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The Cult of Kindle
DaMan writes "ZDNet's Hardware 2.0 blog is pondering the Kindle this week. There have been many attempts at an ebook reader in the past; why does Amazon think it can do any better? Given the high cost and DRM issues, will cachet be enough to win them financial success? Will the 'Cult of Kindle' help guarantee Amazon's success in the ebook reader market? 'A group of people willing to give it a five star rating just because someone else didn't, willing to back up every design, engineering and marketing decision that Amazon made, willing to defend the Kindle with their last dying breath. The Kindle doesn't cost money, it saves money. That 0.75 second flash as the pages turn isn't a downside because it gives you an opportunity to take in the previous page. It doesn't harm your eyes, in fact, it fixes them. Ergonomic issues that other reviewers have bought up are dismissed by the Cult of Kindle as flaws with the reviewer, not the device. The Kindle is perfect, and the Kindle 2.0 will be a little more perfect.'"
I didn't realise the Kindle was made by Apple.
Almost every product has them. I think even the Zune has two.
Pass on this one. This is about the worst article trolling I've seen. All it does is attack a particular set of supporters of the project. It is designed purely to incite flamage. It's disgusting. Zonk please think before approving this crap. The article doesn't want to start a debate at all. It's already made all the conclusions in an extremely prejudiced manner. I'm sure there are supporters of the kindle for legit reasons, and if I was one of them I would be horribly offended!
Disclaimer: I've never used the product in question or even amazon.com for that matter. This was just a particular revolting piece of garbage.
I got a catholic block.
Alright, Amazon, I'm only going to tell you this one more time. People who don't like books aren't going to come around if you put them on a screen. People who like books like, well, BOOKS. And as the reviewer points out, $400 is a load of money for what is essentially a blank, fragile, battery-powered book.
Tags != Comments, and -1 (Troll) != -1 (I Would Respond Angrily To This Poster So They Must Be Trolling)
Amazon has been watching the iPod and iPhone phenomena, and it wants the same thing. What company wouldn't? Whatever you say about Apple, they know how to make stuff sell.
The quote above is exactly the fanboi-ism that Amazon is looking for: "This gadget has absolutely no flaws, except for whatever Amazon deems are flaws, and then we will curse those flaws after the fact."
Sam! If you will let me be,
I will try them.
You will see.
- Doesn't display PDFs natively.
- Doesn't allow me to annotate on the page (or take pen input).
- Can show web pages like wikipedia, yet doesn't allow me to browse.
- Doesn't support WiFi hotspots.
- 600x800x1bit pixel resolution is terrible.
Though battery life does look good. Still, my Newton ten year old 2100 has the same resolution, the same battery life, and many of the same restrictions. Lame.
I don't really get the whole ereader thing; sure the Iliad looks nice, but my Palm TX works perfectly. I have 4 ebook applications on it and combined with FontSmoother it looks great. I always have it with me (because it contains my calendar) and it plays MP3's at the same time. Why would I want to spend twice that money on a dedicated reader?
No PDF support, less features than an iLiad. Lame.
Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'
Attention reviewers buying ergonomic issues, I have a wonderful wholesale offer you can't refuse...
Amazon has a problem in that, books are a "traditional" thing. Most of the books that Amazon sells are for personal enrichment and entertainment. I mean, there's more to a book than its content. Sure, if we're working and doing techy stuff, Google is good for finding things, but, if you want to just relax and unplug, a book is a beautiful thing. You hold in your hand a tradition of printing that goes back hundreds of years, of writing that goes back thousands. There's a whole literary culture floating out there, waiting for you to join it. For a brief time, when you do read a book, you do.
Yes, you could argue, that an e-book could hold 10 million books. But, what of it? A book by itself is something that holds more than enough for you to read for a few hours, and you get the smell and feel of the paper, the binding, the immediacy, history and intimacy. An e-book is just another plastic appliance, lacking in craft.
This is my sig.
I don't know about you, but I think the writer sounds a little bitter. Someone should buy him a Kindle to cheer him up.
Now the ePaper thing is cool admittedly. The DRM is as cool as chilli peppers in Hades...
But does anyone else think that the Kindle looks like an all white speak-and-spell? It really looks like a cheap 90's designed kids toy to me. And not in a retro way -- in a Made-in-Taiwan kind of way.
This has been happening since as far back as you might want to look. Reviews, and really anything news-y, says as much about the speaker as about the subject matter. Go ahead, look at reporting on politics, war, cars, computers, music, art, even the weather.
There is no objective reporting. You can only report your understanding, and while you can be well-informed and well-rounded, you can't avoid subjectivity entirely. (Don't tell Ayn Rand!) The best you can do is be up-front about where you're coming from and let folks take that into account.
What if I do the same thing, and I do get different results?
All eBook readers will come with heavy and draconian DRM (as mandated by the book agency) until one vendor (also with heavy and draconian DRM) significantly corners the market through a beautifully easy to use device, tied in store and large volume of works.
This one company won't licence their DRM to anyone else and uses their huge market presence to force book publishers to accept the price points and the restrictions they want.
Given that the only way to get books out to everyone with that reader and avoid partnering with the one big company, publishers will find themselves having to accept that they're going to have to start looking at DRM free books.
Sound familiar?
(All I can say is thank god for Apple not licensing their DRM. If they'd done a Microsoft and licensed it to everyone who asked, music publishers would never ever have been contemplating DRM free media)
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
"A group of people willing to give it a five star rating just because someone else didn't, willing to back up every design, engineering and marketing decision that Amazon made, willing to defend the Kindle with their last dying breath."
With this quote, they surely meant to say 'Apple', and not 'Amazon'.
Sony isn't any better than the rest when it comes to DRM/keep the customer tight/buy, it's all we care.
Of course I have no GSM in the reader, but I don't need it, do I ?
and you have a plethora of tools working under linux to make your books and mangas compatible.
300US $. and then you take the books wherever you want, even on Sony's book library (bastards offer you "free" books from their "classical collection", everything you can get for free on Gutemberg...).
So, Kindle was a miss for me. I don't need a gadget that makes me pay through the nose AGAIN for everything.
(btw, if you have way more money than me, have a look at Irex second iteration of their epaper. A4 format, tablet functions, wifi..700 or 800 US$)
It takes 40+ muscles to frown, but only four to extend your arm and bitchslap the motherfucker
Sounds like the rantings of an anti-Apple fanboy. Nobody is looking at the Kindle because they find it interesting or might like to try it out, it's because it's a cult.
I can't help but compare the zealous support for this device to a joke, it's a personal favorite of mine. I'm sure we could have some fun replacing 'lightbulb' with 'kindle', enjoy. Q: How many members of Congress does it take to change a lightbulb? A: None. There is nothing wrong with the lightbulb; its conditions are improving every day. Any reports of its lack of incandesence are delusional spin from the liberal media. That lightbulb has served honorably, and anything you say undermines the lighting effort. Why do you hate freedom?!?
No words of wisedom here.
If it doesn't have the scrolling feature of ReadThemAll then it's not worth having. I've been using this app on a Palm for many years. I don't spend a whole lot of time reading on my Palm because I don't have a lot of down time outside of the house and I quite like pulling a book off the shelf when at home. But, I always have a bunch of Project Gutenberg text files loaded on my Palm and if I do get a boring moment the only app I would consider using is ReadThemAll.
No other autoscrolling feature makes any sense after you've seen the line by line redrawing method. I don't have a Kindle and don't see much reason to buy one, but if it doesn't have this mode I wouldn't even consider it even if my Palm died.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I do not own it, but I was able to borrow it for 48 hours.
In reading other reviews, I think most of the reviews I have read are talking about the "eBook" concept in general. That, to me, is separate from a review of the Kindle. I have no idea of "eBooks" will catch on, or if people will generally like them. If you like the idea of an eBook, I thought the Kindle implemented the eBook concept quite nicely.
I thought the platform was very nice. This is not a laptop, it is a book. And, for reading books, I thought it did a great job. I liked the the form factor for reading. It was comfortable to hold and comfortable for reading. I really liked the ability to "impulse buy" books. I only downloaded samples (as it wasn't my Kindle or Amazon account), but it was fast and enjoyable. I also liked the ability to change the font size. It allowed me to place the Kindle in a position that was comfortable on my arms and comfortable for my eyes. I really can't say I cared if it did PDF natively or not. I read PDF's on my laptop. I'm not sure why this has become some huge deal. I didn't feel Kindle was trying to replace all things paper.
Is an e-book reader for documentation. Most software documentation is available as a pdf formatted for an 8.5 x 11 or A4 paper size. Are there any e-book readers available that are suitable this format?
this signature has been removed due to a DMCA takedown notice
Most of that paper is farmed. I suppose next you'll be telling us we'll have to forgo the luxury of killing vegetables because they taste good.
Because your objection is incredibly stupid and ignorant?
Basically, these people have bought the kindle and like it, or at least don't hate it enough to throw it away. What they really DO like is the fact that buying it puts them in a group of people who have a cool device and therefore they get a feeling of belonging. They identify part of their own self-worth with the "coolness" and value of the device.
Therefore, if the device is perceived as "cooler" or more desireable by the general population, they emotionally can transfer that to themselves. They'll promote kindle without reason and defend it to the death because they're really defending themselves. The sad part is that many of them don't know it... they truly believe they're objectively promoting this product, and they truly believe that the people who haven't gotten it yet eventually will.
The same thing happens with many technology items, like many in the cult of Mac or those who are rabid about Linux... the technologies' true worth and faults are irrelevant to them, sometimes without them realizing it, because they identify themselves as "Mac Owner" or "Linux User", and all that matters is if someone attacks their technology, it's an attack on them and their in-group.
Erik
My boss bought a Kindle and let me play with it earlier this week and I've been meaning to write a review of my thoughts, but given this, maybe I shouldn't. ;)
It's a really neat device and if you're a bookworm and do any sort of commuting (where you can read) or traveling, this device will provide an endless amount of entertainment. As long as you're connected - my boss later found out that the Sprint network doesn't work at his house. My boss also doesn't like the ergonomics: when you turn it over to turn it off, you're likely to inadvertently hit the next/prev button.
When I first got my hands on it, I tried hooking it up to my Ubuntu box w/ its USB cable and it locked up the device after showing the USB screen. I wonder what the review-haters would say about that? "Ubuntu? That's a problem with your OS -- get a modern OS"
I'm not sure what the secret to success is, but the secret to failure lies in trying to please everyone -Bill Cosby
Personally, I find my PSP to be a fantastic book reader...all it takes is just two freeware programs (convert the PDF or LIT to fit the screen, held either normally or vertically) and then another program to convert each page into a jpeg (so you can view it, since the PSP doesn't have native PDF or LIT support) and bam, eReader. Works great, and the batter lasts for quit a long time using it in this manner.
Living With a Nerd
The price I've seen is 700USD and for that price I can buy a cheap laptop that is way more expandable.
If you think this, then it is clear that this technology is not for you. I read a lot of this in slashdot but what people fail to see is that there is a specific market for this kind of devices. Specially for the ones that allow making some kind of notes.
As an example, both of my parents are biologists (they go to field trips to that strange place called "the nature" quite often). They sometimes stay camping when doing field trips which are usually done to catalogue species and the like. One of the main problems in those trips is that students may have to take their field guides (which are supposed to be special editions for field work but, are akin to our "SQL pocket edition " manuals, with lots and lots of pages). The problem is that sometimes they have to take two or three guides with them making it really painful to pack 5 Kgs of books...
Now, they usually can not take a laptop because trips last for a lot of time, and they need access to the books quite often. Hence, a laptop which battery lasts for 4 hours at *most* wont be useful. However a device which lasts 15 hours or more will be very very useful.
That is why, when I showed my parents and my flatmate (who is a zoologist) the OLPC, they got fascinated as it really solves quite a lot of problems for them. Specially, my flatmate goes into the Selva Lacandona and stays there camping and examining animals for weeks. A computer which can be powered by turning a crank and which power lasts longer (they do not need fancy graphics, even black and white is great) will be the perfect sollution.
The problem is that from our closed computer cube world, this kind of devices only make sense as gizmos. But there *are* several uses for this technology.
Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'
The CD took over, despite the "warmth of vinyl" BS, because it was small, convenient, easy & fast. Insert in player, hit "play", it plays - and plays perfectly. Hit "next track" and you're there immediately without having to do anything else, without scratches or chipmunks.
... but wake me up when I can flip pages as fast as scrolling on an LCD display, and without bizzare flickering.
The Sony ebook reader, and apparently the Kindle, just isn't there yet: click "next page" and you have to wait, you can't just flip thru pages really really fast, and the page transition makes this horrible wierd flicker that lasts just long enough to be seriously distracting. The screen looks great (paper-like) when just sitting there, but the transition is just bad - and that happens every single page. I applaud the high density of content in a slim package
Can we get a "-1 Wrong" moderation option?
The press doesn't just get it. It's not the device, it's the store. With regard to the device, all they needed to do was not screw up, and by all reports they haven't.
There are two immense difference between the Kindle and all previous ventures.
First, the availability of titles is at least an order of magnitude larger than with any previous ventures. Themeans that the chances the title you want to buy is available is much higher.
In my informal personal tests a few years ago, I found that that about 3/4 of the titles in Oprah's book club books were available as audiobooks, yet less than 1/10 were available in any of the three major eBook formats (Gemstar, Microsoft LIT, Adobe) of the time.
If you are someone who buys books, as opposed to someone to whom books are sold, if you know a title you want to buy, I think your chances of buying it in Kindle format may actually be higher than at a brick-and-mortar mall bookstore, and I'm sure they're higher than at an airport bookstore. This was not true before.
Second, the people griping about the $10 pricing for recent books seem to be unaware that in all previous ventures, the publisher charged something close to the hardbound price for books that were not yet available in paper.
Do I think the $10 ($9, $8, $7) prices are fair for an electronic book? No, I do not... but, for a current hardbound bestseller, a sane person could conceivably imaging buying one. Previously, the selling proposition--hardbound pricing--was so excessively greedy as to be a deal-breaker for almost everyone.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
aaarrrrg
</i>
Use the Preview Button! Check those URLs!
Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'
I have no interest in Kindle - the lack of PDF support, and no pdf converters kind of killed it for me. I've got a smartphone which supports them, and considering PDF is now a standard formate its kind of inexcusable not to support it. The sony ebook reader supports pdf (albiet indirectly), and at least has a pretty decent converter to import pdf files into its native format. Sadly, the best is still the regular adobe reader I have on my junky old Ipaq. The added bonus? My ipaq displayes images in color.
One of these days mankind is going to have to forgo the luxury of killing trees because they smell nice. Why not today
Trees are evil. They are always taller than we are, which means, they always look down on us. They hard and practically unbending, meaning they are inflexible.
They stand before humanity, and mock them, continually. And yet, you support these things?
I enjoy chopping down trees. The mighty axe puts any in its place, and I enjoy wood furniture and flooring as a symbol of my domination over nature.
This is my sig.
I was given a Sony E-reader recently as part of an airline promotion. I was as skeptical as most in this thread about their utility, etc., but have become a bit of a convert:
1. On vacation they're absolutely brilliant. I was out of the country for two weeks. The reader plus charger took almost no space, especially compared to the space ten or eleven books would have taken. I had my notebook with me as well, and was able to buy additional books -- which let me keep going on a series I particularly liked.
2. The slow page refresh isn't terrible, and I gather the Kindle is faster than the Sony.
3. I like the feel of the Sony reader. I suspect the Kindle is clunkier, but I defer to Pogue in the NYTimes who said it was fine. The screen works well in open daylight, and I quickly enough was able to ignore the medium and get into the content.
4. It looks like Amazon is given customers a price break on e-books. Sony charges as much as a paper book.
Bottom line: they're more useful than would appear to a non-user -- especially during travel.
And to the cult thing: I suspect like most people, I am not particularly loyal to any online store. I am willing to pay *slightly* higher prices to Amazon for both the convenience and their excellent handling of (very rare) problems.
I work in the research sciences (bioinformatics) and I'm dying for a device that lets me: - store/categorize PDFs of research papers and journals - annotate them - search them This would keep me from carrying around PDF print-outs of the last 10 papers I pulled from PubMed while I go through them and scribble all over the margins. My iPhone can display them, but that's pretty much it. The scientific journal subscription stuff would have worked nicely in their newspaper subscription model. If it could have done all this I have bought Kindle on the first day (and book reading would have been a bonus.)
I just got a Kindle, but I feel like both sides of the debate are being unreasonable. First, probably the reason that most people who buy the Kindle give it very good reviews is that they researched the issues with the Kindle beforehand and decided that those flaws didn't matter to them (I know I did, before I paid my $400). Those who give it horrible reviews decided the flaws made it not worth it to them. (I also suspect people are inflating their good reviews to compensate for all the 1-star reviews by the Kindle-haters).
Now, why did I get the Kindle?
First of all, the argument that book-readers like physical books isn't always true. I read a lot of law books (big, heavy, unwieldy things that are miserable to handle). I need to read the content. I hate the physical book. I have to lug several around with me when I travel (my backpack is fantastically heavy) and I can't read them in bed without wearing out my arms after a few minutes. The Kindle solves all of these problems. This applies not just to law books, though. Even moderately heavy hard-backed books are difficult to read in bed for long durations.
As to the Kindle vs. other devices, I keep seeing people claiming that their iPhone is sufficient. Maybe they don't get eyestrain reading backlit lcds, but I do. The e-Paper is much easier on the eyes. It's not QUITE at the level of printed books (and you have to be a little forgiving of the typography--the Kindle doesn't seem to have a hyphenation dictionary), but I can read it for long durations without going blind.
Finally, the biggest attraction for the Kindle is that it has the books I want or need to read. Amazon has law books (at least some, and hopefully more will be coming soon). They also have novels, etc. that I want to read. I looked into other e-books in the past and the major reason I didn't get them (even if their specs are better on paper) is because they don't have the content I want or need. The Kindle (mostly) does.
As for the other issues, I would like PDF ability, but from what I understand there is no ebook reader that handles PDFs really well, and you CAN convert PDFs to Kindle's format if you need, though it is a hassle. The Kindle's web browser is decent, and makes a nice backup when I'm not around a WiFi spot, but there is Sprint service (and it's free). I also don't care about the looks of the Kindle (it actually looks better in person, I think, but even if it didn't, I want it for its function, not its form).
Sure, the Kindle isn't for everyone. If you read mostly paperback novels, one at a time, the Kindle isn't for you. If you read enormous, unwieldy books that you have to lug across the country when you go home for Christmas vacation so that you don't fail your exams, the Kindle is wonderful. Same if you don't travel, but just like to read big, bulky books without having to sit up. Anyway, yes, there are legitimate reasons for the Kindle.
I love new tech gadets but the Kindle really is pointless. It's never going to replace printed books. There's the DRM/Privacy issues which concern us techies, but the killer fault is that it's just more hassle than buying a printed book and reading it. No power requirements, no DRM, no internet connectivity... If they could find a way to make using this thing easier than just opening a book and reading it then maybe, but I just can't see that ever happening.
Would could put that land to a different use. Personally, I would like to see that land be used to grow mighty tree's for parks.
I am not against tree farms, but if we could get away from using wood from generic mass produced items I think we would be better off.
OTOH, I love a good park.
"Most of that paper is farmed. I suppose next you'll be telling us we'll have to forgo the luxury of killing vegetables because they taste good."
if we could supplant them with a product that is cheaper sell, quicker to make, and still gives you all the same taste vitamins and minerals, why not?
Not that we are very close to that, but it will happen. We'll probably start selling meat that is grown in vats to the general public before then. The every steak will be a perfect steak, and cheap.
Mmm..I'm getting a steak for dinner to night.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I've got it on my phone and it's pretty good. I think only does plain text, but if you get most of your books from Gutenberg or other DRM-free sources, ASCII-only is a trivial weakness.
Overall, I'm pretty happy with my iPhone as a single-gadget solution. When I had a Treo, I appreciated the ability to read eBooks on my phone, (my main non-phone use) but really wasn't too happy with the browser experience. Having the ability to use OWA to check my work email wasn't an option with the (lame) Palm browser, which was a real pain.
When the iPhones dropped in price and I was able to see the version of Safari that's on them (that's pretty much a full-fledged browser, minus Flash--and is that a defect or a benefit?) I decided to buy one. So far, I'm pretty happy with it.
Interested in a Flash-based MAME front end? Visit mame.danzbb.com
As for the idea that the Kindle "saves" money, it depends on whether the person with it primarily reads hardcover books they buy. If so, then it *might*. But that assumes the Kindle service doesn't disappear in four years, and it also assumes that readers are willing to pay for blogs and newspapers they mostly receive free online right now. In addition, it also discounts libraries, used copies, and borrowing from friends; I would guess that about a third of the books I read come from friends or libraries, and it's not unusual for me to loan books out. It's also not unusual for me to resell books I don't like on Amazon. Given all that, I'm not convinced his cost argument is a good one, and the others I've already addressed.
I do see a need for an e-book device and think they'll eventually take off, but first the legal and social issues have to be overcome.
The Sony Reader, is a better device for display, form-factor, battery life, format support (like PDF) and ergonomics, but lacks the cellular component. The Kindle is chunky, lots of buttons, smaller screen, etc. I wouldn't by either though since they are still fairly costly and both have crappy software (some of which is necessary to operate it, but still buggy).
The next version of the Sony Reader has the possibility to be great, but Sony will complicate it rather than refine it and won't come up with a reasonable DRM scheme (which, iTunes, despite it's wrinkles, is perhaps the most palatable today).
The Kindle looks like a really remarkable little gadget, and perhaps I'd own one if it wasn't for one nagging thing: the price.
All this hype now, positive and negative, only serves to keep the gadget in the limelight until the next generation is announced. That's when we'll see if it really has staying power, because like the iPod it should be tiered.
It'll be those budget models that makes or breaks it. Remove the EVDO connection, shrink the screen a bit, and get the price down to $99 for the "mini" option. A larger screened version with wifi is a $199 "Classic", and a new model with the cellular and wifi access and a color (or at least, a better grayscale) screen at the $399 "Premium" model.
If it fails to tier, or they hold on too stronly to the wireless mode to keep the price high, then it'll never trickle down to the people who are interested, but not willing to invest a month's car payment into it.
O RLY?
I wasn't saying the device isn't useful as is. What I was trying to get at is the price point puts it at a point where most people are going to look at it and think the same as I - "why pay 700 for an reader (even if I can make notes) when I could get a laptop for the same". People as in your example would be better off with one of these. But, people in my example might be better off with something cheaper. People who are reading fiction books generally don't make notations (excepting those doing stuff like book reports) and a read-only device would be perfect - but that market can't sustain a 700USD price point when a dead-tree version costs 5-30 depending on paperback or hardback. Give that market a 100USD device with the "books" being 5-10 and boom - that market will snap up the device and the books. My mother is a prime example. She buys books left and right and that takes a lot of storage space. Have a device that uses SD and she could have hundreds of "books" in a show box. But make it to where the device uses non-standard chips/cartridges/files and/or DRM and very shortly you'll find it being relegated to the scrap heap because people will get frustrated. A sort of related example would be my mother-in-law who simply wanted an audio book and couldn't get it to work because the DRM'd WMA files wouldn't work with all supposedly DRM WMA supporting players. She tried 3 different DRM WMA capable players and couldn't get the file to work (echo/reverb problem that made it unlistenable) so she went right back to paper.
***Blackholes are where the gods divided by zero.***
Ford has a problem in that, buggies are a "traditional" thing
I'm no tree hugging earth worshipping f-g, but, arguing that the car is better than the horse and buggy isn't going to help you much these days. Its not like everyone having a car would do something like screw up the atmosphere of the planet earth, or induce an invasion of the richest oil nation on the planet that results in a trillion or so dollars spent and thousands dead, but hey, you go ahead and say the car is -better-.
The whole point of an e-book is portability. But, its less portable than a book. I can drop a book pretty far, and still be able to read it. I guarantee that if I put a book into a fire, and I pulled it out, it might be singed or even burnt around the edges, but an e-book would be toast. An e-book needs batteries or a charge. A book doesn't. Can I put a cup of coffee on my e-book or write on the back of it as if a notebook? No.
This is my sig.
A completely unfair mod. I'm a Ron Paul supporter and I found the comment funny as hell.
Kindle is Kindling if the Iliad price comes down.
As for Slash, we discussed this the other DAY, but obviously Slash needs to burn some more kindling...
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
Surely, surely the point is not the device! Were I Amazon I'd be totally delighted that people were focussing on the device, because that's not really the issue. The elephant in the room you are all studiously ignoring is the BOOKS. For goodness' sake guys, you are seriously contemplating buying books which can only be read on one serial numbered device because of totally draconian DRM.
What has got into you? Not only that, you are signing up to a EULA which makes MS Eulas seem generous. Not only that, you are signing up to a Eula, to enforce which, is going to require Amazon to closely watch whatever you do with your kindlebooks and your kindle.
This thing is terrible, it shoud be resisted and boycotted, and especially the books should be, regardless of its merits as hardware. The last thing Western society needs right now is Amazon locking up ebooks with this thing and its successors.
And start thinking about the books. Never mind the hardware, its the books!
I just don't get it. If this was MS introducing such a device on such terms, there would be howls of rage all down the page. As it is, I guess you must all think Amazon, like Apple, is 'cool'. Is that it? Or if not, what is it?
I have only ever purchased one dedicated eBook reader in my life and was quite happy with it at the time. The REB1100 from RCA had a decent price tag and I only bought it after some enterprising folks made an altered firmware available which would allow the device to display almost any document format. The whole thing was a good idea, a little poorly implemented, and way ahead of its time.
Since that time, I have used a PDA (ah, my old Handspring) and my computer to read ebooks, though I would still like to curl up on the couch or in bed with a decent sized book any time.
The Kindle looks fine, but is pricey and the DRM thing is an obvious turn-off. For avid readers, the technology is getting there, but isn't quite mature enough to replace the good, old-fashioned tree-book.
Amazon via its affiliate program gives each person who sells a Kindle via a link from their site gets $40. Not too bad. That is why a lot of bloggers are hailing it as the next big tech gadget.
I'm guessing that with Amazon's clout, they'll cause many more books to become available in their ebook format. I don't want another electronic reader--have plenty with my PC's, PDA's and UMPC. I want a software reader that'll run on any of these platforms and allow me to read books from the Amazon store, a la ereader.com and their eReader software, which can be had for many hardware platforms. Forget trying to make $400 bucks on hardware and make the money on reasonably-priced ebooks.
Why not have a flamebait article for Apple, Google, and Amazon. It's only fair.
If you haven't spent time with the thing you are just blowing smoke out your a##.
I spent an afternoon with a friend's Kindle. It's amazing how a couple of hours reading with the thing shot down most of my negative preconceptions. Bottom line: it just disappeared and I was reading a book.
Is it perfect? No.
Is it ugly? A bit, but remember what momma said, "Don't judge a book by its cover."
Is the page flash annoying? For the first 10 minutes or so.
Does it cost too much? Most likely.
Will I buy one? Someday. I won't pay the early adopter premium. I'd like to see more titles and want better conversion software for the Kindle format, etc., etc., etc.. But given Amazon's track record I expect those considerations to be addressed within the next year or two.
I had hoped for a better better reader from Sony but their recent track record in digital media and product innovation is awful. With Amazon on it, e-books might actually become worth the expense and effort. The Kindle is a promising version 1 effort.
I read around 1 book a month right now, and except for a few series I get most of these from the Library. Since they already have DRM on these things, let DRM do what it does best.. limit access. Let me for a fee (5-10 bucks a month, or .99 a book) check out a book for 2 weeks. After 2 weeks the DRM can function and stop letting me access the book. I am ok renting something as long as it is known as a rental. I want to OWN what I purchase, and as we all know here on slashdot... DRM=You don't Own.
I've got a Nokia 770. The current versions are the 800 and 810. It has an 800x480 color screen, displays PDFs, and has a text editor. It can run more than one app at the same time. So, you could read the PDF, and annotate it in a memo pad. The device fits in a shirt pocket, like a Palm. You can get a Bluetooth keyboard for it, if you want. I bought a 2 GB flash card for mine. It has WiFi and USB. So the most likely limitation is the small screen. The dots are really tiny. I read PDFs with 800 dots across the page, and adjust the zoom so that the content area just fits. It leads to very tiny text.
Does that do it for you?
What I'd rather do is extract the text from the PDF, or convert it to HTML and view in FBReader or a web browser. When i get Word Doc files, i often convert them to html for reading. I get pictures, but can adjust the screen with and still have a larger font.
Maybe someone could write a PDF viewer that doesn't attempt to retain the as-printed form. That might not be so hard. There are open source PDF readers one could start from.
-- Stephen.
I have an iPhone and could do basic reading and commenting if I needed to but you're right, size is the problem. I end up keeping all my papers organized on my laptop with .txt files with the same basename as the .pdf ones. I'd rather a kindle-like device for taking to the coffee shop, etc.
> To me, the inability to function as a printer and the utter incompetence on displaying PDFs renders both the Kindle
> and Sony's offerings more or less useless.
Two factors prevent this in the current generation. The e-ink screens are SLOW. Not lcd slow, but hundreds of milliseconds slow. Panning and scrolling around a PDF would be a nightmare and the current generation is orders of magnitude to low in both the resolution and size departments to present an 8.5x11" page in a readable form.
Then there is the total lack of CPU power that dealing with PDF needs for a good user experience. The Kindle is essentially a cell phone (and not a smartphone with a fast CPU) with an oversized epaper display and a keyboard. Most of the other e-book readers currently offered are underpowered as well and for the same reason, battery life and form factor. In the small thin form factor there isn't much room for a battery and to get long life they depend on a slow energy effecient CPU that can be powered off almost all the time.
Give Moore's Law some time and we will see exactly what you describe appear. And it will totally RULE.
Democrat delenda est
reference: e-voting. where technophiles will trade in paper with ovals on it for a more complex, expensive voting system that has more attack vectors and is not transparent to independent verification, thereby undermining faith in democracy, for the sake of a touchscreen
reference: e-books. where technophiles will trade in something that has no DRM, infinite battery life, excellent contrast, its media format never goes extinct, etc. i am of course talking about that strange exotic object called a plain old "book" that is in NO WAY improved upon by an e-book
the point of technology is to improve life. the point of life is not to improve technology
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I'd actually like to see online publication of research papers get beyond 'camera ready' pdfs. The page format for a printed conference proceedings or a journal is not the best for on-screen reading, whether computer or e-book device. The two column format is a pain for on-screen reading.
It would be really nice if the documents were offered in formats that let us easily adapt to reading on something other than paper. Yes, a pdf can be set up to support Reflow, but it seems few research papers are tagged to do so properly.
There are really two factors (IMHO) holding back a wider acceptance of ebooks - screen size and material
cost. All the current crop except the Iliad are still smaller (in screen) than a standard paperback.
the goal should be less buttons/frame and more screen. If you need/want a keyboard, make it slide out
like some smart phones.
Second - the cost of books. Amazon has made a big step here but they are only in the pool ankle deep.
People just find it objectionable to pay the same price (or more when discounting is considered) for an
e-book as they do a regular physical copy. The real thing is still better in most regards and has no
issues of longevity (accidental deletion, firm holding 'backup' copy goes under or stops service); can
be loaned with no thought and is always accessible. In the textbook area, it is also nice to be able
to keep more than one book open when doing problems or research.
This is not to say e-books should be free. The appropriate price should reflect the removal of physical
costs and distribution/storage replacing them with the electronic equivalent cost. This still doesn't
make them free - authors must be paid as well as editors and publishers.
Amazon has put up a fair number of books at $9.99 or lower but the vast majority of books are still
near the regular book price. One could perhaps accept this pricing if you were given the option to
buy the physical book + ebook (even with drm) at a slight premium. But they need to lower the prices
across the board to really get people interested.
Articles that don't really matter?
I know it's heavily subsidized already, but if I am going to get (YA) locked-down device, it needs to be far cheaper. Like my cell phone, which probably has a retail value of $400, but was essentially free since I agreed to be locked down to Verizon's lame network for two years.
I have read a few E-books - with an ancient HP Jornada believeitornot, and I download the content from my local library over the Jornada's IE browser, which, miraculously, still works with many sites. It's not as lame as it sounds, even at 18x80 chars. But If I'm going to pay $$$, I want the device to at least have open content and maybe be able to make cell phone calls or play music.
Give a man a fish and you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish, and he'll say "WHERE'S MY FISH, YOU IDIOT?"
Or, to put it another way: If Adobe asked for permission to sell Harry Potter as an eBook, the publisher would tell them to get lost. If Amazon asked the same thing, they'd be much more likely to agree.
I have come close to taking OLPC up on the 'Give One Get One' idea, just to use the computer as a reader.
Almost.
I used my old Sharp Zarus for years mostly for Ebooks. It's nice to be able to adjust the font size up to where I don't need glasses. It's convenient, and fit in my shirt pocket. The battery only lasted about 2 hours for continuous use, but I would just turn down the backlight, and make it last for 4 or 6 hours if the room light was good. I really liked it. It even had nethack. Good PDA functions, Python, word processing, spreadsheet (you only see 4 X 4 grid of cells at a time). I could have used it for MP3's if I had cared. No reader could do all of that.
I wonder how the Kindle will fare against the Eee or the OLPC. It's bound to only be a matter of a few years and there will be knock-offs of OLPC for general use. It can be set as a tablet. Backlight if you want or need it, not if you don't.
Interesting times ahead.
Everybody knows 3 people with my name.
Many thought the company was crazy-doomed when that little gadget first launched. (Even the die-hards.) And yeah, the price was criticized.
I agree with a number of posters who say when folks trash Kindle, they're really trashing ebooks in general. What I think Amazon pulled off with Kindle was a way of grabbing mainstream book-buyers--Romance, Scifi and Horror readers have been into ebooks for a while.
I'm not a total fanboy; like my Kindle, hate the case. I'll only add that, when taking the wife to malls, I've gone back to bringing the Sony with me, partly because I'm not finished a couple of Talbot Mundy books, partly because, with its slightly smaller size, the Sony fits into my jacket pocket, while the Kindle doesn't.
But, as to all Kindle lovers being cultists:
"all criticism is autobiography"
Oscar Wilde, The Portrait of Dorian Gray
Book on CD + ipod == ebook reader. It even (gasp) reads the book to you so you don't have to squint at an LCD held up to your face while you're trying to get around. So advanced, so sophisticated, so high tech!
I was still a high school student when I first heard about E-ink. Now that I have a degree in Electrical Engineering, I know to refer to it as a "bistable display".
E-ink just seems to be dominating the market.....
The potential for this display is really mind-blowing. Given advances towards color, higher resolution, and faster response time....it is definitely great stuff.
Some people mention that "other e-readers have come and failed", but the new wave of bistable displays is far different from the old LCD screen ereaders of the past. I know Kindle is the big deal, but its the first American E-ink product introduced with any fanfare. When I walk around with my Sony Reader, most people ask me why I have such a large PDA. The point is simple, digital paper technology has the potential to do for books what the mp3 did for music. It wont revolutionize the medium, but it could change the way that people interact with it.
In summation: The kindle has its pros and cons, just like any device.....
Pay attention though, some people aren't as much excited about the "Kindle" as they are excited about kindle-like devices.
And some of the "problems with the kindle" are not problems with this particular device, but rather problems with the technology.
Some examples
1) No backlight--E-ink displays use reflected light. If you want a light you purchase a book light just like you would for paper
2) Delayed page turn--simply a limit of this technology, they are getting better, but this problem will ALWAYS exist. One reason these displays arent popular in phones or similar technology
3) Lack of color--while this is at the bleeding edge of electronic paper, it is not yet a mass produced feature. Expect to see this is a few generations
If you have ever used this technology for an extended period of time, you fall in love with it. I don't love the Kindle, but I love E-ink.
Actually, it sounds to me like Amazon is shelling out for viral marketing, but hired a company that's not very good at it.
> What people REALLY want is something e-paper about 13x19 tabloid size at
:)
> 300dpi & reflective that can roll up.
What they (we) really need is something you can FOLD up. Even a book-like screen works better than a tube-like thing in your pocket.
It will be really interesting to see who'll be first to fix the problem with the creasing
The Kindle display is like reading text that's 75% black on a 25% gray screen. In other words, the contrast isn't that great. Use it under less-than-optimum lighting conditions, and readability is even worse.
So to compensate, one has to bump up the font size quite a bit, which gives you proportionally less text per page.
Now the iPhone has a brilliant high-contrast high-definition backlit display, with 100% black on 100% white. So you can easily read text on an iPhone that's quite a bit smaller than you can read comfortably on the Kindle, which in turn means that the differences in screen size aren't nearly as significant as they would seem at first glance.
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
Apparently, the evil Kindle fanboys have won!
from Amazon.com:
Kindle Availability
Due to heavy customer demand, Kindle is sold out. Because orders are prioritized on a first-come, first-served basis, please ORDER NOW to reserve your place in line. Your Kindle will not arrive by December 24th.
If 'the people' in Amendment 2 are 'the state' then Amendments 1, 2, 4, 9, and 10 benefit the state, not you.
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If it doesn't have the scrolling feature of ReadThemAll [narod.ru] then it's not worth having
uBook does this as well and it's pretty good (and configurable for different reading speeds). When I got my Windows Phone I was trying out all the ebook readers. The Palm-derived eReader is okay, Amazon's Mobipocket was my regular until it started hinking on a few file formats it was supposed to be able to read. I gave uBook a try - it's initially off-putting because it's obviously done by a serious geek because it has around five billion config options, even down to be able to tweak the sub-pixel rendering to suit the individual characteristics of whatever screen you are using. But it also does auto scroll, which is nice.
Da Blog
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Do the math. Kindle is not going to save you money. It's not even a good deal. But if you really want a nice e-reader, and can afford it, get one. I will wait until the price is somewhat less than what I would pay for 40+ paperbacks, since it is unlikely that I will read 40 books in the next, oh, 8-10 years... which, if the books were FREE (ha ha, they are so not free), I would have to do just to break even. Brain says "no".