Electronic Readers

[Carys]

I'm also very eagerly awaiting the release of the next generation iPad. Though I'm not quite as rabid of an Apple fangirl as other people I know, I do like most of their products and I think for the sake of portability and versatility the iPad may be a better option than a Kindle, although I've heard raves about those too.

I've never bought a first generation Apple anything though. There always seem to be too many upgrades that ought to be made for the second one that's released, IMO.

[charlestudor2005]

Originally Posted by atlcomedy

Again I really don't know the specifics on how they work now pricing wise.

I'd be more concerned with the cost of the content (or what it will be in 2 years) vs. the hardware cost. If you can rent an all-you-can-eat buffet for $9/month for all kinds of original content via netflix, etc what is a fair price for an e-book?

& Yeah it pretty much is a "Pay it Forward" proposition for me as far as gifting. The attendant is male as often as not and says, "Oh your reading the new Scott Turow? I loved the last one...."

What am I going to do...carry the thing around for the next couple of days (while I'm on my trip), throw it on a bookshelf for the next 10 years...give it to some charity in 10 years for their bookdrive?

I bought a Kindle for my daughter, and have only a limited knowledge of how it works. I bought one for myself last month after the price drop, and it is due to arrive at the end of August (2 months for delivery from Amazon, sheesh! ).

Yes, you have to know the account and password in order to purchase the book. Otherwise, you can give an Amazon gift card. They have touted the "holds 3,500 books" teaser for quite a while. If you overload the 3,500, you can archive your books, and recall them later if you want. I believe that if you have more than one Kindle at an address (or on an account) you share the "library" that would have been in your home had it been represented by a hard/soft cover bookcase in the home.

I suspect the market might eventually drive a "second-hand" book sharing with ereaders. I don't want to keep my 3,500 books around, or read them again. I may want to keep reference items around, and books I go back to again and again. But I normally read a book only once. Then it goes to the library or to a garage sale. I would prefer to be able to "gift" my ebook to someone else rather than keep it in archive.

[gamma]

Originally Posted by charlestudor2005

I bought a Kindle for my daughter, and have only a limited knowledge of how it works. I bought one for myself last month after the price drop, and it is due to arrive at the end of August (2 months for delivery from Amazon, sheesh! ).

Some cards have price protection on purchases.
So, you might be able to get the price differential.

[Mazomaniac]

Originally Posted by charlestudor2005

BTW, Amazon is about to release a new Kindle DX.

I just got my Kindle DX Graphite and I have to say that I'm really impressed with it. I looked at five or six competitors and went with the Kindle after the DXG was released. There are drawbacks versus other readers - lack of WiFi and limited PDF support being the two largest issues for me. Overall, however, I have to give this thing a 9 out of 10 as a reading device.

The other huge advantage of this thing is the text size for those who are vision impaired. I'm not old enough to need the big text yet, but I've got a relative with an eight-year-old son who was born with a serious vision problem. Once I saw the DXG I knew this kid needed to have one. I popped the credit card into Amazon and had one on the way to him within ten minutes.

At $400 it's a pricey device for a lot of people but for me it's well worth it. I'm on travel five or six months out of the year so I'm happy to pay the price just to leave the paper at home and reduce the weight of my carry-on. So far this is the best gadget I've purchased in the last five years.

Cheers,
Mazo.

[Sydneyb]

Originally Posted by Mazomaniac

I just got my Kindle DX Graphite .....
At $400 it's a pricey device for a lot of people but for me it's well worth it. I'm on travel five or six months out of the year so I'm happy to pay the price just to leave the paper at home and reduce the weight of my carry-on.

As a reminder: you need to put some kind of sticker on the backside. If you lose it (which I have done since starting this thread), at least if someone wants to return it, they can.

[pjorourke]

Ive found the Kindle app on the iPhone pretty useful -- I've read about 4-5 books on it. You don't get a whole lot on a page, but its always with me so I can read whenever I have time.

[atlcomedy]

Originally Posted by charlestudor2005

But I normally read a book only once. Then it goes to the library or to a garage sale. I would prefer to be able to "gift" my ebook to someone else rather than keep it in archive.

see my comment below

Originally Posted by Mazomaniac

At $400 it's a pricey device for a lot of people .

I just saw somekind of reader advertised on TV for $139. I don't know how much memory features etc. but I think that or even the magic $99 price point becomes much more doable to the average consumer.

Originally Posted by atlcomedy

I'd be more concerned with the cost of the content (or what it will be in 2 years) vs. the hardware cost. If you can rent an all-you-can-eat buffet for $9/month for all kinds of original content via netflix, etc what is a fair price for an e-book?

?

per CT's comment above the rental market really makes sense for most consumers, but save for the library, this never really was an option.

as an observer, my question is do these readers ever turn books/novels into a rental market (from the purchase model). Right now it clearly is a purchase model.

For example, a couple of months ago I needed to take an exam to get certification by another state to conduct business there. I purchased a study guide but instead of it being a hard bound book or set of 3 ring binders that would proudly sit on my bookshelf and collect dust it was 90 day access to the content online, password protected in a way that would make it difficult to share with others if I was so inclined. The cost was probably half of what the hardcopy study guide would have cost.


A final thought, I learned from some hard core Kindle users that you can as a small group (I think up to 4 or 5) share your books much in the same way cell phone companies have "friends & family" plans. It is semi-permanent and requires one person to put down a credit card that funds the overall account. So while that works well for a fixed group, you can't give a casual friend access to the book with a little cover note that says "thought you'd appreciate this" without purchasing the title again.