Joel Liu's Library tagged kindle →  View Popular, Search in Google

From looking at the publicly available documentation of their development kit (I am not a participant of the beta testing) it seems there is no way of developing applications or tools that somehow integrate with existing features of the device. For example one could think of an application that uses information about the dictionary lookups performed when reading a book in a foreign language, and then allowing to schedule repetitions of the words helping to memorize them. Apparently there is no easy way to do it.

 

As a user I am probably more interested in Amazon further developing the so called experimental features: the web browser and the music player (with decent UI).

If you already have a thousand books on there as some do, yah, it'd be a bit of a pain, but it's mainly a flick on a highlighted highlighted book on the home page, to add it in to a Collection or into a few collections.

It'd be better to be able to select a few and then, in one, click get all those into one Collection. So far, no other ereader makes this possible to do within the reader device itself so I suppose it's not too easy to program (especially when the server is is often scanning for last page read and annotations to be backed up (if you don't disable the latter feature).

I had tagged my books, in the past, with keywords prefaced by 'x' when I wanted to find things (via the old Add-Note feature) so this will be a lot better :-)

I didn't expect them to do something that would give this much flexibility.

Re the shared highlighting of books info, I've always liked a feature they don't advertise - and that's the private password-protected webpage you get, listing all your books and showing all your highlights and annotations for each book, with all annotations on any individual book shown on a scrolling page, which is very useful. The new update now includes info on what others thought to highlight in the book.

Me? I think I'd turn that off. Not interested in knowing! The marketers thought that one up.

But here's what the private Amazon webpage of annotations looks like. I made a gif of a shorter list. That's at http://bit.ly/kwebnotesample

Hope we get our update sooner than later.

I think the iPad is stuck in a difficult place between the smartphone and the laptop and it's not nearly as convenient as a phone or as powerful as a laptop. That's based on all of four hours playing with it. The device will get more powerful and lighter and less expensive. Over time it may turn into a mainstream computing platform but I don't think it is there yet and I don't think Apple has the kind of hit on its hands that it had with the iPhone.

The thing, the real thing, about the iPad is the stable it comes from. I think of iPhones in the same way the world saw plastics in the '50s. Plastics were great, they were to revolutionise the way we manufactured stuff and interacted with our nascent technological world. But then we learnt that plastics were way harmful and so we now try to steer clear of them.

The "plastics" analogy is good but (as described here), the developer-Apple relationship reminds me more of the musician-record label relationship circa 1995.

In this analogy, both Apple and the record label own a fat distribution pipe to many customers. They are dependent on third parties to create the content to fill that pipe, so they have to cut them in on the deal. Only a few of those 3rd parties get rich, but it's enough to keep many many more motivated. Meanwhile, the people that own the pipes get *filthy* rich.

Forgot to mention that the one thing I really wish they'd add is the ability to have user accounts. I think for many households this will be a shared device and thus would benefit from that.

Completely agree. We use our existing iPod Touch as a shared device and have exactly this issue today.

It flows through to the apps as well, e.g. the Facebook app doesn't show who is logged in on most of its screens, and it doesn't make it easy to switch between user accounts.

Shared devices need shared services. Putting personal services (like a single-user Facebook app, or a single email inbox, etc.) on a shared device is broken.

Right on, plus some apps you can't even share. E.g. Mail. I set up Mail for my wife. I can't use it then myself or for older children. Likewise Photos, I have hers there but not mine. And so on. For me and I suspect many others this will be a shared device like a laptop / desktop. So I think the lack of user accounts is the biggest miss for 1.0. While I'm not holding my breath for it (as Erik mentions) it's such a big miss that I think they'd sell more by having it available. I suppose one might argue that perhaps it needs multitasking for this capability to be put in place, so perhaps we'll see it down the road when/if multi-tasking gets added.

7) The apps. In a digital age, a book is (finally!) becoming more than just words on a page. But the Kindle has been slow to recognize this.

9) The price. For $10 more than a Kindle DX, consumers get an incredible ebook reader, and so much more: a device that they can use for, well, pretty much anything. The options, consumer experience, and flexibility for that $10 are a no-brainer.

It’s clear that Amazon is already scared: witness their recent moves in the last few days running up to Apple’s announcement. Just this month, they’ve announced an app framework and a new royalty structure to be more attractive to publishers – and both moves are clearly defensive catch-up plays to respond to the threat of the iPad. Amazon is even trying to win love by giving away free Kindles to their best customers.

Plus the 10 hour battery life stinks for an ereader. If I take a trip I just want to pack my ereader and go. I don’t want to have to worry about packing a cord, finding an outlet, or bringing a power converter to charge it. I have to bring all those for my laptop why would I pack both.

 

Give me at least 3 days of battery life, on battery life not standby. Then maybe I could at least take it on a weekend trip without concern.

 

And as for it replacing my laptop on a trip, no way. I can’t do work on this, I can’t answer 50 emails in 30 minutes, I can’t edit Word documents, nor can I listen to pandora and work at the same time.

 

Sorry, this is just a cool looking toy, but it serves no purpose.

I am not Apple fanboy. I never had iPhone or Ipod touch. But i want to get iPad. The reason why:
 I am an engineering student. I read a loooooooot of color PDFs and i buy eTexbooks on Coursresmart, which has an app in the app store. I also could use some of the calculator apps…Plus i need portability and low weight. Both of wich iPad has.
 And if i can watch movies, browse internet, listen to the music – that is a big plus.

 

In my opinion iPad will not be as popular as iPhone, but it will fill the “want”(not need) of the average consumer. And Apple created iPad precisely for an average consumer.

 

Bottom line if you don’t like it, if it is not what u want – don’t buy it. But i will.

This is about creating a new category of device that fills needs people didn’t even know they had.
 And Apple is very, very good at that.

 

No, I’m not a fanboy. But I can recognize when someone creates a breakthrough device.

 

Yes, it’s a 1.0 device – and it will surely only get better with future releases.

However, some people (maybe a lot) will buy ipad, but IMO these will be a totally different kind of costumers. More the kind that wants the new gadget to show of (and because it’s fun to use).

 

Then, apple will leverage on these gadget lovers to claim X million people bought its crap and they’ll say they have the best ebook reader, blablabla… In the end everyone will start thinking they are right and they’ll buy their tablet thinking it’s the best experience when it’s not.

 

PS: I still love macbook pros

If you want a conventional reading experience, then, of course, the Kindle/Sony wins. Eink alone will guarantee that. But conventional reading is being challenged here and for that reason the iPad will be a major contender in the field. In the long run, the richer reader experience will trumph. In the short run, there is a place for both types of devices.

A lot of the books I read are design-focused. Color is a must have and is why I held off on buying a device until now.

 

There is no one, single use case that applies for all people

Callywag & Rick,

 

I don’t think you understand the broad consumer audience.

 

Only a small percent of consumers are as passionate as you are about e-Ink. Most would rather have something they can click a hyperlink on and get a full-color rendered page.

Kindle is a niched product and not necessarily threatened a multi-purpose device such as the iPad.

Maybe so if you think of ebooks in the paradigm of printed books.

 

There is a space for a new style of book that is a whole convergence of different media – to which e-Ink would be unsuited.

e-Ink. Not so hot for other forms of printed media. Newspapers, Magazines, Comics, and Text Books.

 

GAME OVER. (Actually maybe i’ll wait until the iPad is actually released)

I read for hours on the iPhone using the Kindle app and Stanza, and the assertion that doing so on a LED backlit screen “kills your eyes” is completely and totally false.

 

The idea that the Kindle is more comfortable on the eyes is another common assertion, and in my view it’s also false to fact. I had two Kindles (G1 and G2) and sent both back. You want to really kill your eyes? Try reading the Kindle’s fuzzy low-resolution low-contrast 75% gray text on a 25% gray background.

 

It was so bad that the only way to make the text legible was to increase the font size… to the point where the iPhone’s screen displayed more words per “page”.

 

So much for a dedicated reader.

 

The Kindle might be better if you spend most of your time standing outdoors and reading under the light of the noon sun, but forget reading indoors under anything other than optimum lighting conditions… unless, perhaps, you clip a glaring, silly-looking book light to it.

 

Then there’s the slow refresh rate, the headache inducing let’s-invert-the-entire-screen page turns, the…

 

Never mind. The ONLY thing e-ink had going for it was battery life, and today that’s simply not enough. The sooner it’s relegated to the technological scrap heap, the better for us all.

Thank you for your comment, Michael. It made sense.

 

I have extreme allergies to dust, etc. I read digital books on my Kindle iPhone app and have waited for a color eBook reader.

 

I watched videos showcasing the Kindle 1, 2 and DX and was troubled by the method that pages were “turned” and refreshed. I simply didn’t like it. The B&N Nook seemed even worse. So I have held off buying anything.

 

I like the iPad a lot. I know I will buy one as my official eBook reader as soon as they are released.

I am thoroughly impressed by Amazon’s PR triumph regarding e-Ink. It is utterly remarkable how there are so many people who genuinely believe e-Ink is better on their eyes than a LED-backed LCD display. This is just utterly false.

 

When I want to read in bed (while my wife sleeps), I have to clip on one of those little book lights. It’s convenient and practical, but after 30 minutes, my eyes are very tired. The book is unevenly lit, some parts of the page are darker than others, it’s very straining. I usually just put the book down and open a laptop instead. Clear, bright, crisp, evenly lit LCD is infinitely more pleasing on the eyes. I dial down the brightness a bit (my pupils are fully dilated in the dark) and I can read like this for hours.

 

E-Ink is a masterful marketing gimmick by Amazon and eventually, people will figure this out.

The only advantage I see of the ipad over the kindle is the color screen. And that gets defeated by its battery life (10 hours is nothing compared to the days or weeks a kindle can go).

 

When e-ink comes out with its color screens that will fall as well.

 

The additional functionality is all already covered by my iphone. So price/value wise… iphone (which is also a phone and fulfills a real need) + laptop (which is also a huge productivity tool and fulfills a real need) + kindle (toy to augment the other two) really is a far better value than iphone+laptop+ipad.

 

the thing that will sell the ipad is the brand which will make it a moderate success. but if you break your ipad, will you replace it? If you break your laptop/iphone you most certainly will. If you break your kindle… you probably will because its far cheaper.

If Apple supports epub, then there are plenty of sources for ebooks OTHER than the iBookstore, or one could always run the Kindle app, or the B&N app, or the Stanza app, or…

It’s not a just Large iPod. Can you imagine writing penning notes on an iPod? Nope! But what you can imagine is a developer making a pretty sweet Journal app that will allow us to do just that…

 

Wake Up people.

 

Just because you didn’t see a “Mind Blowing” app yesterday doesn’t mean they won’t be created within the next two months.

 

What we all witnessed yesterday will soon be extended way beyond the cliche techies. It will be in anybody’s hands that doesn’t mind plopping down $500 big ones.

totally agree. It doesn’t replace anything for me. I have a macbook, iphone and a kindle. all the hubbub about eyestrain – i have significantly less eyestrain on the kindle than I do with an lcd display.

You are also forgetting the younger generation who are accustomed to reading on backlit screens (smart phones and computers).

I read entire books on my iPhone. I’ve read entire books on an iPaq, and on a Palm.

 

The primary reason most people don’t read ebooks on notebooks is that when you’re relaxing or in bed a laptop is heavy and awkward to hold and manipulate.

 

The backlit screen has little to do with it.

I can use a kindle outside in full sun.

Comparing the iPad to the Kindle isn’t like comparing a computer to a typewriter, it’s like comparing a knife to scissors. The knife is obviously better because it can cut so many different things and the scissors are really good at one important task. I predict that scissors will be replaced by knives. They are so much prettier too and come with 60% more hype.

A digital ink reader under a touch sensitive glass pane with gesture control would be nice though.