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Introducing Amazon Kindle
AmzonKindle asked:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000FI73MA/?tag=amzkindle-20 Amazon Kindle is a revolutionary portable reader that wirelessly downloads books, newspapers, magazines and blogs to a crisp, high-resolution electronic paper display that looks and reads like real paper, even in bright sunlight. Kindle customers, no matter where they are in the US, can wirelessly shop the Kindle Store and download new content — all without a PC or a WiFi hot spot. Amazon pays for Kindle's wireless connectivity so …
The Kindle Proves Revolutions are Costly
Bob Livolsi asked:
Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com, began this year’s Holiday season with the release of the Amazon Kindle. This device is a groundbreaking step in increasing the popularity of eBooks. It boasts an electronic-paper display to mimic the look of real paper, wireless connectivity, more than 88,000 books, newspapers and magazines available for purchase, and the capability to email Word documents and pictures. But has Amazon really figured out how to revolutionize the way people read?
The Kindle’s electronic-paper display is not so revolutionary, considering this has been seen before in other products, such as the Sony Reader. The display is also limited to black and white, and is not backlit. This is a far cry from a full-color, high gloss magazine, or even a blog. Also, the free wireless connectivity, WhisperNet, operates on an EVDO network and is therefore only available in the US, and tends to have limited reach and reliability within the US. Amazon charges for every document or picture you receive through email on the Kindle, and does not offer PDF support. The Kindle has a single proprietary format, MOBI. From the leader in the online bookstore industry, you may also expect to have the largest selection of eBooks to choose from for the Kindle, but that is not the case. Amazon only offers 88,000 eBooks for sale, while some smaller companies can offer up to 154,000 eBooks, almost twice as many as the Kindle and nearly eight times as many as Sony.
The biggest question being raised about the Amazon Kindle is about its price. Technological mobility always carries a hefty price tag, but is $400 for a grayscale eReader a worthy price? Keep in mind that this $400 does not include the cost of books, magazines, blogs, and newspapers. Other stores have been recognized for having the best prices on the web for eBooks with no monthly fees, so you can enjoy the convenience of having thousands of titles at your fingertips without the hefty price tag from Amazon. These stores also offer eBooks that are compatible with all PCs, Macs, laptops, PDAs, Windows Mobile PocketPC, Smartphones, Blackberry and even iPods. In addition to the price is the amount of customer service Amazon has shown customers in the past. There has been two instances where Amazon has bailed on eBook customers in the past year. First in 2006 deleting the backed-up bookshelves of eBook customers, and then in 2007 shutting down its Mobipocket servers for ten days. In each occasion no warning or explanation was given to customers. This history demonstrates a clear lack of concern for end customers, concerned first and foremost with the benefit of volume. Amazon’s customers can be discarded because they can afford to buy new ones with major advertising and marketing dollars. Smaller companies like BooksonBoard and Fictionwise care about each customer because it’s their practice.
So has Amazon really found the answer? Not yet. While Amazon’s valiant attempt to revolutionize the industry are definitely appreciated, there are just too many wasted opportunities that the Kindle fails to take advantage of; perhaps Amazon’s efforts will inspire Steve Jobs or even Google to come up with a true revolutionary eReader.
Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com, began this year’s Holiday season with the release of the Amazon Kindle. This device is a groundbreaking step in increasing the popularity of eBooks. It boasts an electronic-paper display to mimic the look of real paper, wireless connectivity, more than 88,000 books, newspapers and magazines available for purchase, and the capability to email Word documents and pictures. But has Amazon really figured out how to revolutionize the way people read?
The Kindle’s electronic-paper display is not so revolutionary, considering this has been seen before in other products, such as the Sony Reader. The display is also limited to black and white, and is not backlit. This is a far cry from a full-color, high gloss magazine, or even a blog. Also, the free wireless connectivity, WhisperNet, operates on an EVDO network and is therefore only available in the US, and tends to have limited reach and reliability within the US. Amazon charges for every document or picture you receive through email on the Kindle, and does not offer PDF support. The Kindle has a single proprietary format, MOBI. From the leader in the online bookstore industry, you may also expect to have the largest selection of eBooks to choose from for the Kindle, but that is not the case. Amazon only offers 88,000 eBooks for sale, while some smaller companies can offer up to 154,000 eBooks, almost twice as many as the Kindle and nearly eight times as many as Sony.
The biggest question being raised about the Amazon Kindle is about its price. Technological mobility always carries a hefty price tag, but is $400 for a grayscale eReader a worthy price? Keep in mind that this $400 does not include the cost of books, magazines, blogs, and newspapers. Other stores have been recognized for having the best prices on the web for eBooks with no monthly fees, so you can enjoy the convenience of having thousands of titles at your fingertips without the hefty price tag from Amazon. These stores also offer eBooks that are compatible with all PCs, Macs, laptops, PDAs, Windows Mobile PocketPC, Smartphones, Blackberry and even iPods. In addition to the price is the amount of customer service Amazon has shown customers in the past. There has been two instances where Amazon has bailed on eBook customers in the past year. First in 2006 deleting the backed-up bookshelves of eBook customers, and then in 2007 shutting down its Mobipocket servers for ten days. In each occasion no warning or explanation was given to customers. This history demonstrates a clear lack of concern for end customers, concerned first and foremost with the benefit of volume. Amazon’s customers can be discarded because they can afford to buy new ones with major advertising and marketing dollars. Smaller companies like BooksonBoard and Fictionwise care about each customer because it’s their practice.
So has Amazon really found the answer? Not yet. While Amazon’s valiant attempt to revolutionize the industry are definitely appreciated, there are just too many wasted opportunities that the Kindle fails to take advantage of; perhaps Amazon’s efforts will inspire Steve Jobs or even Google to come up with a true revolutionary eReader.
What You Should Know About The New Amazon Kindle Wireless Ebook Reader
Stuart Hawley asked:
IS THE KINDLE READER AS GOOD AS AMAZON SAYS IT IS? – AND WHAT ABOUT THE COMPETITION?
With the recent release of the Amazon Kindle ebook reader the Sony ebook reader range face some competition in this new and getting hotter market. Interestingly enough, most reviewers either love it or hate it – there doesn’t seem to be any middle ground, despite it having some really neat features. Admittedly, a lot of the complaints seem to be where buyers have a specific requirement and the Kindle doesn’t offer that function.
In all fairness, if you need it for something specific then make sure that it can do it!. Users, whilst generally hating the design, really love the functionality of the Kindle reader in that the navigation buttons are on either side so left or right handed people can use it with ease. The display, a 6″ diagonal E-Ink® electronic paper display, 600 x 800 pixel resolution at 167 ppi, 4-level gray scale which uses e ink {although converted electronically} tries to emulate newsprint and as such can be read easily in sunlight without the normal glare associated with PC screens. The Qwerty keyboard is used to control and take advantage of the Whispernet technology for downloading and surfing – it’s a direct connection and doesn’t need Wifi hotspots or ISP’s. The battery, which takes about two hours to charge will give you one week of reading but much less if you’re downloading but should last about 2 days.
You have access to Wikipedia, about 250 top blogs and a whole host of Newspapers. The fact that it is only the size of a paperback and weighs just 10.3 ounces with a capacity of 200 books means you’ll never be short of reading material and the easily adjustable font size allows you to find a comfortable reading level according to the ambience around you. It doesn’t incorporate a backlit screen though so, if like me, you like reading in bed you’ll still be juggling about with the torch!
If you’re expecting an all singin’ dancin’ piece of technology in this ebook reader you’ll probably be disappointed since it doesn’t fully support PDF {The Kindle can read unsecured Mobipocket books, and Amazon has provided a still experimental converter for unsecured PDFs}. There is, however, no way to read encrypted versions of either format- annotating articles isn’t possible – you’re limited to the Kindle ebooks available and their pricing structure, also remember that the screen is black and white so magazine articles and pics will take some adjusting to.
The MP3 player seems to be causing some problems as it will only random play and the user has little control over this aspect and users think that Amazon, with its own encrypted books, are trying to ensure that all content comes from them and are just trying to exercise too much control. You can transfer over unencrypted ebooks via SD card or even email them to yourself but the latter choice incurs a 10c fee. There are a few options for storage if you exceed the Kindles memory – you can store them onto a SD card and then transfer them to your PC via USB or Amazon can store them online for you and it does seem possible that you can access Streamload’s site via the Whispernet facility to up and download as you wish.
The main controversy that the Kindle reader opens up is that of pricing, not only of the reader itself but of ebooks in general. Many users of the reader are complaining about the price of some of the ebooks where there is only a small reduction in price compared to the hard back copy. Ebooks are growing in popularity all the time and it is going to be a while though before all publishers and retailers will get their heads together and sort out some commonalities. In comparison the Sony ebook readers don’t have the advantage of the e-ink screen and may be more difficult to read in certain lighting conditions but it does give you easier access to a wider and cheaper range of ebooks.
So should you buy one? – if the higher price tag doesn’t concern you and you’re one of the “gotta have’s” then you’ve probably already decided it should be on your list – personally I’d look at some of the alternatives and wait for not only a later version, which will probably be significantly cheaper anyway, but some of the niggling problem areas may well have been sorted.
For those of you that want more info go to http://www.ebookerstore.com/kindle/kindle_ebook_reader.html
IS THE KINDLE READER AS GOOD AS AMAZON SAYS IT IS? – AND WHAT ABOUT THE COMPETITION?
With the recent release of the Amazon Kindle ebook reader the Sony ebook reader range face some competition in this new and getting hotter market. Interestingly enough, most reviewers either love it or hate it – there doesn’t seem to be any middle ground, despite it having some really neat features. Admittedly, a lot of the complaints seem to be where buyers have a specific requirement and the Kindle doesn’t offer that function.
In all fairness, if you need it for something specific then make sure that it can do it!. Users, whilst generally hating the design, really love the functionality of the Kindle reader in that the navigation buttons are on either side so left or right handed people can use it with ease. The display, a 6″ diagonal E-Ink® electronic paper display, 600 x 800 pixel resolution at 167 ppi, 4-level gray scale which uses e ink {although converted electronically} tries to emulate newsprint and as such can be read easily in sunlight without the normal glare associated with PC screens. The Qwerty keyboard is used to control and take advantage of the Whispernet technology for downloading and surfing – it’s a direct connection and doesn’t need Wifi hotspots or ISP’s. The battery, which takes about two hours to charge will give you one week of reading but much less if you’re downloading but should last about 2 days.
You have access to Wikipedia, about 250 top blogs and a whole host of Newspapers. The fact that it is only the size of a paperback and weighs just 10.3 ounces with a capacity of 200 books means you’ll never be short of reading material and the easily adjustable font size allows you to find a comfortable reading level according to the ambience around you. It doesn’t incorporate a backlit screen though so, if like me, you like reading in bed you’ll still be juggling about with the torch!
If you’re expecting an all singin’ dancin’ piece of technology in this ebook reader you’ll probably be disappointed since it doesn’t fully support PDF {The Kindle can read unsecured Mobipocket books, and Amazon has provided a still experimental converter for unsecured PDFs}. There is, however, no way to read encrypted versions of either format- annotating articles isn’t possible – you’re limited to the Kindle ebooks available and their pricing structure, also remember that the screen is black and white so magazine articles and pics will take some adjusting to.
The MP3 player seems to be causing some problems as it will only random play and the user has little control over this aspect and users think that Amazon, with its own encrypted books, are trying to ensure that all content comes from them and are just trying to exercise too much control. You can transfer over unencrypted ebooks via SD card or even email them to yourself but the latter choice incurs a 10c fee. There are a few options for storage if you exceed the Kindles memory – you can store them onto a SD card and then transfer them to your PC via USB or Amazon can store them online for you and it does seem possible that you can access Streamload’s site via the Whispernet facility to up and download as you wish.
The main controversy that the Kindle reader opens up is that of pricing, not only of the reader itself but of ebooks in general. Many users of the reader are complaining about the price of some of the ebooks where there is only a small reduction in price compared to the hard back copy. Ebooks are growing in popularity all the time and it is going to be a while though before all publishers and retailers will get their heads together and sort out some commonalities. In comparison the Sony ebook readers don’t have the advantage of the e-ink screen and may be more difficult to read in certain lighting conditions but it does give you easier access to a wider and cheaper range of ebooks.
So should you buy one? – if the higher price tag doesn’t concern you and you’re one of the “gotta have’s” then you’ve probably already decided it should be on your list – personally I’d look at some of the alternatives and wait for not only a later version, which will probably be significantly cheaper anyway, but some of the niggling problem areas may well have been sorted.
For those of you that want more info go to http://www.ebookerstore.com/kindle/kindle_ebook_reader.html
Jeff Bezos and Bestselling Authors Discuss Amazon Kindle
AmzonKindle asked:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000FI73MA/?tag=amzkindle-20 Amazon Kindle is a revolutionary portable reader that wirelessly downloads books, newspapers, magazines and blogs to a crisp, high-resolution electronic paper display that looks and reads like real paper, even in bright sunlight. Kindle customers, no matter where they are in the US, can wirelessly shop the Kindle Store and download new content — all without a PC or a WiFi hot spot. Amazon pays for Kindle's wireless connectivity so …
Toni Morrison, Nobel Laureate, about new Amazon Kindle
AmazonKindle asked:
http://www.amazon-kindlemania.com Introducing Kindle™ Three years ago, we set out to design and build an entirely new class of device—a convenient, portable reading device with the ability to wirelessly download books, blogs, magazines, and newspapers. The result is Amazon Kindle. We designed Kindle to provide an exceptional reading experience. Thanks to electronic paper, a revolutionary new display technology, reading Kindle's screen is as sharp and natural as reading ink on paper—and …
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