The Kindle has caught my eye for quite some time, but I’ve always convinced myself that it’s too expensive, or I don’t really need it. That is until the Kindle 3 came on the scene.
The Kindle 3 was touted as a significant upgrade from previous models, sporting an enhanced e-ink display, and faster page turning (refreshing). The form factor was greatly reduced, Amazon chose to eliminate much of the unused space from previous versions, making the Kindle 3 about the size of an average paperback book.
Reading on the new Kindle feels a lot like reading a paper book. The e-ink display looks a lot like ink on paper, and since it doesn’t have a backlight, long periods of reading don’t hurt your eyes.
I know many people will sing the praises of the iPad or other similar devices for reading, and those are definitely great, but at the Kindle’s price point, I don’t think you can beat it.
Not Perfect
So far I’ve only been singing the Kindle’s praises, but there are a few things that I think aren’t perfect. For starters, I wish it was possible to lend books to other users, like it is with a real book. I’ve heard this feature is coming, but I think it should’ve been one of the first features implemented.
I’m also surprised that the Kindle doesn’t support the ever expanding ePub book format. I believe every other popular e-reader out there supports it.
What are your thoughts on the new Kindle 3? Will you buy one? Have you already bought one?
Chase Livingston
Chase is a student at Clemson University, studying Audio Engineering. He is passionate about using technology in the church effectively, and loves talking and ideating about how to do that. Feel free to reach out!
I too have a Kindle 3.
The small form factor is perfect for portability. You’re right that reading is a fantastic experience, much like a real book.
I too think they should have incorporated the “book sharing” feature at the very beginning, but I am excited to hear that it is coming soon. That feature will decide whether I will get one for my wife or not.
I’m finally getting use to downloading books electronically, but it’s still hard for me to browse a physical book store and pass up a great book with the intentions of downloading it later on my Kindle. Flashy covers get me every time!
If put kindles on the same account, then you can share to your hearts content, within Amazon’s guidelines. I have 14 devices (between 10 people) on my kindle account. There are some negatives (like only one method of payment allowed) but overall it is a great, legal way of sharing ebooks.
wow, 14 devices between 10 people…that is sweet.
I agree David, there are some books I still like to have hardcopy’s of.
My iPad works for me for what I use it for.
The Kindle would be perfect for my wife though.
Understood. It’s definitely a device that’s good at only one thing, not multiple things like the iPad. Great, cheap alternative if the majority of your time will be spent reading.
I have a kindle. I got it right after you did Chase.
I love it so far. I seriously do read more because of it (and many sermons are transcribed to pdf, so I can read those as well. Free is good).
My fiance has a 2nd generation kindle, and the ink on the 3 has much deeper shades of black and grey and the contrast is amazing.
The best thing I have noticed is battery life. My first charge lasted well over a month, and I have only charged it once (after inital charge) since I have had it.
If you want a simple, no hassile ebook reader, then the Kindle gets my vote.
Totally agreed man, thanks for the input!
I am an unabashed kindle fan. I think that book sharing is part of the DRM world. Apple doesn’t allow sharing of tv shows purchased on itunes, and when sharing does come to play (where two unrelated kindle accounts can share a book) people will mostly hate it. It will be for two weeks and only one share per book. I don’t know anyone that really likes the sharing feature on Nook.
I also don’t know why are hung up about epub. There is nothing fundamentally better about epub. Both the Mobi format and the Epub format are packaged html. Epub still has DRM and that DRM doesn’t necessarily play well between stores. So you are really not that much better off with being locked into the Sony Store than you are being locked into the Amazon store. Would it be nice if all books were DRM free and shareable, yes. Is it going to happen soon, no probably not.
I’m not sure I would compare sharing books to sharing TV shows. I think if publishers as well as distributors want people to adopt ebooks over paper books, they’re going to have to allow people to do what they’ve been doing with paper books forever: share them.
Maybe. But if sharing is the standard, freely and without restriction, then publishers are going to fight tooth and nail. A paper book can only be one place at a time. A file, can be copied all over the place. Right now piracy is a small problem among books, but not huge among books that are available in ebook format. (Harry Potter books are a great example of books that are not available in ebook, but are widely available in pirated copies.) But even without sharing ebooks have gone from 2% to 9% of books sold, this year.
It may be that sharing is a major hindrance to larger growth, but I think that is probably not the case. But as I said above, you can share with kindle, just have to share an account. If you share an account (which involves opening up a credit card, so you have to trust the other members on the account) you can freely share all of your books. There used to be account restrictions on the number of devices that could share one account, but those have been removed.
I see your point, but it seems that it would be possible with DRM to allow sharing with only one other device at a time, if that’s what publishers are worried about.
That is what is promised for Kindle by the end of the year and is already available on nook. I just don’t know anyone that likes it. It just doesn’t meet the way people want to share. I think for the short term, people will break DRM if they really want to share, but for the most part people will just buy books and not expect to share.
I would like sharing, I just don’t think that sharing, that really works with the way people want to use it, will happen with any ereader anytime soon. Publishers will not allow it.
It’s possible that could happen, but I would expect the publishers to have a tiered price. Non-sharing – reduced price. Sharing – you pay the same as the print price.
Thomas Nelson has had their Nelson Free program for a while, but it doesn’t seem to have much impact. Purchase a hardback that is NelsonFree and get a free (DRM free, so sharable) ebook and MP3 audiobook. I have purchased a few books that way that I knew I would give away, I read the ebook and give away the paper copy. But last I looked you could not find a list of Nelson Books, and when I have asked on the status of the program I just get “I will check on that and get back to you” statements. I have highlighted the program a couple times on my blog but it seems to be very back burner.
My wife got the Kindle (early Christmas present she conned out of me) and she loves it. The e-ink display is really something to see. It almost looks fake because there is no back light.
She has something like 55 books on there already. Only 4 of which she paid for. The rest were freebies.
I think the free books is really the killer feature of the Kindle. Since Amazon has about 75-80% of the market, publishers are getting on board with the free books. There have been about 25 released just today (new books, not public domain.) Many of them are only free for a couple days (long enough to get on the best seller charts and then they are no longer free) but if you pay attention, you can get a lot of free books. My kindle account has close to 550 books now and less than 100 of them have been purchased.
Rocking the Kindle 2. Love it. Kindle 3 isn’t worth me upgrading personally, but I don’t judge anyone who has.
The Kindle 3 is my first e-reader, so I’m pretty happy with that decision 🙂