Amazon Kindle

[yesno]

The next generation of these things will be color, which will make them rock even more for reading the digital comics that I have "acquired," and beyond that, the idea is to make the displays as thin and flexible as paper.

I *still* might return mine, but it could be that I just haven't been reading enough.

[Gilly]

The next generation of these things will be color, which will make them rock even more for reading the digital comics that I have "acquired,"

That will be awesome, and I will totally get one when that happens.

[yesno]

The next generation of these things will be color, which will make them rock even more for reading the digital comics that I have "acquired,"

That will be awesome, and I will totally get one when that happens.

I've seriously considered getting a tablet PC just for that.  I've read a few comics on the Sony so far and it's not terrible, but grayscale, even when legible, doesn't really cut it for color comics.  I guess I could get around to reading Cerebus or something b&w.

[Gilly]

Are they able to do color while keeping the "like a book-easy on the eyes" sales pitch?

[yesno]

The only color e-ink displays have been prototypes, but that's what they say.

[Fido]

But all paper making is immensely polluting, and I'd be willing to be your average tree farm is not friend to the environment, either. 

I'll concede the point and admit that those facts, along with improvements in technology, will change my habits in time, probably before too long. My opinions aren't really that important anyway, but I'll assert that I'm a pragmatist where technology is concerned, someone who's basically in the mainstream when shifts in technology occur.

[yesno]

I returned the Sony Reader.  I figured it was about 50/50 that I would when I bought it.  Not ready for prime time.  Motherfucking Sony restocking fee of $45.  Grrrrr.

I think a lot of the people who like the Kindle so much just like the Internet features and your greater ability to dick around with it, as opposed to reading books on it.  The Reader has the exact same display and is just as good at actual reading, and it looks better, yet it doesn't have as many fans even though it's been out longer and is cheaper.

I would still love a color, 8 1/2  by 11 reader (so it could read PDFs and especially comics at full resolution).

Reasons:

* Who wants to carry around a $300 "book"?  I take good care of books, but I don't want to have to worry about one breaking or getting stolen.

* There's some serious self-deception going on with these e-ink guys if they think the technology is as good as paper.  You're reading black on a grey background, which blows.  You can still see some fuzziness.  The technology is pretty good, but not yet worth the tradeoffs.  Plus, reading off a regular, very high-res LCD screen really isn't that bad, except for the light blasting into your eyes.  I can read really really tiny text on my phone if I have to.

* A bunch of key things that an electronic reader should be able to do, neither the Kindle nor the Reader can do either well or at all.  Such as, full text, instant search (the way the Apple's Safari and Preview programs do search should be standard by now, it's so clearly superior); smart content-based indexing (like Devonthink, etc); and rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) reading, which is weird and hard to explain but very useful (it allows me to read some kinds of texts 5-10x faster than I normally would).

* Although it reads .txt files and such natively, it's often a pain in the ass to reformat them.  For example, a lot of public domain ebooks are in PDF format (which is a terrible format for ebooks because it fixes the layout, you can't re-flow text, etc) or in .txt format with hard linebreaks, which is also super dumb.  (Project Gutenberg, which I love and have donated time and money to, does this for some reason.)

* Sick of multiplying gadgets generally-- I like my hutphone so much because it means I never need both a phone and iPod, and often don't need a laptop or camera.  I am a big technophile, but the technology of books still beats the technology of e-ink displays.  (Similar to how I'm almost morally opposed to electric can openers when the regular kind works just fine.  Listen up, electric can opener users, I'm sick of your shit).

* Finally, I was hoping it would be useful for reading work documents, but it's just easier to print them out.  And it's WAY easier to skim paper, which doesn't take almost a second to flip from one screen to another.

[mokin]

Yeah, that basically confirms everything I thought about e-readers. The technology and design will eventually get there where it will be more desirable to have a reader over a book. I bet if Apple released one it might come pretty close.

You're totally right about electric can openers, too. Biggest waste of counter space. Electric can openers are a scam!

[chrisfoll577]

You're totally right about electric can openers, too. Biggest waste of counter space. Electric can openers are a scam!

I think electric can openers are fine for little old ladies with Arthritis, but my parents got one as a gift from someone and it felt like the countertop equivalent of tooling around the house on a rascal... maybe kind of fun for the first time, but the noise and power consumption just makes you feel lazy after a while.

I think a lot of the people who like the Kindle so much just like the Internet features and your greater ability to dick around with it, as opposed to reading books on it.

this is precisely why i'd be interested in a kindle...  i have a terrible habit of sitting in front of the tv and going stream-of-consciousness through wikipedia.  the kindle would allow me to do that practically anywhere...  which is precisely why by no means should i ever buy a kindle.

[yesno]

Several years later update.

I got a Kindle DX. This is the one that is more iPad/hardcover sized than paperback sized.  You need this size if you want to work with non-reflowable formats like PDF, or images.

The current generation of e-ink is much improved.  Much better contrast and better at images, and it refreshes more quickly.

It is very good at displaying PDFs, and although it can theoretically display .CBZs (not .CBRs) natively, comics work much better if you turn them into PDFs.  I think it is tuned to deal with images inside of the .CBZ of particular sizes.  Even color comics are legible--you don't need to pre-convert them to B&W on a computer.  Calibre is a really ugly program, but it is useful for organizing and tagging my collection of ePubs, PDFs, and so forth--and I use it to convert things to a Kindle-ready format.  With some tweaking, for instance, I figured out how to get it to make Kindle-ready PDFs very quickly out of comic files.  (It is annoying that Kindle doesn't support ePub natively, though of course conversion to .mobi is lossless.)

I had a work justification for getting one--I was sick of printing out hundred page PDFs all the time.  I have also been traveling a lot lately, and it is good at that.  Plus, Instapaper is great on Kindle.  (Instapaper is in my top 3 favorite applications ever.)

The question now isn't whether to get a tablet-sized device, but rather, which one to get.  I am quite picky about adding new things to fiddle with to my life.  Given that I have an iPhone, the only functionality I really would like to have that an iPad can give me but the Kindle DX/iPhone can't, is doing crossword puzzles and playing adapted board games like Catan more easily.  (Regular video games are just fine on the iPhone--I've been enjoying The Incident.)  The iPad is obviously better at comics or anything you might want to pinch-zoom in on.  But I'll wait for the tablet market to mature.  Especially since I mostly read text, the Kindle is a better choice because of the e-ink display, battery life, and most especially, weight.  The Kindle DX weighs about 11 ounces less than an iPad.

I usually don't like buying new kinds of gizmos, but the Kindle DX has replaces the reams of printouts and books that I normally have to carry around.  It will be nice when one device can combine all the the features of a laptop, e-reader, and smartphone without tradeoffs, but this is a ways off.  In the meantime, if you deal with a lot of documents, the Kindle DX is a pretty good tool.

Smirnoff Ice.

[masterofsparks]

I have an old-school (non-DX) Kindle and I'm quite fond of it. I got it as a gift - in all honesty, I probably would've gone for the DX if I were the one buying it. I'm not a comics guy so the color thing doesn't matter as much to me. It doesn't do very well with pictures in general (I bought Get in the Van for the Kindle and it has lots of photos), but that's not too big a deal for me. The not having to pay for a data plan, combined with the lower price, makes it an obvious choice (for me) over the iPad.

The Nook has a color display, doesn't it? I don't know anyone who has one of those.

[yesno]

The Nook's main screen is not color. It has a tiny touch screen used for navigation. It was largely trashed by all the gadget gurus when it came out for being slow and buggy, but I hear these problems have been fixed.

[Kim Kelly]

i have a nook. i'll probably replace it with an iPad a few generations down the line.

[Joe Rogaine]

Has anybody seen this new Kindle commercial?

Man "by pool cant see the screen"

Man "asks woman in bikini how she is reading hers"

Woman "its a kindle, it was only $135 i paid more for my sunglasses"




I think the correct response for the gentleman is "well la de da  you got reamed".

[Gilly]

I really would like to have that an iPad can give me but the Kindle DX/iPhone can't, is doing crossword puzzles and playing adapted board games like Catan more easily. 

I have 2 Across for my iPhone and I think it's really easy to use. It's 6 bucks but that's cheaper than buying a newspaper subscription or a puzzle book. I agree with Catan, that's a pain in the butt.

I won't buy a tablet until I can get it in color for under $200. If it can't do comics and magazines in color it's kind of worthless for me since I don't know how to read big words.