OK, first thoughts on Kindle.
1. How long before this gets ‘upgraded’ and you piss off the early adopters? (a little Zune frustration is coming out here)
2. $400 is high. How come this doesn’t come with a few public domain books on there for fun?
3. Battery life looks awesome, as does weight. Think this is too late to ask for this for XMas?
4. Did they really just advertise blogs on there? That is cool (no, not being silly, really I do think that is cool).
5. Any audio? Will it read to me? Can I podcast newspaper subscriptions (ie Audible) on this device?
6. How long before this gets hacked like the jukebox? I mean the fact that it’s not wifi but mobile (ie like a cellphone/modem or aircard), makes this really cool for a hacked web tablet. Then again, the N770 is less than the $400 that this costs though it’s only Wifi capable out-of-the-box, but the potential is so darn fun…
… and, PS to Amazon. Tsk Tsk, the only ‘share’ option is via email. Not very WOMM friendly. Also, when you ‘work three years’ on a product, make sure it’s ready to sell via your Associates store on launch day. Argh!
UPDATE: OK, another thought… Could this solve the sagging backpacks problem in school? I mean, I know you’re thinking, ‘she acts like she’s never seen an e-reader’, but I can’t help but think this is an almost must have for a traveling reader (erm, like me).
Considering my nine-year-old daughter has to have a rolling backpack to transport her books to and from school, I think the time is past due for eBooks and eTextbooks.
The Kindle looks very cool to me.
Mine too! My nine year old is lucky if she can actually pick hers up.
If we actually used something like this for kids, beyond the fact that we won’t be giving our children hernias (a real concern), we could finally give them books that weren’t full of vulgar marked up pages and were in brand new condition.
Wonder if you can highlight and notate in there? Well, I suppose if you get too ‘markupable’ then you’re getting into the ‘computer’ class of machines…
Students aren’t usually allowed to mark in their texts at all, and most publishers create consumable workbooks to go along with their texts.
I taught elementary school for ten years and then taught math at the secondary level for a few years. I got this expensive piece of paper that says I’m a master of mathematics education and so now work in the curriculum department for Fresno Unified.
I’m very concerned about the size of these texts that we are weighing our children down with these days. Lockers have been eliminated for the most part because of security issues, and students are forced to either trudge around like arctic backpackers or to leave their texts at home and just make the best of it.
You would not believe the process we go through for a major textbook adoption. It’s extremely frustrating. It’s like going into the grocery store and being told you can only buy from the racks of candy bars near the checkout stands.
How great would it be to have something like the Kindle that would provide reference material that would reinforce lessons given in consumable workbooks?
Just my $0.02, or maybe that was two dimes and a nickel.
i still haven’t seen e-ink in real life! but i am excited by the prospect.
i think it’s too pricey, but on the flip side, e-book prices for the kindle seem to be a *lot* lower than they are for competing devices.
i will get some kind of e-reader someday. it’s sad how many books i end up not reading because they’re too heavy to carry with me all the time (i already carry too much :P), and i just can’t read long passages on regular LCD screens.