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Quick Kindle review—a TEN STRIKE
December 8, 2007 | 10:09 pm
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By Mary Minow
Moderator’s note: Mary Minow, a consultant to LawLibrary.com, loves the Kindle even though, like most TeleBlog readers, she is not a fan of Draconian DRM. Fair’s fair, so, after publishing our share of Kindle-skeptical posts, I’m pleased to pick up Mary’s upbeat review with her permission. Thanks, Mary! You can also read a handy Kindle tip of hers. Meanwhile see Mary’s thoughts on Kindles for libraries, where she thinks the OLPC’s XO might be better because of its durability and support for more formats. I’m curious if there might be other Kindle library issues such as terms of service. – D.R.
I’m trying out an Amazon Kindle. Love it.
It’s clearly designed by people who read. Delightful to read the newspaper, magazines, books, your own documents. You can read for hours comfortably. In fact, I believe that in many scenarios, I’d prefer this; yes, you read that right, I’d prefer the Kindle to a real book or magazine. That surprises me, even though I was looking for the convenience of an e-book reader (dozens or hundreds of titles), I always expected to say, “Of course, the paper book is a better reading experience.” That may be changing. This not only rivals the paper experience, it surpasses it in many ways. It’s easier to hold than a hardback, easier to turn pages with one hand than a paperback or newspaper, and that’s all before the extra features.
Extra features that books don’t have: The New Oxford American Dictionary lookup is well integrated. One click gives you the line of text you’re reading with all the key words neatly defined at once. Seamless link to Amazon that allows you to download free samples of titles in the Kindle Store (90,000 including most best-sellers—no Harry Potter unfortunately). A few magazines and newspapers are available—all with two-week free trials. All delightfully easy on the eyes. Then there’s a rudimentary web browser so you can read free newspaper sites et al, but not designed for heavy web surfing. Or e-mail. Now I think this is actually a plus in a way—who needs all those distractions when you’re lost in a book or lengthy article.
Virtual reference—an experimental feature I like. While reading Armageddon’s Children, I wanted to know which was further south, Cleveland or Chicago. Within a few minutes I got the answer from NowNow. In fact, I got three replies, and all had the same final answer. Two cited Wikipedia and one cited a better geographical source. I was delighted. I asked this late in the evening, mind you, and got the answer back right away—all without ever having to touch a computer.
I’m sure people who are gadget-oriented will decry the obvious missing features—no touch screen, no backlight etc. You know, if those are the tradeoffs to get that outstanding reading screen, it’s worth it. It’s a pleasure on the eyes. It doesn’t get hot or need a recharge every couple of hours like a computer does. It’s just the right size, if you use the smallest font. It may be frustrating for folks who choose the largest font and need to turn the page every couple of paragraphs. Still, a nice feature to be able to make the font bigger if you need it.
Yes, I know about the DRM and privacy complaints, and I hear you. But you don’t have to use Amazon as your source of content. I’ve emailed myself open documents that I want to read (10 cents a document). I’ve also gone to Manybooks.net to get a bunch of Mobipocket (or .txt) titles for free and transferred by cable—-free. No tracking of my reading there. Couldn’t get the SD card to work right yet, but that’s supposed to work too. I also tried to use the clunky Kindle web browser to download directly from Manybooks.net—without success.
What I would like, though, is better picture quality. And more pictures/diagrams that somehow get lost on their way from print to Kindle—e.g. in the San Jose Mercury News. Color would be nice, if it had that same high quality resolution. I’d also like to be able to type a password before making purchases from the Kindle store. Yes, there’s no password needed right now. Anyone who gets their hands on someone else’s Kindle can wreak all kinds of havoc with the account. I requested a password option from customer service, and it’s on their list of suggestions.
Bottom line: Very expensive, but a pleasure to read real books, magazines, documents on a portable device.
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Comments:
See, this makes me scratch me head. Did she ever know of the Sony Reader? Yes, the K has other whizzbang features that are very nice (and some lousy features — like no page numbers), but most of the use is reading on that screen. And the Reader had it first and Reader v2 has it even better.
I confess I haven’t used the Sony Reader, and from what I read, it would do much of what I want.
However, the EVDO simply cannot be beat. I’m reading blogs (free, using bloglines mobile), getting sample chapters of best sellers and back list books (free from Amazon).
The best feature for me is the seamless way to email documents to the Kindle (10 cents). I do this every day. One less cable to worry about. This may sound lazy, and probably is. But I use a laptop and move about quite a lot. If I used a stationary desktop, I could probably keep track of cables better. But I know myself – I’m not a cable sync-er. The podcasts on my ipod are always weeks behind because I don’t cable sync them.
It’s nice to know, though, that I have the sync option when I want to transfer a large number of documents (for free).
Most of my needs, though, are for on-the-fly transfers. It’s worth the ten cents for the convenience. Someone sends me a document and I email it to the Kindle. Done. Waiting for me to read next time I turn it on.
I find myself actually reading documents that I used to glance at online, and wistfully say I’d print and read .. one day. That day has come. I read more. No need to print.
Thanks, Mary, for clarifying that. I know some people within Sony have been preaching the wireless religion there for years. Maybe your testimony can help them move it along.
My biggest gripe with the Kindle and the Sony readers is simple. I am limited in the sites I can shop and buy from. I am not willing to buy $300, or more, to be told that I HAVE to buy my books from them. Not to mention the fact that I already have a good sized ebook library and I would not be able to read those books on the Kindle and Sony readers.
What I would like in an ebook reader is simple: I want it to handle multiple formats (pdf, mobi, text) and I want to be able buy my ebooks from the sites I want to buy from. All of the sites I frequent offer adobe and/or mobipocket format books so, why isn’t there a deicated ebook reader that will allow me to read them?