A Portable Book Reader Is A Great Gift
Written by man on May 8th, 2009 in Uncategorized.
I just ordered one electronic book reader, the Amazon Kindle portable ebook reader. I have been waiting for the next generation device. It is not cheap, as I travel by air almost every other week. Don’t have much room for books – certainly not for more than one. I think this will be good for light reading (popular fiction, newspapers etc). If it is too expensive – do not buy it, go use a library instead.
As for button placement and all this other hoop-la, there is likely a good reason it is the way it is – I am certain they have tested it that much. I agree, you would think they could put design somthing that is more pleasing such as Apple?). But this ebook reader is a straight forward device that serve one simple purpose. You may not be able to have a touch screen with electronic ink with current technology, you need real estate to hold on to the device without smudging the screen. By the way, they likely want wireless phone connection so folks are more likely to make at the spur of the moment buying decisions (gotta have it now society). Its a big challenge for the manufacturers to try and cram all these things into one device. Just look at mobile phones, even the iphone and Blackberry aren’t any where near perfect and they have been building those things for sometime. iphone has lousy calendaring and Blackberry has lousy internet interface (both these things have been refined over the years). This should get competitors busy with competing products and that is good for all of us.
I have a first-generation Kindle and I absolutely love the shit out of it. I don’t think I’ll jump on the upgrade bandwagon right away, however, since it doesn’t really seem like *that* big of an upgrade for *another* $400. The improved screen refresh and 16 shades of gray is extremely tempting, though. Maybe if I can pawn my old one off on a friend for $150 or something… we shall see.
For the purpose of reading books, though, Kindle 1G is certainly more than adequate. Physically ugly, probably. But it is adequate for most of the time.
