81 comments:

1. jfwhite at 11:31 am, February 11, 2009
   

   Um, Amazon sold something like 500,000 units of the Kindle 1. These have gone somewhere other than into the ethers, right? Could the remote possibility exist that people outside of your smug, elite little thinktank *are* buying, downloading and enjoying books on this platform?

   Zheesh, what a pretentious attitude…

    
2. Joshua Benton at 11:38 am, February 11, 2009
   

   Thanks for the comment. Actually, Amazon’s never released even a single sales number of Kindles sold — another reason to question its penetration. *Of course* some people are using them. But the issue is whether it’s going to be a big breakout success — the “iPod of Books” that becomes the default platform for reading the way the iPod has become the default platform for music listening.

   I’m just saying if the Kindle was going to be a breakout success, we’d see a lot more of them at places like a conference fundamentally dedicated to the Kindle and Kindle-like electronic devices. Even these people haven’t bought in. There’s been way more buzz around here around other ebook formats (Stanza on iPhone, straight PDF/.mobi/.epub, etc.) than around the Kindle.

    
3. MichaelJ at 12:30 pm, February 11, 2009
   

   “I say all this to illustrate that I am the exact target audience for the Kindle — precisely the mix of book reader and tech lover who should want one.”

   Maybe, maybe not.

   I live in Park Slope, Bklyn and don’t go out of the neighborhood much. I saw a fellow Sloper sitting outside the coffee shop on the corner in the sunshine, reading her Kindle.

   “Is that thing any good?” said I.
   “It’s really actually pretty cool,” said she. ” I can even read it in the sunshine,”

   “Have a nice day,” we both said.

   The Kindle, IMHO, is exactly NOT for busy people. They are much too busy checking their iPhones or blackberries and twittering and all the other busyness that fills the day.

   The Kindle is for Cranky Geezer Baby Boomers and College kids. Cranky Geezers because we don’t want to engage directly with anyone we don’t already know. Plus it’s time to read all those books we blew off in college cause we’ve lived through enough of life to finally understand why we should read them.

   College kids because someone is forcing them to read.

   It’s also the tech that is going to reinvent first college textbooks and then with a little Print on Demand tech, textbooks in K-12.

   It’s not built for speed. It’s built for comfort.

    
4. Azimov at 12:42 pm, February 11, 2009
   

   Amazon sell 1 million kindles already. It’s a big success. The Kindle never fail unless some asteroid hit our planet.

    
5. Tim Windsor at 12:51 pm, February 11, 2009
   

   I thought you were heading somewhere, then veered off. So I’ll pick up that thread.

   I don’t think Kindle will fail, but I think its success will be as a distribution system and software. Kindle 1 and 2 (and 3, maybe) are loss-leading proofs-of-concept to get the world open to the idea of an e-book (or, as we say with dreams in our heats in newspaperland, digital paper) as a legitimate business proposition.

   Imagine what happens to the space when Apple springs a tablet-like, larger-screen iPod Touch on the world. What if you could tap into the Amazon book marketplace as easily as you can buy music and video and apps in the iTunes store.

   That’s where I see Amazon’s investment paying off.

   As for spotting them in the wild, I haven’t seen one either. I actually bought v.1 on day one, but returned it, because it was half-baked. And ugly. v.2 is nicer looking, but I still can’t see parting with $360 for what’s essentially a 1.5-trick pony. I’ll save the cash for the Apple device.

    
6. Tim Windsor at 12:51 pm, February 11, 2009
   

   ummm, that’s dreams in our “hearts.”

    
7. Glenn Fleishman at 1:13 pm, February 11, 2009
   

   I’d accuse @1 and @4 of being shills, trolls, or griefers, except that they can’t possibly work for Amazon or have any sense in their heads.

   Sony said last year that it had sold 200,000 Sony Readers: minmal-function touchscreen, no network connection, no keyboard. That was extremely impressive to me. Sony also has a very large library. From that, I’d like to extrapolate that Amazon has likely sold 150,000 to 300,000 units, except we just bloody don’t know that.

   Take Bezos’s statement (disclosure: my former boss many years ago) that 10 percent of unit volume sales of titles available in print and on Kindle (230,000) over 14 months were to Kindle users. That is, 90 percent of those titles were sold in print (or perhaps other electronic form, too); 10 percent of unit volume to Kindle users. That still tells us nothing.

   Amazon did about $5.3 billion in sales in North American of media in 2008, according to their 10K. How much of that was books v. DVDs v. audio CDs? Dunno. How much was electronic download versus physical? Dunno. How much was U.S. v. Canada? And on and on.

   So let’s pretend that books remain a strong part and they sold nearly $3b in books in the US or perhaps 200 million books. (The Book Industry Study Group says that over 3 billion books were sold and over $30 billion in revenue realized in 2007, the latest full year’s numbers. That’s consumer book sales, excluding schools of all kinds. The New Media Record estimated Amazon’s 2008 book segment sales a few months ago.)

   When you look at the Kindle titles available, they include bestsellers and long tail. So let’s say that perhaps 20 million books sold are represented by the 230,000 books that Bezos is talked about. That would put Kindle sales at 2 million units, which would likely mean that there are over 200,000 Kindles sold.

   That’s great, but not a breakout product.

   For Josh’s remark, I agree: I know a total of one person among all my technology and non-technology friends and colleagues who own a Kindle. However, when I talk to people about it casually, I find that some frequent travelers I know, especially those that travel often with their kids, have Kindles because of the sheer ease of carrying lots of reading material with them and additional material that they can buy on the road.

   I suspect that the target audience isn’t on Josh and my radar, because they tend to be head’s down business travelers or family travelers.

   That said, I haven’t spotted a single Kindle in the wild on four recent flights comprising 8 flight segments to and from Seattle and San Francisco.

    
8. Alex at 1:13 pm, February 11, 2009
   

   Joshua,

   I have been writing for quite a while on the subject of digital publishing and even have started a blog to discuss these issues. I must say that I disagree with your post.

   Not because I feel the Kindle is the next iPod, but more so due to your argument. Simply because you saw 1/8 in a room with a Kindle, you assumed it would fail. That is the title of your article. Personally, I think the assumption is irresponsible considering the readers that you may have.

   Think about it this way: If after 8 years, only half of a room has an iPod, yet only after 1 year, an eighth of the room has a Kindle.

   You do the math. Maybe you will see that your assertion of failure undeniably does not add up. I do enjoy multiple views though because I believe that no one can tell what is going to happen.

    
9. Jeffrey McManus at 1:36 pm, February 11, 2009
   

   Amazon may have sold 10 million Kindles, but it won’t be a success unless people keep them and use them in the long term. And I agree that will be a challenge for them, mostly because of the closed nature of the device; they are profoundly vulnerable to a competitive attack in that area. For example, 10 inch netbooks are getting close to the price point of the Kindle, and those provide access to e-books as well as the whole internet (as well as all the other features of a “real computer). This means that Kindle’s principal differentiator is all-you-can-eat wireless access, but even that won’t last long. Wireless carriers are beginning to see that these devices are a potential new vista for growth as the market for wireless telephony plateaus, so you’re going to be seeing more innovation (on the tech as well as the business side) in this area.

    
10. Charles at 1:45 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    Whatever, I published 30 books on kindle and I’m doing fairly well. I love residual income streams,
    I make money while I’m sleeping – I sleep better!
    Maybe kindle will fail. It’s not failing now.

     
11. Joshua Benton at 2:19 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    For the record, I absolutely think that *some* e-reader will find great success. And eventually, book-length works will be someday be consumed en masse on an electronic device. My argument is that the Kindle, as currently devised, isn’t that device and is a *very* long way from it. And while “me and my friends” is, admittedly, a very limited subset, the fact that the tech-savviest segment of the book industry’s editors and publishers aren’t buying it nearly as much as they’re buying iPhones indicates that this isn’t the device that’ll do it.

    My suspicion is that it’ll be something more like an iPhone with a foldable and more eye-friendly display — that is, a reading app will be one part of a multifunction device that we’re already carrying around, not another “1.5 trick pony,” as Tim put it.

     
12. Martin Langeveld at 2:26 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    I haven’t seen one either, but have to disagree as well, Josh. I agree with Glenn’s numbers; the published guesses were 230,000 last September, and they sold out around Thanksgiving. So let’s assume it’s 300,000, tops. That’s not a lot, in a population of 300 million, so I would not expect to see them all over the place. You don’t even see people reading printed books all over the place, except park benches, and it’s winter. And actually, I never saw an iPod, I’m sure, during the first 15 months they were out.

    Also, this is an item I would not expect to catch on first with the early adopter tech crowd you’re hanging out with at Tools of Change. Instead, I think it has been a hit with people who read a lot more than they Tweet.

    I think Amazon may have rushed Kindle 1.0 a bit because of the Sony product, so it had its flaws. I’m guessing they treated it as kind of a beta test, and are applying a lot of lessons learned in 2.0.

    To me, the price is still a little daunting, even though I read a lot. Also, the Whispernet coverage map says I can’t get reception at my house. I’d have to drive somewhere to download the New York Times every day, so I think I’ll wait. But basically, I want one. And I’ll stick with my earlier prediction that they will sell 2.5 million 2.0s and 25 million 3.0s, and that the New York Times will get 100,000 Kindle and other e-reader subscribers during the 2.0 phase and 1 million during 3.0. If that happens, we have a different ballgame.

     
13. Glenn Fleishman at 4:03 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    @8: Alex wrote, “Think about it this way: If after 8 years, only half of a room has an iPod, yet only after 1 year, an eighth of the room has a Kindle.”

    That’s not what Josh said. He wrote,

    “The moderator asked the audience of hundreds of tech-savvy (or at least tech-interested) publishing professionals how many of them had a Kindle. I’d say maybe 1 in 8 raised their hands.”

    That’s pretty paltry, especially because some people in the publishing industry have bought Kindles specifically to learn whether the model makes sense. My one friend and colleague with a Kindle bought hers for that reason.

    So in an audience attending a conference for which they paid hundreds dollars about the future of publishing to have 1/8th in a session on ebooks to have lacked the curiosity (and cash) to buy a Kindle–seems very odd indeed.

    It adds credence to my argument that the current buyers aren’t technophiles at all, I guess.

     
14. Maura, one librarian point of view at 4:19 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    Here’s my 2¢:
    I have a Kindle, got it when Oprah offered a $50 discount. I love many things about it although I don’t feel proficient yet.
    One obstacle is visual – who wants to read Vanity Fair without pictures? Another is tactile. I often enjoy the weight and texture of a book. The last drawback for me is price. I’m too cheap to invest $9.99 when a used copy is available for $3.44. (This is a mystery and character flaw; I have no similar compunctions when buying expensive shoes, for example.)
    I find the online store rather cumbersome to browse. I would cite that as what I would most like to see improved. I do agree that for travelers and students – and I actually fit both categories on a regular basis – this is a wonderful invention.
    I know a couple of people who got kindles and sent them back because they didn’t have web 2.0 features. I know others who object to not being able to lend a book or leave volumes to heirs. Neither of these bother me but they are what I hear cited most often as reasons for not buying a Kindle. Oh, and price. But I think the price is really rather reasonable. See – there’s that irksome contradiction again!
    Bottom line: I am happy with my Kindle. I think it’s a tip of the iceberg kind of thing.

     
15. MichaelJ at 4:52 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    My two cents, to add to Maura’s 2 cents.

    The real opportunity for the Kindle is to destroy the college textbook market. The hold up for now is IP and all the incentives to buy textbook content. But with open source curriculum, wikipedia, and many other initiatives quickly expanding I don’t see how the textbook business model holds on.

    Given that textbook publishing revenue underwrites alot of commercial book publishing and the market in second hand textbooks is significant revenue for Barnes and Noble and anyone in the textbook retail business, the collapse of textbooks in college will probably have some serious ramifications.

    Is it going to be the Kindle or the 10″ netbook? That’s the really interesting question. I think Amazon wins to the extent that they figure out the IP for college textbooks.

    It’s very similar to the value created by Apple when they solved the music IP issue. Music was not the revenue stream, selling hardware brought in the money.

    Can Amazon get the cost low enough to go mass market? But, in the college textbook market, $400 plus $25 dollars a textbook is competing against up to $1000 to $1500 a semester.

    One thing I’m watching is to see if Amazon makes a move towards Open Source textbook content. That could mean that college textbooks fall alot sooner than later.

     
16. Holden Lewis at 4:53 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    If Kindle sales were promising, Amazon would disclose the numbers. The reputed sellout by Thanksgiving might have been caused by heavy demand or by manufacturing or distribution problems. Most likely it was the latter, because if it had been the former, Amazon would have bragged about it.

    I think Apple has invented the content-distribution model that the first successful e-reader devices will use. Like Josh, I base this prediction on a hunch. The iTunes Store is easy to use and attractive. Already you can download content from the iTunes store over the air to your iPhone or iPod touch.

    Maybe Apple will spin off the iTunes Store someday to encourage platform independence. A merger of the iTunes Store, Netflix and TiVo might create an unassailable distribution platform.

     
17. Rod at 5:01 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    To me, the Kindle is too expensive for too little value – insufficient multitasker.

    I carry a shoulder bag – variant of the Fast Action Gun bag used in Central America – that these days includes a couple reporter’s notebooks, an old-fashioned paper Day-Timer, pens (and a pencil for rainy days), thumbdrive and a basic prepaid cell phone that does 1) phone and 2) text for about $100 every six months.

    Now, give me something about the size of that Day-Timer that is PDA, cell phone, AND wireless computer – with a fold-up or roll-up keyboard for serious typing – AND that also serves as my e-book reader… and you got a sale.

    Until then, the only real market I see for dedicated e-book readers is if someone can take over the college textbook market – and slash the cost of textbooks.

     
18. Maggie Leung at 5:07 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    I’m buying a Kindle. Just been waiting for version 2. I’m not a gadget freak, early adopter or book nerd. Maybe I’m the target audience, as opposed to the author and his bookish friends. I just like to read, and I’d like to be able to carry a multitude of books on the go, without having to charge my reading device every five minutes. I expect reading devices to improve over time, but Kindle will do for now. As for it being a one-trick pony, that actually appeals to me. I don’t want whatever I’m reading to buzz, ring or vibrate, for instance.

     
19. A Tool for Change at 5:20 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    I’d guess that one of the reasons you’re so convinced that the Kindle is going to fail is that “[your] girlfriend is editorial director at a book publisher; [you] have lots of friends who’ve written books; and [you]’ve got a variety of fiction and non-fiction book projects of [your] own, in varying states of completion and disarray.”

    To any author or publisher, the Kindle – and Amazon’s business model/strangehold, more to the point – offers an unmistakable threat. Regardless of whether Apple ends up besting the Kindle, Amazon has set in motion what iTunes set in motion in the music industry. (It’s not a coincidence that the Sony reader failed *until* the Kindle came along.) Yes, other and better readers will be made. But to proclaim that the Kindle is going to fail is like saying B&W television has no future – it’s utterly beside the point. You’re avoiding the larger issue.

    Even if they are selling them at a loss, every Kindle in circulation is another pound of leverage for Amazon when negotiating with publishing companies, who are already over the barrel. The more Kindles there are in the world, the cheaper ebooks will be. And wait until Borders goes under!

    I’ve been surprised by the number of Kindles popping up on the NYC subway in the past six months. I used to think it would flop, too, but the fact that Amazon has sold 500K units of an inferior device should be an indication of the demand that’s out there.

    I see that you used to work in newspapers, incidentally. Are you experiencing any deja vu yet?

     
20. Max Chafkin at 5:51 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    Great post, Josh. I think it’s probably too early to know for sure. You brought up Twitter as being more popular at TOC than the Kindle. But Twitter is more than three years old. The Kindle is a year and a half old. A year ago, I wrote a story on Twitter for Inc. magazine. At the time Twitter had been around for two years, and not a single one of my friends (young, early adopters, many of whom work in media and technology) were using it. When I told them about Twitter they looked at me like I was crazy–now many of them love it. These things take time.

     
21. Chris Krewson at 5:59 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    I’m not sure, for Amazon, it has to be any more of a success than it already is. Amazon owns it all, hardware and software, so it doesn’t have to compromise, like the cell phone companies or Apple with its iPods and pay vendors for parts, etc, and then try to make up that $ in volume. Amazon owns the whole thing, lock, stock and barrel.

    I was of your mindset until a Kindle user showed me one at IgnitePhilly – and I was pretty impressed. I haven’t seen the next gen one, but I’m excited about it. If I traveled more, I’d definitely consider it.

     
22. Rob at 7:23 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    So since you believe it’s going to fail, what would it take for you to define it as a success?

    I disagree that you are the target audience for the Kindle, for many of the reasons that you listed. IMO it is aimed at people who do little more than read and only need a simple device that is not cumbersome to hold or use and then gets out of the way once you being reading.

    Someone else has summed up my feelings quite well, far better than I could have. http://charleswhittlesey.blogspot.com/2008/07/amazon-kindle-makes-print-superfluous.html

    (Hopefully the link to Charles Whittlesey’s blog didn’t get removed on posting)

     
23. Matt Thompson at 10:02 pm, February 11, 2009
    

    Josh, if you’d shared this theory when we spoke at the conference today, I totally would have let you see my Kindle. :)

    I suspect that’s actually *part* of why they were missing at the conference – after all, I definitely didn’t see many analog books around that weren’t promotional materials for conference attendees. My Kindle stays in my bag at conferences. It comes out when there’s no wifi around – on the subway, on the plane. I curl up with it at night. Where there’s lots of networking and e-mail checking happening, I would not expect Kindles to emerge.

    Of course, that doesn’t answer why so few of the publishers in your session had them, but I can offer some anecdotal counterevidence. On my flight here from Missouri, all three of us in my row were reading Kindles.

    You may very well be right that the Kindle is not the device that will make the e-book explode, but I am typically on the lagging edge of the early adopters (my first iPod was a gift given two years after the iPod was released; I still rock a Blackberry), and the Kindle was the first device that awakened a desire for an e-book reader in me. I don’t have all that much a stake in whether this particular device is the future, but it’s been fantastically handy in the months I’ve had it.

     
24. Jackie Burhans at 12:09 am, February 12, 2009
    

    Maybe its the content. eBook readers have been around for awhile. Kindle is not the first. I am an avid reader and a gadget geek and after much research and heart searching…I did not buy one of those earlier eBook readers. When I first heard about Kindles I was very intrigued but I held out until the price dropped $50 and I was faced with a 2 week business trip. Then I pounced. And I would not go back. Just ordered Kindle 2 and will hand down my Kindle to my husband. When the Kindle 3 comes out, we can do the same but hand down #1 to the son. Why did I get one? It was the combination of device and service. I was not spending much money at Amazon after my initial forays there as I wanted less shipping and more support for my local bookstore. But this lured me back. At least theres no shipping of books, mags, etc. I’m not a book publisher I’m a book reader. Although this did make me experiment with Mobi Creator…just sayin’.

     
25. robert ivan at 12:46 am, February 12, 2009
    

    Josh, great seeing you at TOC. like you said, we’re putting faces to URLs today.

    I agree with the fact that the kindle is over-hyped. I don’t know anyone who owns one, wait, Matt Thompson owns one. Okay, I know one person that owns one.

    Newspaperdirect serves up 940newspapers in 82 countries in 38 languages and is avoiding the kindle like mad. They’re sticking with the iRex tablet and Readius for mobile. Kindle is too restrictive.

     
26. Francis Hamit at 4:48 am, February 12, 2009
    

    I published a Kindle version of my novel “The
    Shenandoah Spy”. So far it has sold three
    copies. The print version is selling well and is in all the usual channels, including Amazon.com
    If Kindle had a six figure installed base, then sales would be a lot higher. Methinks the
    Emperor has no clothes and that there is no “there” there. IMO these things are being made in a Cupertino jobs shop by elves on H1B visas.

    Seriously, Amazon has blown it. Uploading to Kindle is no fun. Deliberately so, I suspect, since they generously offered to convert files for me for a mere $99 each (marked down from $299) on the same day that Ingram Digital offered to convert all of my 66 existing e-book titles
    to Sony Reader format for free.

    My future e-book offerings will go to Smashwords.com, which charges no upfront fees, converts files to all ten reader and cell phone formats automatically, and pays out 85% of the net received to the author/publisher. That includes uploads for Sony Reader and Amazon Kindle. Compare that to the 35% offered by Amazon for Kindle books and 45% offered by Ingram distribution of e-books.

    The future of e-books is not with dedicated readers, but cell phones like the iPhone. The installed base is in the millions.

     
27. Barry Hollander at 8:38 am, February 12, 2009
    

    It’s too early to predict whether the Kindle will be a success, and it sure won’t make it selling vanity press e-books. Travelers are the target audience, it seems, at least early on — people who love to read, don’t want to lug around a lot of paper/hardbacks, and aren’t afraid of technology. How big an audience is that?

    I don’t travel enough to make it worth my $350. And I don’t see them trying to compete with all the itoy phones and berries crowding the market. It’s not an updater/connector, it’s a reader — something none of the rest do well at all.

    My own hunch — it’ll plug along with a narrow niche and those who have it will love it. Who the hell wants to read an iphone?

     
28. Jeffrey Weiss at 8:40 am, February 12, 2009
    

    The Kindle, nifty as it may be, is still a V or three away from being the breakout. Too expensive. Too small a screen. Too heavy even now. It’s still an Early Adopter product. Which is not a bad thing. But the iPod of digital ink will roll up and fit in your pocket. Cost less than $100. Have color and video refresh. Wireless broadband access. All of which is in the tech pipeline. It’s coming. The Kindle is a place-holder, like the Sony version. (And nope,the iPhone ain’t it, either. I luvs me my iPhone and do lots of reading on it. But real book reading? On that tiny screen? Only if I have no other alternative…)

     
29. Charlene Jaszewski at 9:55 am, February 12, 2009
    

    So far no one has mentioned the form factor. The Kindle is butt ugly (well, the new version is an improvement) and it’s not intuitive to use. I thought for sure that Kindle version 2 would learn from the iPhone and include a touch-screen interface for gestural turning of pages, but nope. Also there’s a magic price point for these things and $359 ain’t it. Not for butt ugly, anyway (I happily forked over $499 for first gen iPhone.) Other issues include DRM (if I change ebook readers, do I lose everything I’ve already put on the Kindle?) I also think that people regard books as the last vestige of a tactile age. When everything else in our lives is digital, there’s a visceral joy in turning the pages of a loved book. Or throwing it across the room in disgust, as the case may be.

     
30. Self-Publishing Review at 10:26 am, February 12, 2009
    

    The Kindle is too expensive, plain and simple. To say the Kindle itself will fail is not accurate: the Kindle at this price will fail. Once the price comes down and more people have them, they’ll be more recognizable, more people will buy them, etc. Right now, something that is supposed to make books cheaper is for people who can afford $350 for an untested device.

     
31. MichaelJ at 10:51 am, February 12, 2009
    

    @Self publishing,
    My sense is the right price for not early adopters or gift givers is about $199. But for college kids, I think parents will pay $350 once the textbooks are available.

    Thoughts?

     
32. Nina at 11:25 am, February 12, 2009
    

    Good grief. “I’m a writer. I work at Harvard…” It’s reporting by folks like you that gives journalism a bad name. Try reaching outside your circle and you just may meet someone like… me. I’m a writer. I buy dozens of books a year. I also just bought my second Kindle. It’s a hugely flawed, but magnificent and life-changing device.

     
33. Steve at 12:43 pm, February 12, 2009
    

    Just found out there’s a Netflix for books WAY cheaper than the $360 investment in a Kindle just to pay another $10 per book.

    MarketWatch.com article excerpt about Kindle 2:

    Eric Ginsberg, vice president of marketing at BookSwim based in Newark, N.J., agrees that pricing is key. His company rents books, much like Netflix Inc. rents movies, and eventually plans to also embrace the downloadable content model. But for now, with the economic recession closing the pocketbooks of most consumers, Ginsberg said his company’s business is doing well as a service renting physical books.

    “More and more people are subscribing to BookSwim because they want to keep living their lives, but they want to have budgets,” Ginsberg said. “We are following [e-book vendors] Amazon and Google and Sony but mostly right now it’s hype.”

     
34. Troy at 4:48 pm, February 12, 2009
    

    I have a Kindle. Everyone keeps talking about having devices that do eight things. Word process, make phone calls, work as a book reader, etc…

    I bought my Kindle for the e-ink screen and the fact that I can carry lots of books. The e-ink screen has the resolution of paper so I can read a hundred pages and not have my eyes hurt. I get a double whammy because I also crank up the font to a larger size. I don’t have to have large print but I figure why not make it even easier on my eyes?

     
35. Julia at 3:54 am, February 13, 2009
    

    I am at turns amused and dismayed when self-appointed pundits preach the doom of something they’ve never even seen. If you’ve not used it, you don’t know what you’re talking about.

    I just ordered my third Kindle. When my new Kindle 2 arrives, I’ll give my first one to my mother, who has been eyeing it jealously for the past year. I bought one for my daughter after four months of her pawing mine at every chance. Soon, we’ll have three generations of Kentucky rednecks reading Kindle books. It might be worth a trip down from your ivory tower to witness the phenomenon in action.

    Bibliophiles are the target demographic, not technophiles. Kindle’s big selling point is that you don’t even need a computer to use it. I happen to be an unrepentant geek, so I push the envelope of Kindle functionality to the limit. But, it’s obvious that gadgeteers are not the primary audience for the product.

     
36. Tim Windsor at 6:55 am, February 13, 2009
    

    @Steve…

    Regarding BookSwim, I found an even better “Netflix for books.” It’s my local library.

    Yes, my eyebrow is a bit archy here, but to be serious and on-thread, there was a point in my life where I bought all my books. One day, as I ran out of space on the eight bookcases in our small house, it dawned on me that I would probably never re-read 90% of those books. I got a library card and never looked back.

     
37. Thomas at 8:23 am, February 13, 2009
    

    I disagree. I have been using the Kindle for 7 months. Here is what I love about it:

    1. Now for me it’s easier than reading a paper book: flip pages with a flick of one finger; enlarge the font size if I’m tired or in low light; look up words on the fly; even searching the web on the kindle for further info on something mentioned in a book.
    2. Often a non-fiction book will cite another book that I will want to read. I simply turn on the wireless, order the new book, and it’s downloaded in 10 seconds. Surprisingly, many of these books were available.
    3. I often have 3 – 4 books going at the same time. All are waiting on the Kindle and will open to the last page I read.
    4. If I’m in the mood for a different reading experience, I can browse for, sample the first chapter, read reviews for, and download a fun book in a matter of a few minutes no matter where I am. Prices are from $0.50 to $9.99 on Amazon and thousands of great books are free.
    5. It certainly seems a lot more ecologically friendly to move books around digitally than printing them.
    6. Much, much easier to carry around than paper books.
    7. For a dime, can email and receive directly back onto the kindle any pdf, doc, txt, or compatible ebooks.

    I received the Kindle as a gift and probably wouldn’t have bought it, for some of the reasons mentioned. However, after using it, I can’t imagine going back.

     
38. Chuck at 8:56 am, February 13, 2009
    

    I have an iPhone, a Palm T/x PDA, AND a Kindle. I have just ordered my Kindle 2 and am making a friend very happy as I pass my first Kindle to him. I tell you all this so that you will know I can read content in a number of forms, including the web and “hard copy.” Simply stated, I like the Kindle because it has (and still does) increased my attention span. Further, it is probably the most relaxing (no glare, font-size flexibility, excellent contrast) read I have ever had. The wireless access to so many different publications in so many places is also a major plus. If the Kindle fails, it will be because we, as readers, have failed.

     
39. MichaelJ at 9:12 am, February 13, 2009
    

    Bob, while I don’t necessarily disagree with your a hole comment, I think it’s not going to be kindles OR books. It’s going to be Kindles and copycats AND books.

    The underlying good news is that it probably means that the vocal, but small market, of people who read – not scan or view – will continue to expand.

    Given how much room to grow for the reader – person, NOT tech, market has to grow, this is not a zero sum game.

     
40. James at 9:21 am, February 13, 2009
    

    The preceding are interesting comments. I’m 71 years old and have had a Kindle since I was 70. I have always read a lot and at any given moment I have about 30 books in my Kindle. Earlier this year I read Snowball, the autobiography of Warren Buffett. I believe the hard bound, dead tree variety is over 900 pages. The Kindle version did not take up any physical room for me or make the Kindle weigh any more. I am able to read it sitting up, lying down, while traveling, while sitting in doctor’s waiting rooms. That to me is a great advantage.
    The Kindle has a built in dictionary which is a great help when reading books from the 19th and 18th centuries. I was sitting having lunch with a group of friends when someone asked me if I had read the book The Shack. I hadn’t even heard of it, but I had a sample chapter on my Kindle in about two minutes. They couldn’t believe their eyes.
    If I want, I can read to music. If the weather or the inefficiency of my paper deliverer keeps my morning paper away from my paper box I call the newspaper office to get a credit for the day and have my paper downloaded to my Kindle. Again, that process takes about two minutes.
    There are many web sites that offer electronic books free. I regularly peruse the sites and download them to my computer and then send them as attachments to my Kindle e-mail box. Those public domain books, in fact, have enabled me to read far more popular and scholarly books than I ever dreamed I would be doing.
    In the same fashion whenever I read an article on the Web that I want to continue perusing while I travel, I simply copy and paste it to my Word Processor and e-mail it to myself at Kindle.
    Our son was driving with us from the east coast to the mid-west before Christmas on a day when ice storms were forecast for our home city. I sat in the passenger seat and periodically used the Internet access on the Kindle to update the weather forecast and conditions for our city.
    Whenever I am called on to do public speaking which can be frequently, I e-mail the speech to myself and take my Kindle with me to the podium. Holding the Kindle enables me to avoid paper shuffling or the worse fate of having a non-adjustable podium which has a different focal length than my eyes or glasses are capable of resolving.
    The Kindle has changed my life for the better and I’m very happy with that fact and look forward to many more years of usage.

     
41. MichaelJ at 10:07 am, February 13, 2009
    

    James,
    I think you and I are pretty close to the same generation. I’m 62. I’m also a reader and hate carrying around bulky stuff. I can’t wait to get a Kindle. It’s just a matter of getting around to it.

    Your story supports my sense that it’s going to be baby boomers. There are still lots of us around, although the marketing types are all focused on 18-24. And we are all going to either retire or go to part time in the next couple of years.

    They were blind to us in the early 1960’s. They still have a blind spot in 2009.

    Meanwhile the college kids and reinventing broken textbooks is the young market. Plus they are forced to read. And some of them actually comply!

    The folks in the middle are too busy making a living to have the time to spend real time with reading – either on the Kindle or in a real book that has a table of contents and sits quietly while ideas rumble around in the head. That it also feels good in the hand is just an undocumented feature.

     
42. thuggins at 10:17 am, February 13, 2009
    

    People, especially as they age, cannot and will not read on phones. Phones are something that people want to be smaller, not larger.

    Main problem with Kindle is that it is expensive as a reading-only vehicle. The discovery (1 in 8 have it) is more of a sign that most tech people don’t give a shit about reading. They want gadgets for music, web, text, email, etc. They’ll pay for that but never for reading.

    People (or at least households) who read alot will all eventually have a Kindle once the price comes down. It’s a remarkable reading experience, especially for people comfortable with technology.

     
43. Chris M. at 10:38 am, February 13, 2009
    

    I work in a startup software company in MA. There are 3 people in the engineering department who own Kindles. I’m one of them. My wife bought me one for my birthday last year, and I loved it so much that I decided that she needed one and bought her one for her birthday. At least two friends have Kindles. That’s 6 Kindles in just my immediate circle. I know 4 people with iPhones (including myself).

     
44. MichaelJ at 10:51 am, February 13, 2009
    

    Chris,
    My take is that you must have a great start up team. Techs who read books. My bet is that when the market turns around, and if you’re interested, there’s an IPO in your future.

     
45. Ivan Strand at 12:24 pm, February 13, 2009
    

    My wife and I both have Kindles since they first came out. Both have paid for themselves given the reduced price of books and that we have each read more than 60 books. We travel a lot,and not having to pack several books is convenient, but we use them all the time at home too. Now, I only buy books if I want to show them off in my library, or can’t get them on Kindle. I really don’t care if people such as you don’t like them, if enough of us do it will not fail and you can exercise your freedom of choice by carrying around your backback full of books. Who says more you and your peer group should be the judge of success?

    Written on that other oft predicted failure, a linux netboot.

     
46. Amy Van Court at 12:50 pm, February 13, 2009
    

    When the device is paper-thin, in color and has actual flippable pages, it will be a huge success. Give it a few years and we’ll be there. Might not be a Kindle, might not be an Amazon product. And it’s on its way.

     
47. Dave at 1:00 pm, February 13, 2009
    

    Your logic is flawed. You are not the initial early adopter of this product and the fact you don’t want one is skewing your conclusion.

    You are entrenched. How many people in Microsoft’s mobile division have iphones? My guess is not many. You are the guy that says Twitter and Facebook will fail because you don’t get it. The fact is new media attracts the new minds.

    Carry 50 books in the space of one on your next vacation. Never lose your page again because the bookmark is built in. Instant delivery/acquisition of books. Always have a dictionary. Search the book. Get your home newspaper while you travel. These are the attributes that will drive this product to success. Good luck explaining to a college student in 10 years that you had to purchase your text books at high prices before this invention and why that was better.

    It is officially in release 2, and yes, I think it is too closed too. And they need to solve for color. It should support PDFs. It should be lighter. They said the iPhone (v1) would fail because it wouldn’t connect to MS Exchange (fixed in V2). In a few years, this device will be lighter, brighter, and more open. It will use multiple wireless networks.

    The reason ebooks have failed over and over is the selection and chasm crossing thing. Amazon has addressed that. Now if they can just execute.

    One more factor, the publishers like it and will want this to succeed. Current pricing is on par with printed media, but that is silly. Logistics are too expensive for printed media. Plus used books are getting resold – eating revenue from the publishers and the authors. The Kindle solves all this. Make the Kindle edition 30% less than paper (only a matter of time) and watch the market adoption rate swing.

    I remember telling a friend that I needed a bigger ipod – 80GB – and he could not fathom why I needed that much music on the go. Wrong paradigm. It wasn’t the on the go, it was the elimination of CDs on my shelves and the ability to find the music I wanted. Now that I have videos on it, the 160 GB version is too small. What value do bookshelves offer a home or office?

     
48. lmv at 2:19 pm, February 13, 2009
    

    I agree, with author to some extent. My reasons include:

    1. Kindles are only sold in the US. Sony’s can be sold anywhere. Why are we focusing on the kindle?

    2. While it would be great to replace college textbooks with an e-reader, courses often require multiple books. Q: How do you compare passages and quotes in books when you only have one reader?

    3. On college e-textbooks: Who didn’t write in their books in college? I don’t think that the kindle note-taking features are robust enough for a Uni student.

    4. The size of a kindle is too small to digest content when speed-reading.

    Unless these basic needs are addressed, I don’t think Amazon can corner the college e-textbook market.

    e-books for education need to offer robust note-taking features. If I was at Uni, I would consider purchasing multiple Kindles (one per course, or for the ability to compare books with each other) only if I could take notes and export them.

     
49. MichaelJ at 2:27 pm, February 13, 2009
    

    @Imv,

    You are exactly right for the serious student. In fact you have made all the arguments, I wish I had said as clearly,for the fundamental advantage of paper books.

    But, the reality is that serious students are a small niche in the mass market of college students who buy textbooks fundamentally becuase it is required by the instructor.

    But as the niche of serious students grow, my take is that Print on Demand might fill the needs you describe. Until e devices have all the features you need.

     
50. Steve at 3:32 pm, February 13, 2009
    

    Re: Tim

    I love libraries, don’t get me wrong, but mine is open from 9am-5pm and I work 8am-6pm. Free is great, but it just doesn’t fit my schedule.

     
51. Bob at 8:53 pm, February 13, 2009
    

    Kindle = too few reading choices, especially in magazines and too much kindling in literary mask.

     
52. Lisa at 10:45 pm, February 13, 2009
    

    I think you’re looking in wrong communities to find Kindles. It really isn’t about the techheads, it’s about readers. Among my friends, all huge bookworms, I know about 20 who have Kindles. My elderly uncle & his wife each have one. My husband and I each have one. They work well for us – and I’m reading more than ever now.

     
53. Mick at 12:08 am, February 14, 2009
    

    Like so many others trapped within your institution, you are a lot less savvy than you think you are. Take a small step out of your little world and you’ll find lots of people who love to read, who read all sorts of books, who read at every opportunity for whom a device like the Kindle works really well.

    Actually I suspect that you do not belong to any of the market segments for whom the Kindle works, because you really don’t read very much or very widely.

     
54. Kontra at 1:58 am, February 14, 2009
    

    ”I can even read it in the sunshine,”

    Duh! That’s pretty much the only way you can read eInk screens as they are NOT backlit, unlike iPhones. Speaking of the latter, we explored the iPhone-Kindle comparison when it was introduced last year in:

    Why is the new Kindle eBook reader from Amazon and not Apple?
    http://counternotions.com/2007/11/19/kindle-vs-iphone/

     
55. MichaelJ at 5:20 am, February 14, 2009
    

    @Lisa and Mick,

    Exactly.

    The notion that everyone who graduated from college is a reader is just not true. And the idea that everyone in college – even Harvard – is a reader is also not true. The idea that people buy newspapers to read is just plain silly.

    To be clear, very high performance certificate holders of even Ivy League schools are not necessarily readers. Consider ex-president Bush. On the other hand, my immigrant grandmother was a reader.

    Readers engage with the world of emotions and ideas through words. Words and the way they are used and presented supply the threads that hold facts and ideas together. It’s when the flux of life is captured in words that new thoughts have the best chance of occurring.

    The internet and all the gadgets that connect to the internet are conversational. The Kindle and it’s copycats are the first electronic tech that is optimized to present words to do what they do best.

    Readers are getting the same freedom to choose as TV watchers. Once you can time shift an activity, it’s much easier to do what you want to do. Readers read. Viewers scan and watch. Everybody loves to talk.

    For readers, at different times the words present in a paper newspaper,magazine or book or the web version or the epaper version. It’s not a zero sum game as the reader niche continues to grow.

     
56. Francis Hamit at 9:36 pm, February 14, 2009
    

    I rather resent the “vanity press” label applieddd to Smashwords. It implies that there is value to the work, and that’s not the case. My existing 66 e-books are actually previously published magazine articles for which I was paid. They are very narrow niche products and publishing them was an early experiment to determine the size of the market. (Not large.) Smashwords.com is a way to feed content to this market without getting ISBNS registrations. These only get you into online bookstores, which have not proven to be an efficient channel for distribution. Moreover, Smashwords.com returns 85% of the net and allows you to set your own price (which can include free or letting the customer set his or her price).

    E-book distribution is still in its infancy and no where the financial gold mine once assumed. It can serve as a test-bed for new text and new writers without the expense and gatekeeper obstacle course of print publication. My novel in a print edition is selling well and getting great reviews, but I also want to experiment with these new forms.
    An efficent e-book reader would be a great help in enabling this process, but so far, that’s not the Kindle, but the iPhone which has millions of verified users, not thousands of possible users

     
57. Francis Hamit at 9:40 pm, February 14, 2009
    

    I rather resent the “vanity press” label applieddd to Smashwords. It implies that there is no value to the work, and that’s not the case. My existing 66 e-books are actually previously published magazine articles for which I was paid. They are very narrow niche products and publishing them was an early experiment to determine the size of the market. (Not large.)

    Smashwords.com is a way to feed content to this market without getting ISBNS registrations. These only get you into online bookstores, which have not proven to be an efficient channel for distribution. Moreover, Smashwords.com returns 85% of the net and allows you to set your own price (which can include free or letting the customer set his or her price).

    E-book distribution is still in its infancy and no where the financial gold mine once assumed. It can serve as a test-bed for new text and new writers without the expense and gatekeeper obstacle course of print publication. My novel in a print edition is selling well and getting great reviews, but I also want to experiment with these new forms.

    An efficent e-book reader would be a great help in enabling this process, but so far, that’s not the Kindle, but the iPhone which has millions of verified users, not thousands of possible users. Smashowrds.com formats for every device on the market, so it’s the future or the medium and the one that treats authors the best.

     
58. Podesta at 10:20 pm, February 15, 2009
    

    I can only underline your point about being of the target demographic for Kindle and never having seen one in the wild. Among the places I have not seen a Kindle is Powell’s flagship store, where I spend at least a few hours every week. Ditto for Elliott Bay Books in Seattle. Both cities are invariably in the top five of ‘where people read’ lists.

    My tech junky bona fides include buying the iPod when it cost $499 and was only Mac-compatible, standing in line for the first generation iPhone and then upgrading to the iPhone 3G expeditiously. I ordered the first MacBook Air as soon as it was announced. Moved on to the revamped MacBook Air less than a fortnight ago. I’ve read ebooks on my iPhone. Have had an Audible account forever. But, still, no Kindle, even though I don’t like to carry hardcover books around with me.

     
59. MichaelJ at 8:53 am, February 16, 2009
    

    Podesta,
    re”I can only underline your point about being of the target demographic for Kindle and never having seen one in the wild.”

    The Kindle and copy cats is for college educated baby boomers and students who are forced to “read” in school.

    The iPhone & copy cats is for everyone else. Probably including the target demographic in which you live.

     
60. Maggie Leung at 9:22 am, February 16, 2009
    

    Podesta, once I get my hands on my Kindle, I don’t imagine I will be whipping it out at a bookstore. I’ve spent many hours at Powell’s and Elliott Bay, though.

     
61. Daniel L. Lieberman at 9:55 am, February 16, 2009
    

    There is a niche market for people who need large print books. The electronic reader can make it possible for them to have a book that is reasonably light weight and is relatively current.

     
62. Erik at 10:43 am, February 16, 2009
    

    Sort of reminds me of that great line Pauline Kael was alleged to have said after Nixon was relected: That it couldn’t have been possible, because she didn’t know *anyone* who had voted for him.

     
63. JHH at 7:18 pm, February 17, 2009
    

    Hey, I have a Kindle (1.0), and just as I knew the world was different when I got my first Tivo (OK, ReplayTV), and my first iPod, that same aura of utter certainty surrounds the Kindle.

    The Kindle (and Sony ebook reader, and all future players in the space) change the publishing business forever. Say goodbye to the midsize and small publisher and the big bookstore (as currently configured).

    I’m a frequent business traveller and love the tactile feel of books, but I like the convenience of carrying hundreds simultaneously on my Kindle more. I like having someone recommend a book to me via email and owning it 30 seconds later. I like paying about half price for everything. I like saving trees. Look, the Kindle is far from perfect, but I’d be shocked if the volume of printed books doesn’t mirror or approximate the decline of the music CD in ten years or less. (I know, this is a category statement and the post is about the Kindle, but right now Kindle is the category.)

    Anyone care to wager?

     
64. Maggie Leung at 11:32 am, February 18, 2009
    

    JHH, I’m ready to put my money where my mouth is, but I agree with you.

    I also find it odd that so many people reject reading devices because they like hard-copy books. It’s not like I have to give up hard-copy books just because I’m going with a Kindle. I can have both. Gasp!

     
65. Steve Hill at 2:37 pm, February 25, 2009
    

    The basic concept behind the “iPod of books” idea is flawed, I believe. Simply put, people do not read books the same way they listen to music. Listening to an album is a 30-40 min activity – and that’s only if you choose to listen to the whole thing at once. People are happy to store 1,000s of songs on an iPod because they don’t know when they will want to hear one particular song. They will browse and shuffle and it’s all good.

    What is the equal experience when it comes to reading? Maybe we dip into magazines & newspapers, and we can even have several books on the go at once. But if I buy a book & keep a book, it’s because I know I’ll want to read it again some day, or lend to someone else to enjoy. When I reread it, I will start at the beginning & read it through. I won’t want to just read a few paragraphs in the middle, or a single chapter halfway through, in the same way that I may just want to hear one song from an album.

    Will people store books on a device in the event that they may wish to read it again in the future – maybe years away? I’m not sure they will. At least, not in the same way that they will store an album on their iPod when in fact there’s only a couple of songs they regularly listen to on it.

    The iPod is more than a listening device – it’s a storage device. You can store your entire music library on it and listen at will. eReaders are a reading device, but I don’t see them becoming anything more.

     
66. stephenq at 7:48 pm, March 10, 2009
    

    The comments on this article have been a fascinating read. Makes me sad I live in Australia. The Kindle is not available here. And different technologies mean it’s pointless buying an e-reader in the US and hoping to use it in Australia. I think the e-reader could transform the newspaper distribution chain. Printing and distribution account for at least 60 percent of a print newspaper’s costs. Imagine being able to read a newspaper on a color screen the size of a magazine like The Economist?

     
67. jim at 2:04 pm, March 11, 2009
    

    Interesting conversation. I have one friend with a Kindle – a lawyer friend and he likes it.

    I would probably buy one if it were under $200. For $350 I’d rather buy a netbook.

    I also think piracy will be an issue. Most popular books are already online in pdf on various sites. And they are often packaged in huge blocks (1000 best novels, 1000 best mysteries, 1000 best SF novels, etc).

    The awkwardness of reading on a laptop limits this activity. But when eink readers are cheap and widespread then piracy will grow.

    The counter-argument is that the minority of the population that reads is upper income, so it’s not worth it to them to pirate to save $10-$20 for a book.

    We’ll see, people under 35 or so have been well trained to find all forms of media they want for free.

    The textbook market is safe until color eink becomes practical. And that is many years out still.

     
68. MichaelJ at 4:41 pm, March 11, 2009
    

    @Jim,
    Interesting point about textbooks. I hadn’t thought of that. On the other hand Open Textbooks is trying a textbooks for free model that I assume is meant to be read on a laptop or net book.

    I also wonder whether color is going to turn out to be as important in a $10 digital version as it is in a $200 hard cover paper version.

    It will be interesting to watch.

     
69. BenN at 7:32 pm, March 11, 2009
    

    Interesting discussion.

    I’m surprised more hasn’t been said regarding the delivery of school textbooks to eReaders. That seems like an exciting, obvious development — one that would end up being extremely useful and, I dare say, profitable for the schools/teachers who get behind the technology.

    That said, I am posting just to be the first to point out (here, anyway) that the Kindle is not just an ordinary eBook reader…

    It is the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy!

    I do not have a blackberry or an iphone, yet I’m 29 years old and have three computers in use at my desk. I am a small business owner, to boot. I’m sure I’m part of an attractive demographic for a smart phone… but… they are not for me.

    The Kindle is apparently not for the publishing world itself, either (as evidenced by the iphone to kindle ratio at your conference), but is rather intended for the consumers of the content they distribute.

    When it comes to smart phones I am a hold-out, and fast becoming practically anachronistic amongst my friends. I totally empathize with the poster who described their incongruous budgeting (expensive shoes without a second thought, but serious pause at the $3.50 vs $9.99 issue). I simply do not want to pay a premium for a data plan on a phone that will most likely be used for a CLOCK APP 95% of the time. My Nokia 5190 10 years ago had what I needed in a phone.

    iPhones are NOT the ideal place for book distribution, despite the saturation of the device. For a lateral example of the social reasoning behind that statement, read the article on this blog “He’s a PC, but he prefers small niches”.

    Back to the Kindle, and to the reason I wanted to post in the first place.

    Free access to wikipedia and wikitravel? A huge supply of books and PDFs at my fingertips?

    It’s the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy!

    Jeff Bezos certainly makes for an odd Ford Prefect, but there it is.

    Will the Kindle fail?

    Don’t Panic.

     
70. Suzanne at 8:16 pm, April 4, 2009
    

    I am not sure that the Kindle or Kindle 2 is *the* answer but it is *the* answer for those of us who travel all of the time. I love it for reading newspapers on the plane or at hotels that don’t provide them. It also allows me to bring lots of books with me so that I can read whatever my mood dictates. I love tech & love reading + travel every week so it’s perfect for me.

     
71. Scott E. Stratton at 2:49 pm, June 5, 2009
    

    I believe you’ve set up your premise to make it easy to prove. If the essence of the argument that the Kindle won’t be the “iPhone of books” you have made a safe bet. Virtually *NO* product will be as successful as the iPod/iPhone phenomenon (you have to consider them together). It was a spectacular, rarely occurring type of success.

    Second, you are dead wrong, in my opinion, about the target market. It is precisely NOT the tech savvy. As said so well by an earlier commenter: “Bibliophiles are the target demographic, not technophiles.” I happen to be an anomaly: I am run a 150 person software company, I program, I love gadgets (of course I have an iPhone); but I am also a hard-core Bibliophile. I have 3,000 book library with collections ranging from 1550 to 1850 plus many thousand more moderns.

    Until the Sony or the Kindle, I didn’t bother reading on electronic devices. If you are a dedicated reader you know what it means to “get lost in the book”. That simply doesn’t happen with LCD or CRT screens. Period. E-books will NEVER be widely popular on phones, computers, or TV’s. That is why I think you are missing the point. The electronic ink innovation changed all that. The Kindle is the first electronic device I’ve every had where I could “get lost in the book.” I’ve read many, many full-length books.

    Is it perfect? No, of course not. But it’s in a completely different world from cell phone or computer screens. If one thinks this is a “gadget” marketed to “technophiles” that happen to read, one is waaaay off base. Technophiles love the sleek look of the iPhone; the Kindle 1 is ugly. That is almost completely irrelevant to the bibliophile. I don’t know that the Kindle will be the #1 e-reader forever, but they currently have a enormous advantage in content over everyone else.

    I do know this – the future of eReaders will NOT be on a device that is “a little easier for reading”. It simply won’t happen. It hurts your eyes way too much after more than 30 minutes of reading. I challenge you to read a full-length novel on a cell phone or computer screen AND on an e-Ink screen. Most people can’t do the first one at all.

    I would ask how many technophiles will pull out a book and read for 4 hours straight. Being one, I know many, and most of them won’t. That’s why you aren’t the target market. The target market are people who buy a book or more a week. Who can’t go on a trip without bringing 10 books because they don’t know what they might read. People who have long ago run out of space for their books. Those are the target for first adoption. If it takes hold there, I assume Amazon is hoping they can expand the market from there.

    Anyway, that’s my $0.02! Opening my Kindle 2 box right now!

     
72. Amy at 1:10 pm, December 5, 2009
    

    Just a personal note: I Own a Kindle and have also seen them “in the wild”. They may not be for everybody but I can personally say that for me it is fantastic. I can take the multiple books that I am reading anywhere I go….and I do. This is a great item for people who enjoy reading, or read multiple books simultaneously for research.

    It is not the best format for staying connected (lap top, I phone). But when I am using my Kindle I am usually glad to be avoiding the usual chat screens, texts, phone calls etc….

     

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