A Beautiful Book

One week ago I received my new Amazon Kindle e-book reader, the Kindle 2. When the original Kindle came out I was intrigued and eager to learn more. I thought the idea of it was cool. I had looked at e-readers before. The Sony model had been on display at Borders already for some time. But I didn't know a lot about the file formats. Could any book be made into an e-book? Did you have to download them to your computer and then put them on your device? How did all that work and was it really better than just a good old hardcover or paperback?

After some investigation, I found that Amazon's device had the added functionality of direct wireless download of reading materials. No computer necessary. The wireless service was included, no service plan or per download charge. These were definite benefits the Kindle seemed to have over Sony's or other devices on the market. This, plus the ability to carry hundreds of books with you in this slim handy device seemed a book lover's dream. Of course if you're like I am, and usually don't attempt to read more than one book at a time, is this really better than just keeping the book you are reading in your purse so you always have it with you? Well, it is if it's only available in a bulky hardcover. Or if you're traveling and don't want to carry more than one book, and you are worried about having enough reading material for the whole journey.

The wireless delivery capability also allows for subscriptions to newspapers and magazines as well as selected blogs. Amazon's Kindle store offers these subscriptions. The newspapers and magazine subscriptions service seems handy. Especially for publications that are not graphics intensive. I have a few papers and mags in mind that I'm thinking of getting this way, but haven't yet. I can imagine the convenience of not having to deal with all the cumbersome newsprint or magazines piling up in your recycling bin which is only picked up once every two weeks. Amazon backs up your purchases online and for subscriptions will archive several back issues under your account.

As for blogs, I can't really see the advantage of paying Amazon to send a blog to your device. Apparently they have versions of "The Onion" and other popular blogs that are formatted especially for reading on the Kindle. But if you just wait to read them online, they are free. I found a way around this by visiting a couple of the many online forums devoted to e-book readers in general and the Kindle specifically. Forum users are full of ideas and resources for securing free content. A free service called Feedbooks allows you to package RSS feeds for single or multiple blogs you read regularly into a "newspaper" which you can transfer to your Kindle via USB and update wirelessly each day. Feedbooks also has a catalog of free and low cost books for download. Many other sites like this exist. In some cases there may be a format conversion needed depending on the type of e-book file they have available. The Kindle's native AZW format is very similar and compatible with mobipocket files (.prc or .mobi). There are at least 2 dozen other formats. It seems easy enough to figure out how to convert them even if you're only slightly tech savvy.

There are plenty of free and low cost books available in Amazon's Kindle store as well. Just search Kindle books by lowest price. As of today, there are 7000 results. Loads of the classics are available for free since the material is public domain. I started my Kindle reading experience with Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, a perpetual favourite, just to initiate myself into the feel of reading on the Kindle. The novel was as wonderful as it always is.

So as for the reading experience on the Kindle, I'm very happy with it so far. The device does the obvious things like saving your place in the book and allowing you to return to it easily. You can add your own bookmark, or use the wireless to sync to the furthest page you read. Amazon backs this up for you as well as any notations or highlighted sections you mark.

I like that you can read one handed, turning the page with a gentle pressure on the next page or prev page button. The e-ink technology causes the screen to blink quickly as the ink from that page is cleared and the ink from the next page is placed. It reminds me a bit of an Etch-a-Sketch, but you get used to it quickly and it becomes barely noticable. The choice of 6 font sizes makes readability a cinch. I've been told that the largest font is comparable to about 20 pt. I find the 3rd largest font most comfortable since the larger font you use, the more you have to turn the page. The 6 inch display is about 3/4 the length of a typical paperback page. Other e-readers like the Sony expand the display to take up more of the device's size, and rely upon touch screen controls. I would rather not have touch screen on the reading surface because of fingerprints, so I appreciate Amazon's choice to keep the screen at 6 inches and include a physical qwerty keyboard to search for books, make notes, type URLs etc. The screen itself is very nice to read on as it's not backlit and therefore glare free!

The thing I find hardest to adjust to so far is the page numbering. Kindle books don't use page numbers. It would be problematic of course because changing the size of the font would re-paginate the whole text. Instead, the Kindle uses location numbers. A scroll bar along the bottom of the display shows current location, total locations in the book, and notes your percentage of completion as you progress in your reading. When you set a bookmark, the device records it by location number, and you can easily return to that location by using the Go to location option on the menu. Still, I've always been one of those people who mentally notes the page number as I go along. As in "10 more pages and I'll go to bed," or "I'm 100 pages in and I can't put it down!" It's a hard habit to break. Now I find myself watching the percentage ("I'm 25% of the way through...") and it's just not the same.

Aside from the basic reading experience, the Kindle has a bunch of other nifty features that aren't strictly necessary, but cool. It has a built in dictionary. If you come across a word you aren't familiar with, you can look it up by moving your cursor to it and clicking. The definition will appear in short across the bottom of the display, so you can check it out and keep reading, or you can click through to the full display of the definition, and see all the meanings and other info. If you come across a foreign word, proper name or other reference that isn't in the dictionary, you can look it up using the Kindle's basic web browser on Google or Wikipedia. The Kindle browser bookmark menu has links to these as well as a handful of other useful sites. You can also enter a URL for other sites of your choosing. But I wouldn't say the browser is all that handy for web surfing. It's kind of slow, and images don't work so well in the greyscale. I'd just as soon wait until I have a wi-fi connection and use my iPod Touch or my laptop. I'm sure they will improve it in future versions, but it's definitely not a reason to buy the Kindle 2. In the menu it's listed under "Experimental" features, so the developers want to make sure we aren't expecting perfection there anyway. Another "Experimental" feature is the Text-to-Speech option. The Kindle will read to you. The choice of male or female voices both sound kind of robotic, but it works in a pinch if you want to close your eyes for a bit. And also, it will play audio books. And Mp3 files. Both nifty, but not necessary. My favourite of these features is definitely the dictionary. Stopping to look up a word is something I have done, and will probably do more often now.

As a lifelong lover of books, I've been following with interest discussions of the Kindle and other e-readers and their potential to supplant physical books completely. I can confidently say this will not happen. Not any time soon, and probably not ever. The reasons are fairly obvious to me, but in the interest of being specific:

1. E-ink cannot do color, yet. Illustrations and photography are still a negligible part of the e-book experience. The Kindle displays a selection of author portraits in greyscale as a screensaver when the device is asleep (see photo). I'm sure they are working on color, but even so, this is never going to replace a huge coffee table art book, a beautifully illustrated children's book or comic.

2. A physical book does not require batteries or a power cord. Yes, the battery life in the Kindle is good, 4 days with wireless on, up to two weeks with wireless turned off. Common sense applies here. I turn mine off at night, and let it sleep with wireless off if I put it down for a while. So I haven't tested it to see if it lasts 2 weeks on a charge. But yeah, books still win on this one.

3. A physical book, as an object, can be a work of art. The tactile nature of reading one will remain appealing. Picking one up, flipping through it, turning it over in your hands, I can't imagine not having that. A beautiful copy of a favorite book will always be a good investment (both in my hard earned dollars and in shelf space). For example, I purchased along with my Kindle, a hardcover copy of Neil Gaiman's Newbery Award winning "The Graveyard Book." Gaiman is a favorite author and I own copies of many of his books. Presently, works such as his "Sandman" series of comics cannot be replicated on the Kindle. And when I met Mr. Gaiman this past November, he couldn't have autographed and sketched in an e-book as he did in my physical copy (see below) :)


4. A physical book can be shared or passed along to someone else once it's read. Kindle's can share books within a single account. For instance if you have more than one Kindle in the household, but otherwise, no.

Anyway, this isn't meant to be a comprehensive review of the device, or an argument for or against it. I happen to think the Kindle and physical books will co-exist just fine. From what I can tell from the online communities I have visited, members of the Kindle Kulture (not my word) would agree with me. These are just some thoughts on my experience so far.