I posted in another thread about my kindle and how much I love it etc.

Many of the services on the kindle are 'experimental', meaning they're not guaranteed services and may be discontinued at some future date, or replaced.

One feature that was kinda a big deal (and is STILL a big deal in the user interface as a feature option) was kindle Now Now.

Now Now was a free (to the user, amazon paid 25 cents every time we used it, though I think later they moved the turk fee to a chance in a weekly drawing but I'm not 100% sure on that, they were paying for a LONG time) information service. The user would ask a question and submit it. Amazon would post the question and pay people to respond. The kindle user would 'rate' the responses which determined whether the mechanical turks would continue to get to do Now Now (and could get them various bonuses).

It's not a shock with the economy they've discontinued the service.

I found it pretty useful. It was always information that I could have looked up myself, but didn't have access and/or time to do so (as it's a pain in the ass to quickly search all over the internet with any mobile device in a research capacity). Sometimes the answers were shitty, usually they were pretty good. Sometimes they were unbelievably good.

It was a selling point of the kindle. Alas, we hardly knew ye blah blah blah.

Some users are screaming they want compensation for the loss. Amazon has always been upfront about the majority of bonus services being 'experimental'.

I wouldn't be shocked if we eventually lose internet access except to Amazon stores AND specific sites (like wikipedia and news sites only).

Given the level of access we have and the amount of time one can stay connected, we're essentially getting at least a $25 per month service for free...for now. Anyone who's had their kindle a year IMHO has gotten more than they've paid for...in terms of services.

Book purchases have been MUCH cheaper than other ebooks, and that price has been rising as well. It was unusual to see ANY book, even a new release in hardback only that you couldn't find ANYWHERE under $30...for $9.99 on the kindle.

Prices have been slowly rising, but there's a movement among users to boycott all books (sans specific books, such as specific works that would normally cost hundreds of dollars that are MUCH cheaper on the kindle but of course aren't $10) but all new releases, best sellers etc. over $9.99.

We'll see if people do it.

Even with these changes, I personally think the kindle is worthwhile. Of course you have to really love books, and be an avid reader for it to be worthwhile.

But I wanted to give people a head's up on these changes, and potential changes for the future.

Additionally kindle has always charged for access to various blogs, news sites, yadda yadda. It's worth paying for certain magazine subscriptions, at least for me. I know some ppl prefer the newspaper too. But any saavy user knows how to bypass various things on the kindle to use it to access email, and access those blogs *for free*.

Why would I pay for a boing boing subscription when I can get there for free? Well the access is guarenteed, it's also delivered and stored offline...but free is better. Usually those paying are those people who aren't really that saavy who don't know how to get around certain things.

I suspect some of those holes may be shored up in the future to prevent people from excessively using the online access, which is IIRC through Sprint and again...not cheap.

Since I do recommend it, though I have been leery at actively shilling for it because it's such a specific use item for avid readers...I wanted to inform people of the changes.

Again, I still think it's worth it, but it depends on what YOU are buying it for. I knew at the time of purchase that everything experimental could be pulled, and I was okay with having nothing but an ebook machine. It is worth it as just an ebook machine (that I can buy titles with and get instantly...that service is not experimental). But it may not be for everyone.

So for the tl;dr crowd (who shouldn't buy a kindle anyway!): caveat emptor

In the future I may be getting a Kindle, but for now I just don't read enough. It would be nice if I could get my textbooks on the kindle, but with all the books these days coming with access codes for internet "supplementary" sites, it's really not feasible.

what the hell is a Kindle?

The Kindle is too small, too expensive, and too late.

http://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Amazons-Wi ... B000FI73MA

portable ebook device pretty much

Why do you say that Givin?

It's surprising how many you CAN get on the kindle. Additionally more than a few textbooks have pdf versions you can get, which you can convert for the kindle.

For people too lazy to convert, or unsure how to do that, you can e-mail your kindle the file and Amazon automatically converts the pdf for you. Each email to the kindle is 10 cents (since it's a wireless upload and they REALLY would rather you didn't xfer files that way). Since you pay for each e-mail you can restrict who can e-mail your kindle. My kindle can only get e-mails from my primary e-mail address...and no other.

With bookmarks and other things you can do, you can get the kindle set up where you can easily 'flip' directly to a certain page just as fast as you would with any textbook. And of course, not having to lug around a massive book is important too.

I would also want any e-book textbook to be something I could open on the computer though. That way I have the option of printing out specific pages if I want, or opening another 'copy' on the computer screen to make it easier to do various things, such as have a specific data up on the computer, while having specific chapters up on the kindle, etc.

I LIKE books, so I don't at all mind real textbooks. It's just a fucking nightmare to haul around so many pounds of it, plus lab equipment.

Who hauls around lab equipment?

Everyone hauls around personal equipment; coat, goggles, shoes (since most people do not wear lab appropriate shoes all the doo dah day). And in some instances more specialized equipment.

And no, most of us do not store this shit at the lab, since we're often in more than one lab, aaaand our stations are generally shared with at least three other shifts. There's usually only enough space to lock up glassware and the like. My 'space' is a good sized drawer.

I did keep a spare set of goggles at one lab though, because I'm super pissy about my goggles and dislike the 'rental' pairs you get to use if you forget your goggles or god fucking forbid the instructor finds them in any way unsuitable because he was a goggle nazi.

Then again, we did do quite a bit of acid work, so it wasn't completely unreasonable.

ha

i've just known a lot of biochem/ochem majors and stuff, never saw them hauling around lab equip. what kind of science are you talking about?

Too Small because I feel the thing is too small. Even with larger font choices that can be picked from at will, my eyes got tired fast staring at it.

Too Expensive because 400 bucks is silly to pay for a library card and no substitute for 10 seconds at a newsstand or vending machine if you're on the go, or the ease in which such information can be accessed online.

Too late because this would have been hot shit five to ten years ago during the PDF rush. Granted a lot of the internet distribution was just being born then, but partner this shit up with 3Com/U.S. Robotics back then and it would be an industry standard, not a novelty item.

I'm sure its a great device and it does have its uses. But I very seriously doubt it as a substitute for textbooks and reading the paper.

Chemistry requires the most safety gear, including shoes. I live in Southern CA, where the weather is pretty damn nice most of the year. Many people wear shoes that are not lab safe. Most lab professors are nazis, and given the absolute dumbasses I've seen working with a high mole solution of sulfuric acid...I'm kinda glad. I don't want to be in the chemical shower.

I'm not a fashion horse, and I often wear shoes that wouldn't pass lab muster. So I keep a very light pair of nurses clogs (with a back!).

They're also needed for biology lab work if you're working with certain things, because of potential biohazards. Eyewear is much more liberal though.

Chem. lab eyewear isn't.

And physics lab work primarily exists of setting up physical experiments (when they can't be computer modeled), and requires no gear. Huzzah!

Well it requires calculators and specific computer programs but no special clothing. Oh, except the damned eye wear sometimes. But you're more likely to be injured from weights and any work which is more 'dangerous' is usually done outside of a lab. Such as the solar car team (which they didn't do the year I was in the class. =\)

If a textbook is normally $100, what would it be on Kindle?

$33.87

Depends on the publisher, there's no set discount rate. Generally speaking new hardback releases run 9.99 and all other books run $4-7 dollars, like shit that's still popular like Neil Gaiman.

I really enjoy a book called 'Number the Stars', and I have a copy already. However I couldn't easily 'find' an e-copy I didn't have to pay for (which I will do when I own the book already etc.) I think I paid like $4 for it, but it was worthwhile to me, as that's one of the books I like rereading every so often.

Most textbooks though that I saw were not that much cheaper on the kindle. In some cases it said a kindle version wasn't available, and in one case I knew that wasn't true. I read Steven Pinker's work, which is also used in a number of courses. One of his books it said wasn't available, which I happen to have on my kindle so that's clearly not the case. And since his books are also read outside the classroom, the pricing wasn't too obscene for the kindle version.

I think most e-books are overpriced considering there's ZERO printing cost, etc. but the prime concern of authors has been the fact that the books can be easily copied/shared (in many formats) and they do not get lost or wear out. So the concern is that it costs them money.

Other publishers and writers are moving away from that (yay) and Tor gives out free e-books, and authors who've participated RAVE about it because no fucking surprise...it sells books. I've gotten into a few authors purely on the free book giveaway, that I wouldn't have otherwise read.

They realize it no more 'damages' their sales than a library does.

Anyhoo...many textbooks include a digital copy of the book with a disk, and if so if it's a pdf version you can put it on the kindle. The ONLY drawback is the kindle is greyscale only, so any color diagrams ...well it doesn't work out. Which can be problematic in some areas for sure. But in those instances you'd still have the computer copy which would be in full color.

Check this thread again in 10 years or so. 400 bucks for the first generation of these things? That's about where stuff like cd players and cell phones checked in, if memory serves. I bet when the price drops under 100 bucks, and you can get a Times subscription on them, you see more of these on the bus than any paper publication.

seemed at least once a week I would have skin peeling off my finger tips from sticking them in puddles of acid from my sloppy lab work

sulfuric acid is hell on text books too

Again the price only seems high if you're not including FREE INTERNET ACCESS. If it was just an e-book without the ability to access the internet at all...yeah sure. Many people would have paid it and been happy to pay for monthly internet access as well (or just have it be wifi capable) and it's worth the price.

The fact that I can connect online anywhere for free?

Additionally I paid $350. They sold out at $400 on release and people were paying much higher prices. Then sales leveled off then they price dropped and sold out again. They JUST had some back in stock for Xmas when Oprah went bananas about it.

So they were sold out again. I don't know if they're back in stock yet or not. Probably are.

They're not back in stock. It's a month or two before you can get one.

I'm still waiting for Joxur to show us all how enjoyable it is to jump in bed, pop out your iPhone and begin squinting at the latest legally easily-available novels.

Just how much "internet access" are we talking about?

I imagine it's comparable to an older Blackberry's browser, with some fun dithered b&w images?

Yeah, like a dot-matrix printer. That's what I imagine.

This will be the Game Boy of handheld hard news media. So you should wait those 10 years for the Nintendo DS.

It's pretty decent, especially when you consider it's merely an additional feature. It's good enough to read these forums, for example:



And it would look better if I signed in and had the forum set up, but I rarely use the kindle to browse this forum. I generally only use it for news sites, Google maps or mapquest, and wikipedia or quick info lookup. I'll often use it from the living room if I want quick information on something and I'm too lazy to look it up on the computer. Other than that I'm only using it when I don't have access to a computer which is when I'm out, or when I'm traveling and not at the hotel.

Oh it's also an mp3 player, but I don't use it for that. /shrug

There's also a large group of grumpy old people who are kindle users who basically don't want ANY EXTRAS. They don't want the mp3 player, or people to talk about it. They don't want the web access, or people to talk about it.

They just want the ebook reader and they go batshit when ppl try to push for any development, screaming about how it's JUST an ebook and all these other applications will RUIN IT.

Seriously cranky old people. lol

Shit, if that's the case, I'm tempted to buy it right away. Nothing even came close to the Game Boy for a good 3-4 years. Game Gear had a piss poor selection of games. The Final Fantasy games that came out for it were absolute top-notch for the day, a couple of them even coming close to SNES's FF level of gameplay.

In a way they're right. People dont' want to deal with complexities.

As long as there is a "I'm a retard just do eBooks" button though, they'll be OK.

So.. someone clarify for me.

How is it having extremely limited Internet access a selling point?

If i want full fledged internet access, I open one of my two slightly bigger but infinitely more readable laptops to browse the web.

If I want 95% of the functionality of my laptop while sitting at the doctors office, on the toilet or in the car, I use my iPhone. Still more functional than a kindle, in terms of how many pages it can open.

The Kindle is too large to fit in my pocket while on the go, and too small to replace my laptop at home.

If your point is that it's free... well, that's a moot point, isn't it? Is anyone going to cancel their home broadband in favor of surfing on the Kindle? Is anyone going to stop their cell phone service or data plan in favor of the Kindle? Oh sweet, I have a device here that I paid more than double what I paid for my iPhone, isn't as portable - but let me cancel my e-mail and web access on my iPhone...

I saw an interesting show the other day on brain science and it talked about how as we age, our brains don't slow down but rather we lose the ability to filter out "useless" information. It made sense!

That's probably why old folks freak out over features and such. They can't just hit the "E-books" button and go, they spend 30 minutes looking at each button freaking out over it.

You're reading the kindle forums aren't you?!

Some of them seriously do. I LOVE that older people are into technology and I like seeing how much they love the kindle, because obviously I do too...but then they morph into 'GET OFF MY LAWN' when dealing with any feature they don't value or understand.

Not all of them. But a lot.

Most of that is a selling point because it comes with a "book." It's not supposed to replace your computer. I messed around with one of these, and it honestly looks like reading on paper to me. Worlds different from reading on a laptop. For people like me, for whom reading is a hobby or comfort type activity, there's something really swell about sitting down and reading on paper. If "extremely limited Internet access" allows me to download a new book wherever I happen to be, without hooking up my book to my computer, I think that's a fairly significant selling point. Same goes for downloading the morning paper if/when that's available. I'd rather read a kindle on the train than my laptop. Sure, my laptop has more functionality, and I tend to read it now, but I can't really pick it up and relax and read it like a book. I suppose I could do that with an Iphone, if I wanted to read 4 inch wide books.

I really think you're focusing on your requirements for an electronic device. Clearly this one isn't for you, but the selling points aren't really as easily trivialized as you would like to make them. This thing will appeal to a lot of people. I'm going to buy one at some point for sure.

I was responding to:

Saw that. If that's really the launch...I like mine much better. I like the larger size and I wouldn't like the metal back. The buttons on the side look much better, but I like that mine are all the way up the sides.

If they offer trade ins, unless there's something major...I'd keep mine. Mine fits in my purse already.

The other bad thing for me about a size change, is that all kindle accessories will be tailored for the new size. Soooo I guess I'll have to buy an extra cover or two in the next year =\

Why do they reserve so much space for the keyboard? Do you use it enough to warrant the loss in screen real estate?

I really like the new shiny kindle! Though, it seems to not have SD Card slots, which, sort of sucks if true, gotta find out more.

Dang, after reading up a bit more about it, I want one!

I get a kick out of the size description, only Americans would add fractions to metric!



Sci-Tech
The Kindle device is shown in this photograph released by Amazon.com on Monday, Nov. 19, 2007. The $399 electronic book device will allow downloads of more than 90,000 book titles, blogs, magazines and newspapers. (AP Photo/Amazon.com)

The Kindle device is shown in this photograph released by Amazon.com on Monday, Nov. 19, 2007. The electronic book device allows downloads of more than 90,000 book titles, blogs, magazines and newspapers. (AP Photo/Amazon.com)
Amazon says new Kindle to be slimmer, out Feb. 24

Updated Mon. Feb. 9 2009 12:55 PM ET

The Associated Press

NEW YORK -- Amazon.com Inc. is releasing a new, slimmer version of the Kindle, its electronic reading device, and it will have an exclusive release of a new book from Stephen King.

The online retailer's founder and CEO, Jeff Bezos, told a New York news conference Monday that the highly anticipated new Kindle will cost US$359, the same as the previous version. Amazon says it will begin shipping the new Kindle Feb. 24.

Neither the original nor the new version of the Kindle is for sale yet in Canada.

The new Kindle will be about four-fifths of a centimetre thick and weigh about 280 grams. It includes a screen with 16 shades of grey, compared with the previous Kindle's four shades. It will be able to read text aloud and can store 1,500 books, compared to 200 on the previous version. It also promises two weeks of reading on one charge of the battery.

King has written a novella, called "Ur," that will be exclusively available on the Kindle and will incorporate the device into the story.

King has been known as a digital publishing innovator. In 2000 he released a novella, "Riding the Bullet," as a free download. Websites such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble.com were swamped by high demand for the 66-page story.

lol, wouldn't 8mm take up less type and actually seem smaller?

Well, do most Americans even know what a millimeter is? =X

That's the only thing stopping me from ordering one right now. I feel like I am going to get one, have cool internet access for 3 months, then they are going to implement a usage fee or discontinue it all together.

It sounds awesome right now, but I hate having the rug pulled out from underneath me.

I want one of these so bad. I've wanted one of these even before there was such a thing, heh. It is a pricey SOB though.

It is, that's what's keeping me from getting one.

Then ask them to figure out what 4/5's of a centimeter is.

an inch, duh

I don't think that's an unreasonable fear. When I bought mine I knew that was a possibility but things were better in the economy. Since then they've yanked NowNow (I wish they would just make it a 10 cent per use service /sigh) and it looks like they're going to HEAVILY scale back internet usage.

Right now I can literally log into stuff for work with it. Which frankly is a huge plus for me if my DSL goes out. The kindle is 'hackable' (workarounds really) so you can access email and do a lot of other things online which were never really intended.

I suspect they're going to start preventing that.

Based on an email I got (as a Kindle user announcing the 'new' Kindle...and offering us a 'deal' on the new one...the deal being we'll be guaranteed to get one whereas others will probably have backorders) it looks like they intend to scale it back to Wikipedia access, subscribed content (pay a monthly usage fee for access to blogs/news sites...which exists now but why pay when you can access it via workarounds), and Amazon purchases.

Is it still worth it? To me...yes. But it won't be for a lot of people at the price they have it at, I suspect.

trolling right?

word

ps: 8 mm?

Wait for Kindle 3 with 8 GIG MP3 PLAYER!!!!!!!!!

Interesting note for all of you that were looking at Kindles:

http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/null/121556

I can sort of do the same on any computer. I wonder how this will play out.