch. 'Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs has a not-so-secret weapon when it comes time to load up the iPhone with content: Google ... Google's Book Search project has already pumped much of the world's printed matter into Google's servers. Downloads of classic titles, such as Bleak House, can already be had for free. Mix Apple's iTunes content distribution smarts with Google's vast storehouse of content, and you'll have an instant competitor to Kindle -- one with a touch interface and the ability to play movies and music, too.'
Lend books to friends, are you kidding? Novels and light reading can be had from the public library; the type of books I collect tend to be those that are vital for my research, and those are expensive and only get more so with time. When I succeeded in getting a fairly cheap copy of Joseph's The Synchrony and Diachrony of the Balkan Infinitive , which now costs fifteen hundred bucks, do you think I'm going to lend it out to someone who might lose it? Granted, this doesn't hold for all, but the other academics here know what I'm talking about. Kindle would only make things easier for us if it meant easy replaceability from digital copies, but unfortunately there's often DRM involved.
Some of the folks who frequent this News for Nerds site are already used to using their notebook on the toilet with no problems, except for that poor guy who burnt his penis a couple of years back.
I saw his enthusiastic promotion of the Kindle on Pete Rose last night. However he was twitching all over the place. I would have thought he has a dyskinesia like Parkinsons. Extreme stress can increase the symptoms, i.e beingin in interviews from morning to night.