Okay, I’ve had about a week of playing around with my Kindle 2 and I guess it’s time to express my first impressions.
All in all, I’ve become a big fan of the e-reader. Sold as a paper-like electronic substitute to hardcopy books, I have to admit that the normal eyestrain associated with reading text on a computer (and the accompanying headaches if one should do it for too long of a period of time) is absent. Aside from the slight greyish background, it really does look and feel (to my eyes) like I’m reading a real book. I know that some people have complained that you can’t read a Kindle in the dark, but that’s because those people have a terrible misconception about e-paper — equating the viewer to a LCD flat-panel monitor. I have no such misconception; part of the reason a Kindle is less strain on the eyes is that it is not back-lit. The point I have to bring up to people who have this complaint is: Hardcopy books don’t have backlighting either, and nobody’s ever complained about the lack of readability in the dark when it comes to a paperback. If I want something portable that is back-lit, I’ll use my smartphone. The point of a Kindle is not to have a book to read in the dark — it is to have a portable storage device for massive amounts of electronic books that reads (to your eyes, anyway) like a real book.
I like the ability to choose the size of my text. As I grow older, I depend more and more on my reading glasses — a hard thing to succumb to if you were previously proud of your excellent vision. This function allows me to read electronic books without worrying about having my reading glasses ready at hand. I still use my glasses with the Kindle, but that’s because I’m reading in bed or I get tired of hitting the “next page” button as much as I would have to without the glasses. On the fly, it compensates for my diminished eyesight.
Wireless web-surfing… Well, the feature is “experimental” and less functional than my smart-phone. Still, I can check my gmail and download e-books directly to my Kindle from sites other than Amazon…. And, heck, the service is “free” (or, I should say, is included in the price of the Kindle). It’s barely 3G with respect to speed and the browser has VERY basic functionality, but I honestly can’t complain — I didn’t buy a Kindle to surf the net. I bought it to read books. The feature is just an added bonus.
The “text-to-speech” function has been under fire since the feature was announced. There are a number of audiobook companies and people who are employed by those companies that have argued that this hearkens the demise of audiobooks and is possibly and infringement of contract, copyright or any number of other horrible, nasty things. As Neil Gaiman pointed out (some of these points, not all) in his blog:
1) The quality of the text-to-speech function is similar to the quality of weather radio or GPS directions. It is a far cry (very far) from paid actors who read audiobooks. It is almost tedious to listen to.
2) When you buy a book, you are free to read it out loud to anyone (without reimbursement) you please. Text-to-speech is of a lesser quality than even that….
3) The feature is really only useful to people with physical impairments that prevent them from reading a book (e.g. paraplegics, lower-income deaf people, illiterate people). The first parenthetical example can derive much enjoyment from “reading” books not available in audiobook form. The second likely doesn’t have a disposable income required to buy the device. The third isn’t normally interested in reading books.
The text-to-speech issue is really a null issue. I played with it a few times and didn’t personally find value, but I think it adds value to those who can use the feature.
“Download a book in 60 seconds”…. I have to admit the claim is true, based on my experience, when ordering direct from Amazon. Maybe faster. I like the fact that I can download a book in a minute on a whim, at a price much lower than the hardcopy price. I haven’t taken advantage of Amazon’s pricing (free books are the bulk of what I’ve downloaded), but I think that NY Times Bestsellers at $9.99 is a good deal when the books themselves often cost close to $30 ($20 if you find a deal).
Most of the books that I’ve downloaded have come from internet sources. Some are “out-of-print” transcriptions of books of varying quality, others have been from high-quality sources like Project Gutenberg (or modified versions). I am currently reading Burroughs’ A Princess of Mars, in most part because the Barsoom books are out of print and extremely expensive as paperbacks. Because the stories are public domain, I can download them via Gutenberg or, my preferred site (because the texts are formatted for Kindle use) www.freekindlebooks.org. Reading this series alone has paid the price I paid for the Kindle as, at last shopping round at a used bookstore, each of E.R. Burroughs’ Barsoom books were priced at over $50 for pulp versions of the books. I’ve wanted to read the stories for a long time, as Heinlein makes it quite clear in many of his stories that the stories were greatly influential to his own work. I downloaded the 7 or so books in less than 5 minutes.
The other books, well, I have to admit, are prolly not legal but, because I already have paid for the books, there is no substantial difference better downloading scans and ORC=software versions of the books than if I did it on my own for my own reading (which is arguably allowed via fair use). All in all, I have not downloaded a book that I have not, at one time or another, paid for. I am excited to visit some of those books again (even if many are books I’ve read at least twice),
Weight…. I don’t know if the claim that it is lighter than most paperback books is true. Using bookseller terminology, the Kindle weighs less than a QC paperback with thick, acid-free paper, but is not nearly as light as a MM paperback (average pages around 300). Still, I can carry well over a thousand books on the device, which beats the hell out of the weight restrictions of hardcopies. Because I do some traveling for work, I find it useful to have a number of choices at my disposal for the same weight allotment.
As a writer, being able to download personal docs (either for review by myself or my wife) is a plus. The main problem with getting M’s input on my work for editorial purposes is the hurdle that must be crossed regarding the cost of printing out the material. The Kindle allows me to convert my Word docs (among others) to an easy-to-read version of the text that wastes no paper or ink. You can send certain text formats to Amazon for conversion, or you can convert on your own using the Mobi-pocket conversion tool. While PDF conversion by Amazon is “experimental”, I think that having the remaining formats available is nice. I haven’t converted via Amazon any of the texts I’d like to have, but the fact that they offer conversion is a plus.
I’m a cheap bastard, so it was quite an effort to allow my inclination to purchase gizmos to take charge of the decision making process…. So the $359 price tag was a bit hard to swallow…. add another $30 for a protective cover (which is really a must for such an investment), I was hesitant to buy a Kindle… Now that they got some of the bugs ironed out (through Kindle 1), I could almost justify the cost and so I bit the proverbial bullet and bought one.
I’m glad I waited. The old Kindle is a bit clunky, as far as I can tell. It’s an obvious prototype, beta version. The changes in navigation are a plus (five-way joystick-type mouse control is a bonus over the scrolling wheel of the Kindle 1), but I miss having the SD port. 2 gigs of memory (mostly taken up by OS) is not nearly as much as I would expect, but considering that you can archive your purchases from Amazon and re-download at any time, I guess it isn’t much of an issue.
Overall, I’m thrilled by my purchase of the Kindle 2. It might not really be worth the money I put down on it, but my soul is warmed, so that makes up for it.