From Rachel – ‘It’s awesome…Amazing.’
As I suspected, a kid that reads deserves this. Obviously the price is insane for most.
As most have already complained, the buttons are bad – too many actually as well, and the design is just bland.
It’s about the WORDS though. Rachel could give a rat’s ass about design walking around the house or reading while I work out at the gym.
I can’t believe how easy it was to load a book and start. Whispernet is genius. Genius.
I am early on this one, but that’s ok. I know my pain point.
If you’ve priced college textbooks lately, the Kindle starts to seem reasonable. Textbooks are very heavy also, this cuts down on the weight for students. I think students will be the early adopters of the Kindle. Design ain’t pretty though, but that can be fixed in version 2.0.
I feel that pain, bocagirl. Thinking…every freshman gets a new Kindle at orientation? Amazon needs to get on that.
I’ll start out with a short disclaimer: I have never seen/used/held a kindle before, so the following is soley speculative on my part.
Personally, I see no place for a kindle in my life. I have a laptop and a smart phone. I read on both of those devices. I have an EV-DO card for my laptop, so I gain nothing from whispernet either.
Perhaps I am not the target demographic or perhaps I just lack the ability to envision what that target demographic might be, but I just can’t see it getting any kind of broad adoption.
Give me a software version for 50 bucks and I might be interested.
University kids will always want textbooks. heavy but just easier to syudy
I saw a Kindle at Borders a couple of weeks ago (first hear about it on WallStrip) and I think it is a silly little toy. It has the feel of a Palm III. If I want a portable book, I’ll get the audio version, duh. Besides, if it is any good, someone will hack it and then I’ll simply be able to download the book in a pdf and stick it on my Macbook Air. Isn’t Google like scanning in the library or something (the English version, which is another story). There are so many reasons not to Kindle…maybe if Apple made it, it would have a chance.
Thanks for the update Howard. Just make sure you use the dry-erase marker and NOT the Sharpie when you start writing in the margins.
Look forward to round 2.
Hey I went to school in the 80’s so I may be out of date, but textbooks are for: highlighting, writing in, doodling when bored, throwing against the wall when frustrated, throwing at roommate for various reasons, reselling when you need cash, etc. The Kindle just won’t cut it for these uses until maybe version 3!
$400 – a regular cell phone does a fine job for free (well already paid for). You can get free classics and creative commons stuff from http://www.booksinmyphone.com if you have internet connectivity on the phone you can browse and install directly – sweet.