Archive for February, 2008
Poll: Amazon Kindle Books vs. Paper Books?
Posted by P. Rad | Filed under Polls
Loading …A Message To Amazon.com Kindle Naysayers - Part I :
Posted by P. Rad | Filed under Thoughts
I have heard numerous stories about people who are not satisfied with Amazon Kindle, but have not even touched the device once. There are many arguments out there against Amazon Kindle, but I don’t see to find a valid one:
- A Laptop Is Better than Kindle: Really? This got to be the most ridiculous argument other there. A laptop is a laptop. Amazon Kindle is a revolutionary reader that does not claim to be a laptop or anything else for that matter. The digital ink technology that is used with Kindle provides better reading experience as it is easy on the eye. Besides, Kindle is much more portable than any laptop out there (MacBook air may be a good competitor). In addition, Kindle’s long battery life means that you can keep on reading for days whereas with a laptop you can only read for a few hours, and having an AC adapter would definitely make the laptop less maneuverable. It is true that you can read eBook on Laptops, but Kindle’s purpose is to make it easy for readers by providing convenient access to Wikipedia and a Dictionary, and other cool features. Is Kindle as powerful as a Laptop when it comes to computing power? Probably not, but if you need a computer by a laptop. If you need an alternative to paper books, buy Kindle.
Stay tuned for the second part in which I discuss some other invalid arguments made by Kindle Naysayers.
Amazon Kindle Availability Myth: One-Day Shipping Doesn’t Help!
Posted by P. Rad | Filed under News, Thoughts
I know a lot of Kindle fans get desperate and change their shipping method from 2-day shipping to 1-day shipping. Not to be the bearer of the bad news, but this does actually more harm than good. Technically, if you make this change, you should get your Kindle sooner than later. However, there have been incidences where people have been moved backed further down the line because of making changes to their orders. Besides, Amazon cannot process your order sooner than the others just because you have chosen 1 day shipping. So save yourself some money for you will need it when you get you Kindle (with all the books available and all).
Restrictions of Kindle DRM
Posted by P. Rad | Filed under Tips
As you may have found out by now Kindle has a proprietary DRM in order to allow Amazon to protect their interest by restricting the number of times that you potentially share Kindle Content. So you may ask what the limits are. It’s hard to find but here it is:
- You can not share Amazon content between two Kindles that are registered under different Amazon accounts. That includes books, magazines, and subscriptions (unless of course you hack your Kindle).
- You cannot share subscriptions with any other Kindle regardless.
- You can share books between two Kindles registered under same account, but that would be only 6 times.
- Your books are stored online by Amazon and there is no limit as far as the number of times you can download an eBook.
So basically if you do not have eBooks (PDF or any other format) of your own, and you decide to go with Amazon content, you are pretty much limited to one Kindle. If your Kindle dies, you can transfer data to your new Kindle that is registered under the same Amazon account. Now this would be a fair deal if Amazon dropped the prices from $9.99 to $4.99 or something like that. I think $10 is too expensive especially since you can’t sell these books after you are done with them!
Where to get an Amazon Kindle: 3 Legal Ways To Get a Kindle
Posted by P. Rad | Filed under Uncategorized
So now that Amazon.com is shipping Kindles faster, I doubt eBays can ask for the amounts they were asking a few weeks back. But if you need to have a Kindle right now, you have a few options:
One way to go is of course eBay. I think you will be able to get a Kindle for as low as $420 on eBay depending on your luck. You want to make sure you are getting a healthy Kindle though as you don’t want to spend days sending the Kindle back and waiting for a replacement. Also, make sure you don’t get ripped off by people who claim your money and don’t send you your product.
Craigslist is another way to go if you are disparate to get a Kindle. You can search for Kindles in your local community and you may get lucky to find a buyer who’s feeling a buyer’s remorse with his/her Kindle (though that is hard to believe). Again, one needs to be aware of the scammish offers on Craigslist.
But you can also choose to wait for a Kindle from Amazon. This option probably takes the longest but is the surest bet out there. It only takes a month to get your Kindle and shipping is free too. Besides, you know that you are less likely to end up with a defective item if you buy it directly from Amazon. If you are on fire and need a Kindle to put it off, then this option won’t work for you. Otherwise, save your money and buy from Amazon.
Kindle eBooks are Not Perfect
Posted by P. Rad | Filed under Thoughts
After uploading a ton of my ebooks to my Kindle, I decided to buy my 10th Kindle book from Amazon. I had not experienced anything with Kindle eBooks before as they all turned out fine. However, this time around the book turned up rather ugly (bought ultimate guide to search engine marketing). It was certainly readable but all the letters were sort of mixed up. For instance instead of saying “ultimate guide to SEM” the book showed “ultimateguidetoSEM.” Not impossible to read but that’s what you don’t expect to see after paying $10 for the book. Having said that, 1 strike out of 10 tries is still a pretty good deal to me. I saved over $200 on my Kindle books, and that sort of justifies paying $399 for the device.
Kindle Delay News: Kindle Shipments Speeding Up
Posted by P. Rad | Filed under News
It seems people are now getting their Kindles in about 20 days. It seems people who ordered it before 1/25 have received their items in about 20 days. Of course, there are a few who will have to wait a bit longer due to Amazon reaching its cut off point, but I doubt anyone will have to wait more than a month to get a Kindle these days. Surely beats my 47 days of waiting.
The Kindle: Has Amazon Struck Old With the Older Generation?
Posted by P. Rad | Filed under Uncategorized
Now when you hear about the latest gadgets, you don’t expect to see the older generation and baby boomer generation to be among the early adopters. But that is what has happened with the Amazon Kindle. To be quite honest, books are now competing against the Internet, games, and all kinds of other 21st century activities that were not available to our grand fathers. So it is pretty much given that the fairly older (wiser) generation would put more value on reading and learning new things as they go along. Kindle is unique as it satisfies both the gadget-crazed and fairly senior citizens at the same time. Amazon Kindle is cool and offers many hot features that any gadget fan would look for in a gadget (e.g. mp3 play, GPS, games). But at the same time, Kindle makes it convenient to buy books and read them immediately. In addition, you can change the font, use a dictionary, check Wikipedia, and do all kinds of neat stuff with Kindle. So instead of dealing with a useless gadgets that only appeals to teenagers or people in their 20s, Amazon has created a learning/reading tool that appeals to the people of all ages. Forget the early-adopter late-adopter mambo jumbo. When it comes to Kindle you are either an adopter or a laggard.
Just Released Books For Amazon Kindle 2.14.08
Posted by P. Rad | Filed under Kindle Books
Amazon.com has released the following books for Amazon Kindle today:
- The Powers to Lead by Joseph S. Nye
- Tribology on the Small Scale: A Bottom Up Approach to Friction, Lubrication, and Wear by C. Mathew Mate
- Homeric Hmyn To Demeter by Homer
- Burn Zone by James O. Born
Is paying $500 for Kindle on eBay worth it?
Posted by P. Rad | Filed under Polls
I remember seeing Kindle go for $600 on eBay a couple months ago, but I wonder how many people actually paid that or more to get their hands on their Kindles. In your opinion, is it worth paying $500-600 on eBay to get Kindle in 2 weeks rather than 2 months?
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