March 2009 -- by Jamii

I received an Amazon Kindle as a Christmas about this time last year. They were back ordered and it took several months for one to finally arrive. At this point I've read about 40 books using the Kindle and find that I carry it in my purse pretty much everywhere. This review are my thoughts on the good, the bad, and the ugly of using a Kindle.

 First let me say I don't think the Kindle is for everyone. It is an expensive device and not as rugged as one would hope. However if you read a lot and like to have something to read with you any time you're stuck waiting somewhere you'll find the Kindle a joy to have. 

 I'll try to answer the following questions over the course of the article. 

1. Is it easy to use?
2. Will the Kindle save you money?
3. Can I get free content for my Kindle?
4. What are the downsides of owning a Kindle?
5. Would you read all books on a Kindle or are there some that aren't well suited?
6. Can I read in the dark?
7. Can I share books?
8. What happens if my Kindle dies?
9. Do people really come up and talk to you if you have a Kindle?
10. What else can you do with a Kindle other than read books?
11. How does the new Kindle 2 compare with the older Kindle?

Is a Kindle easy to use?

Yes. That's it's strongest point. It has a screen that's about the same reading area as a paperback book. The fonts are well designed and easy on the eyes. You can adjust the fonts to six different sizes which helps greatly for reading in dim light. The Kindle is not back lit and the color of the page is a soft gray rather than a pure white. Also the characters are a dark gray rather than a pure black. This actually makes it easier to read for a long time.

Turning the page just requires a tap on either of two buttons on the right or left side. In fact, this is one of the downsides in that it's TOO easy to turn a page. Once you start reading on a Kindle you will stop noticing the device and get lost in the book. At times I've actually reached up to the top of the Kindle to turn the page before realizing I was reading on a Kindle.

 Will the Kindle save you money?

The short answer is 'it depends'. If you're the kind of reader who wants the lastest book in a series and doesn't want to wait until it's out in paperback then the Kindle will save you bunches. A new hardback released book is around $25, and the Kindle version of that book is $9.99. If you're like me and you previously had some discipline in waiting for books to be released in paperback you may find that you're now reading the books when they first come out because it's just so easy to get it. And the price difference between $9.99 and $7.99 for the paperback just isn't enought to stop you from buying it new. Paperback releases are less expensive for the Kindle than the physical book, anywhere from $1 to $1.50, and the books don't pile up looking for a bookshelf to hide on.  So you may save some money on bookshelves .

Update May 2009: I have noticed an unfortunate trend of Amazon releasing the Kindle version of a new hardback at around $15, instead of $9.99, then one week later dropping the price to $9.99. Caveat Emptor.

Can I get free content for my Kindle?

  Yes! Absolutely. The first book you should buy for your Kindle is The Kindle Cookbook by David Emberson. It has pointers to numerous sites with free ebook content for the Kindle, plus lots of information on using the internet features, converting your own material to Kindle format, the built in MP3 player, and other Kindle resources.

There are places like Project Gutenberg dedicated to making copyright free books available to everyone in any format they can use. So if you like Sherlock Holmes, or are a Jane Austin fan or if the Edgar Rice Burrough's Martian books are  your guilty pleasure you can find them all out on the net and available for you Kindle.

  What are the downsides of owning a Kindle?

OK, so far I sound like a cheerleader for the Kindle. I am fond of mine, but there are some annoyances. First, the next page button on the  right side of the device. It runs the length of the screen and is slanted downward making it really easy to use and find. In fact, way TOO easy. If you're reading at the dinner table (who would be so crass) you can accidently slip the edge under your plate and away it goes changing pages. You can be 10s of pages past where you were reading before even noticing. 

This brings me to the second issue. Bookmarks. You can bookmark a page, and you can have multiple bookmarks but there is no good way of managing these. If I hand the Kindle to my husband to read a book after I've read it it would be nice to have a single button to clear all bookmarks. Also, not all Kindle publishers include a table of contents. When you don't have one it's a real pain to get to a known location. Example: I'm reading a book on my Kindle, and my husband is reading the same book as a physical book. We get to a restaurant and I (as is usually the case) have a physical book and my Kindle, but he doesn't have anything to read. He knows he's on chapter 10 of the book we're both reading but that book has no table of contents. It takes him 10 minutes just to find where he's reading. Very annoying. 

Third annoyance: the 'mouse'. OK, it's a silver bar that runs the length of the Kindle vertically. You use it to select an item from a menu. It's just plain awkward.  There is no other way to put it. The Kindle has an 'experimental' web browser and this input device makes that such a pain to use that web browsing is better handled by your smart phone, even given that the Kindle's screen is so much larger. On the other hand, the Kindle isn't intended to be a mobile computing platform, and as a book reader it's really quite nice.

Fourth issue: books. Not everything is available on the Kindle. It's a decision the publisher makes. For example, I'd love to get a set of the Harry Potter books, but they aren't available. Maybe someday. On the plus side Amazon has a button you can push on any book that's not available on the Kindle to let the publisher know you'd like this book to be available. However Amazon does have more books available for the Kindle than pretty much any other electronic format.

No PDFs - yep, that's right. You can't read a PDF on the Kindle. You can email one into Amazon and get it converted, but that's just annoying.

Update: The Kindle 2 apparently solves this problem.

Would you read all books on a Kindle or are there some that aren't well suited?

I had the idea that the Kindle would be great for carrying around a lot of reference material. I'm sad to say this is only true where the reference material is pure text. You can display pictures on the Kindle but at this point they aren't really good enough to use as reference material.

Update: The Kindle 2 and the large Kindle both have more levels of gray making pictures much more readable and usable. I haven't gotten my hands on a large Kindle yet, but if I was in college and carrying about a ton of text books I think I'd love the large Kindle.

Can I read in the dark?

No. The Kindle isn't backlit. The advantage of this is the battery lasts a long time, and it's easier on your eyes. The disadvantage is you'll still need some sort of light source. If you keep your Kindle in the leather case it comes with you can clip a light onto that case, but you'll need at least as much light at you need to read a paperback book. The one upside here is you can crank the fontsize up to six and you can read that in very dim light.

Update: OK, this isn't actually about the Kindle, but if you have a Kindle and an iPhone get the Kindle reader app. It allows you  to download all our Kindle books onto the iPhone for times when you only have your phone with you, or you want to read in the dark. There is a 'whispersync' capability that's supposed to sync your iphone and your Kindle to the same place, however, I find it's doesn't always work. It usually works to sync my Kindle to the iphone, but not the other direction. I'm sure that's in part because I don't keep the Kindle wireless connection on unless I'm using it to buy books or browse the bookstore.  Still, this is a really nice feature and allows me to share books with my husband.

Can I share books? 

In a limited way. Amazon allows several members of a household or group of friends to have a joint account  with multiple Kindles (or iphones) attached to that account, up to six at this point. Any of the Kindles can download any books purchased by that account. 

What happens if my Kindle dies?

I have a weird story about breaking a Kindle. I was sitting on the couch reading my Kindle when a spider crawled up by leg. I'm pretty spider phobic so naturally my reaction was to scream and drop the Kindle. By horrible bad luck the middle of the Kindle screen fell on the point of the coffee table denting the screen. This caused serious disruption of the pixel addressing and while my Kindle still functioned it looked like a bad tartan kilt. I'd only had the Kindle for a couple of weeks, but was still amazed that Amazon replaced it for me. The second Kindle was tied to my account and I was able to download all the content I'd purchased.

I did discover that each Kindle as a unique encryption key because my first thought was to simply copy the files I'd backed up to my computer to the new Kindle. They we not viewable.

Do people really come up and talk to you if you have a Kindle?  

Yes. They really do. I like to read in restaurants and I've had waiters, waitresses, and just random people sitting near me come up and ask 'what is that thing? Do you like it?  Is it fun?' I've never had another electronic gadget that people were so curious about. That's part of why I'm writing this article, to answer some of the questions people ask me.

What else can you do with a Kindle other than read books?

You can buy books over the cellphone network that's built into the Kindle. It's free. (well you pay for the books, but not for the cell service). That means when you finish book 3 in the series you're reading at 2 am you can get book 4 in about a minute. Is that a good thing? Not sure.

You can browse the web, and as long as you're using it to read websites it's not a bad interface, but interactivity is awkward.

You can listen to music or books on tape, it has a built in MP3 player. 

How does the new Kindle 2 compare with the older Kindle?

Well, I haven't held a Kindle 2 yet, so I'm going from some of the reviews and articles I've read. They've apparently fixed the button problem by making the buttons smaller and giving you more space for holding the device comfortably.

 The silver bar is gone and the new selection device is apparently a big improvement. It's thinner and lighter. It will read to you now, although in that creepy metallic voice

The replaceable battery and the SD card are gone. That seems like a step backwards!

More memory will hold about 1500 books, 16 shades of gray instead of 4.