Comments on: Dissecting a typical ‘Kindle has zero prospects’ anti-Kindle article.

By: JP

JP — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 19:02:56 +0000

Great post. I don’t get where all the nay-saying is coming from. I guess professional “opinion-makers” have to say *something,* and they feel it’s cooler (and safer) to be pessimistic.

By: Kevin

Kevin — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 14:05:20 +0000

On pirated books and libraries…

Well, both of my kids out read the public library years ago. They still go weekly but since we are in a small city, it doesn’t keep up with them. On technical stuff, libraries seem to run 2 years behind which is unacceptable in my field.

Pirated books already exist. You can probably down load anything you want from a torrent. Everything from current best sellers to classics is out there. I understand the quality if iffy and you have to convert but they are available now.

By: shadaik

shadaik — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 10:25:57 +0000

Heck, $360 is a lot of money to shell out for anything. A book-reading device is really the last thing I’d buy at this price.
Also, this is no hate for the Kindle at all. I’d like to get one (whenever it will be available in europe), but not for more than $100. After all, everything it does I can do on a used 1990′s laptop. There are even mobile phones that could do that if amazon would support them.

By: redzeppelin

redzeppelin — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 20:19:47 +0000

I agree with most of your points, but I think you’re dismissing the price point issue too easily. $360 is still a lot to pay for a device that lets you read books (Yes, I know it does more, but let’s be honest. Reading books is — for now at least — its main purpose.).

I’m very happy with my Kindle and it is quickly becoming one of my couldn’t-live-without gadgets, but the device itself and the Kindle format have their negatives and I can see why people wouldn’t want to be early adopters with it at the current price point.

By: Tim B.

Tim B. — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 20:16:10 +0000

re: libraries… i dunno, all of the peeps in my little circle of readerly friends buy their books, either at retail, or at used book stores… personally, i only buy at retail… and i dont think ANY of us use the library… why? its a pain in the ass. the selection is poor; when you read 100+ books a year, in 20 years youre going to pretty well have devoured all the really good books in your genre of choice and so are usually buying books as soon as theyre published. i dont know what the libraries are like in your neck of the world, but my experience has been that new books are rarely immediately available, and even when they are, i have to get on a waiting list behind a bunch of other people, and by the time im able to get the book, the spine is broken, the pages are dogeared and fingerprint-smeared, and everyone i know has already read the book some time ago. if im lucky, they havent been talking about it and spoiling it for me public libraries are great for folks without the means to buy books… but they cant hold a candle to having a private library of your own where every book is in good condition, and absolutely guaranteed to be on the shelf when you want it.

even so, i see your point, i forget that people do use libraries (or more accurately, i forget that libraries even *exist*), and for those folks maybe the kindle doesnt make as much sense… but that will change as the early adopters eat all the R&D costs and the units get cheaper and cheaper…

By: MJ

MJ — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 17:47:49 +0000

@Tim B.

“for any avid reader, the price point is a non-issue. ”

This depends on what your definition of a ‘avid reader’ is.

While I take your point that the the Kindle could pay for itself if someone is buying scores of new books at retail prices every year, most of the really avid book readers I know (100+ books a year) make extensive use of public libraries.

The libraries where I live do make plenty of books available as e-books, but none work on the Kindle (yet?).

Once we hit a tipping point of installed base of e-readers (of which the Kindle is currently the best, imho), we will start to see pirated books (the NY Times recently ran an article about the pirating and dissemination of college text books). The publishing industry presumably knows this is coming, and it will be interesting to see if it can learn from the mistakes of the music industry in how to adapt to this inevitable occurrence. Many early adopters of the Kindle will be the ones who will be the most eager consumers of pirated content, just as the early adopters of MP3 players were. (One of the reasons that people are able to afford expensive iPods is that the cost of the related content — music — approaches zero for a large number of users.)

This is especially true as the Kindle makes inroads into what should be natural market — college students buying required textbooks — for whom a ‘book culture’ might mean something totally different than it does for older ‘avid readers’.

As @Jerry says above, “As I use this device I continue to find new ways to use it, and anticipate that this will continue.” I presume many othes will as well!

By: Jerry

Jerry — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 12:35:35 +0000

I have had my Kindle for about 2 months now (I waited for the price drop), and wonder why I waited so long.

In addition to books, I have also put the pdf conversions of amateur radio equipment manuals, some audio books, converted HTML pages that link to mobile web sites, and converted journals and e-magazines, along with four Bibles, on my device.

Having these resources, even if some of them aren’t perfect due to conversion formatting, at my fingertips is liberating and time-saving.

As I use this device I continue to find new ways to use it, and anticipate that this will continue.

By: Blog Kindle · Anti-Kindle rebuttal

Blog Kindle · Anti-Kindle rebuttal — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 09:16:28 +0000

[...] Liz Gunnison eventually whittles down the number of American’s who would be interested in buying a Kindle to about 500,000 – 2,000,000 people. You can read her article here, there’s a lot of misinformation and half-truth’s scattered around the article which makes Gunnisons analysis seem kinda factual, however, a post at thekindle offers a good rebuttal of the entire article. [...]

By: Kevin

Kevin — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 16:57:00 +0000

The above comment is dead on. I read about 2 or 3 books a week for recreation and more for technical. Not carryinf more than one book in my carry on is worth a lot.

Now if the dang thing would read PDF files without the conversation (it messes up formatting sometimes) it would be perfect.

Anyway, saving from 2-5 dollars a book and buying half my books on the Kindle means I save roughly $130 to $325 a year . And I am tending to the higher prices on the Kindle (hard backs more of a pain than paperbacks). So a 2 year payout at the most?

By: Tim B.

Tim B. — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 17:52:45 +0000

for any avid reader, the price point is a non-issue. i read between 100-150 books a year, and have for the last 20 years, so prior to buying a kindle i was spending three or four times the cost of the device *every year* for books anyway.

ive had my kindle for 8 months now, and its more than paid for itself in the money ive saved from the reduced cost of the ebooks over the shelf price… so far it looks like ill spend roughly the same amount this year as i usually do on books, when i *include* the cost of the kindle in the costs… so essentially, my kindle was free. and next year, itll be *better* than free, as i will *continue* to save as time goes on.

add in the benefit of not having to do my annual “clear out the bookshelves, sort the books, box them up, and haul them into the attic to join the other thousands of books threatening to collapse my house at any moment” thing, and its even nicer

for me, the kindle is up there with my tivo and gps: one of those technologies i absolutely cannot do without…