So a week ago, after juggling of many paperback books on the Australia Trip, I finally went over to the dark side and picked up a Kindle, preliminary to going to Chile, and, in a few months, Italy. Plus, of course, the rest of my life.
I went with the Kindle DXG (or Kindle 3) because, honestly, I’m so bought into the Amazon world, there really was no choice. I went with the WiFi-only model, since I’m often where there is WiFi, and even when I’m not, I have more than one book already on the unit, right?
So, thoughts on how Kindle is going for me?
- For the basic function of “carrying a bunch of books in a tiny form factor,” it does spectacularly.
- Battery life is great, WiFi connectivity is good. But if you’re not doing WiFi, then it’s worth turning off the WiFi
- Reading on the Kindle is easy and pleasant. There’s no backlight (and I didn’t get a cover with a built-in lamp), but that’s actually comfortable.
- Unlike a paperback, it always lies flat. While page turning requires a button press, that’s still easier (with finger, knuckle, whatever) than, sometimes, turning a page.
- Desperately trying to avoid re-buying books I already own, just for the novelty of it.
- Kindle book pricing is obnoxious. There’s no used books. The prices are, in fact, comparable to hardcover in many cases. I’ve decided that any Kindle book that’s selling at that price point — is not being sold to me.
- I did download a bunch of free books. Yay for free books! The Kindle doesn’t do EPUB format (without some conversion), but it supports a lot of other ones. So far, hasn’t been a problem.
- Yes, DRM still sucks, at least philosophically.
- I find the metadata with books, and the ability to sort and display them, a bit limited. I’d love to see a listing by author, or by title, or by category/tag, or by publish date; don’t see an easy way to do any of that.
- I wish there were more fonts to display in. One thing I can already tell is that removing the book content from the book format removes a bit of what makes a book special. You don’t get the cover, the typography selection, etc. Yeah, that’s sometimes a good thing, but it homogenizes the overall experience just a bit.
- Heck, it would be nice if there were a cover image of the book that would default as the screen saver instead. That seems trivial, but …
- Because in a leather sleeve it looks like a portfolio, it’s more acceptable to bring with you places (or carry into the head) than a book.
- I feel a bit better having played with Kindle for Android that I can fairly easily still read my book if I should happen to forget my Kindle or be unable to bring it somewhere.
So, overall, the convenience factor rocks — enough to so far overwhelm my DRM dislikes and the “in the dark all cats are gray” homogeneity of the Kindle experience.
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Exactly how does DRM affect you? Because you can’t get stuff for free and avoid having to give those tiresome authors payment for their work?
No Last Hussar, DRM hurts me all sorts of ways that have nothing to do with not paying authors.
1. It makes it difficult for me to move the book I bought to the reader of my choice. I am on approximately my third generation of reader tech, starting with my first reader on a Palm Pilot. I have lost books permanently at each transition, because the formats are never quite compatible and the converters are always afterthoughts that barely work.
2. DRM makes it harder for me to get to my books. Even when they work, I end up getting asked for things like the credit card number I used to purchase the book originally. So I need to keep a database of ancient credit card numbers. Nice.
3. DRM is not about getting money for authors, it is about getting money for publishers who add perhaps 2 cents in overall value to my e-book transaction. I was overjoyed to be able to go over to Diane Duane’s site and buy her Tales of the Five books directly from her. I love the books, wanted electronic copies, and happily paid her directly to get them as DRM-free ebooks. I felt great knowing she was getting the money herself, since she wrote them and the transmission costs were free. And since I like Diane’s work, I happily tell my friends where they can get them as paid items. And my friends buy them. Not a one of us interested in books for free, as it turns out. We like authors to have money so they can write us more books. Diane, by the way, makes plenty more than the publishers would give her at the price of $2.99. http://www.dianeduane.com/The-Door-Into-Fire-Diane-Duane-Ebook-Edition. Go Buy ’em.
Publishers, on the other hand, I have no particular interest in funding extensively if at all. They were quite valuable when someone had to front money to buy a lot of printed paper and warehouse the books and ship them to stores. For e-books, I have no idea what value they are adding. And since I perceive little value, I have zero interest in paying them the lion’s share of the total price of my books.
Hussar, that’s a bit presumptuous, not to mention harsh. As a purchaser of bound books, Dave fully supports authors’ rights.
I think he’s bothered by the fact that he doesn’t actually own the books he buys for the Kindle. If they get removed from the device, he may not be allowed to redownload them, losing them forever (until he pays a second time for a book he has already purchased, at least). Apparently there is a limit on how many times a book may be downloaded, and users are not informed of this at the time of purchase. Worse, different publishers set different limits, and the only way to discover them is to exceed them.
In addition, Kindle owners have had books removed from their devices without warning. Supposedly, that will not happen again, but the knowledge that it has been done is rather disquieting.
There is also the disadvantage of being unable to lend an individual book to a friend, which is not a concern with a bound book.
Kurt and Avo sum up my position pretty well. My basic position is that an ebook should follow the model of a physical book. Once I buy it, I should own it — I should be able to take it with me into the future, read it in perpetuity (or at least until it wears out), loan it to friends, donate it to a library, or even resell it.
Ebooks, through their DRM, don’t let me do that.
They do give me other advantages, obviously. But those advantages are definitely tempered by their arbitrary limitations by the publishers.
I certainly support authors getting money for their work (as someone who both knows authors and occasionally aspires to being one). I am even willing to see publishers, as facilitators of getting books from the author to me, get their few ounces of flesh. I just feel, at this point, that publishers aren’t treating their customers well.
Btw, Avo, both the Nook and now the Kindle support loaning of a book to someone with the same platform — for up to two weeks. IF the publisher allows it for that title.
As an expansion on the loaning bit:
– The loan is for 14 days (and you can’t read the book while it’s loaned out, which is fine).
– The loanability of the book needs to be set by the publisher (ugh).
– A book can only ever be loaned out ONCE (which is damned silly).
Cool!
Dave, have you grabbed a copy of The Complete Works of H. P. Lovecraft for your Kindle? It’s on Cthulhu Chick’s site. It’s free, so the late author receives no royalties. 😉
No, haven’t gotten that one yet. But, then, I don’t enjoy Lovecraft enough to think I’m going to be reading him any time soon.
***Dave, just thought I would point out that the Kindle DXG and Kindle 3 are two completely separate models, each having their own pros and cons. Unfortunately the DXG has dropped off Amazon’s radar as it caters for a niche market. Strangely although released almost the same time as the Kindle 3, it operates the older Kindle 2 firmware, which Amazon obviously would be reluctant to update with their latest innovations, as from a business perspective it makes sense to phase out older models so users have motivation to buye newer ones. Although still a new model, if the DXG gets the same updates as the Kindle 3, the Kindle 2 would also by default get them as it runs the same firmware, keeping the device alive and current. This subject has caused major upset amongst DXG users, and although maybe a little off topic, the reason I point it out is because you state that the DXG is capable of sharing eBooks, but I believe this was a Kindle 3 update and not issued to DXG users! So that info might not be entirely correct!
D’oh! I stand corrected. Yes, I got a Kindle 3 (newest generation small Kindle), not a Kindle DXG (the graphite-gray version of the large-screen Kindle). I think I was confused by some other folks’ references to them. Thanks.