Kindling
I'll get to my third evil act later...
I could write pages and pages about e-books and what I think of them, the readers, and the future of mankind. I don't really feel like doing that anymore than anyone else would probably want to read it. A friend of mine, though, recently had a chance to put his hands on Amazon's new horribly named Kindle device, and his boss apparently told him he thought it would do for e-books what Apple's iPod did for MP3 players. I don't think so. So here's a small bit on why...
First of all, I think the biggest factor in whatever popularity e-books enjoy may very well be the "self-fulfilling prophecy" angle. Technologically proficient people assume that since technology can do something, that it eventually will. Maybe it will happen, maybe it won't; that's part of the larger argument I'm trying to avoid here. There is a niche market, though: commuters, travelers, and people like me (I had eye surgery - I use a Sony eReader to spend two or three sessions every day, eye patch over one eye, to try to counter the effects of amblyopathy - I didn't want to start a library of large print books (they're expensive) and I either read books in the public domain or the ones that came with it). But will it "kindle" the industry?
What Apple did was come up with a name for their MP3 player that didn't have any other meaning (i.e. Zen, Jukebox). This helped give them an identity that other manufacturers lacked. With iTunes they gave non-techies a simple way to populate the thing with songs.
The crux of my point is that the groundwork had been laid by other products and technologies for a number of years before the iPod was introduced. That groundwork wasn't an underground movement, it wasn't unreported or obscure, and it made the consumer base aware that there was a new electronic device suitable for playing music. It's very important to note that playing music has always required an electric/electronic device; an MP3 player was merely an incremental advance.
As far as e-book readers go, no such groundwork exists. Instead of the device being an incremental improvement or "new" option for reading books, it's radically different in that traditional book reading doesn't require a device of any sort; it requires a book. Being able to wirelessly download content may be compelling, but my guess is that only for that small segment of people that have already bought into e-books (commuters, travelers, pirates) but this is NOT the reading community at large. It better not ever be or we will all be in trouble.
I love my Sony eReader. I can increase the text size for my eye/brain therapy and I can read the works of G. K. Chesterton from Project Guttenberg for nothing. This is a very good thing and I've saved a ton of money over either buying large print books I don't want or else going to the library to read large print books I'd rather not.
It might be nice to be able to buy a book wirelessly if I actually bought e-books. Aside from the fact that they're more expensive than mass market paperbacks (explain that to me), Amazon charges for each page you upload that you didn't actually buy. Rather than promote e-books this seems more in line with hurting public domain ones. The Kindle is a transport mechanism and to the extent you hamper my ability to transport what I want, you're shooting yourself in the foot.
I'll stop. I think I'm rambling. I wrote a few notes the other night and pasted them in here and I'm not really taking the time to ensure cohesiveness. If that bothers you, and you were reading this on a Kindle or an eReader, you could throw it in the sand or at the wall or spill your drink on it in disgust. But then your "book" would be ruined.
I could write pages and pages about e-books and what I think of them, the readers, and the future of mankind. I don't really feel like doing that anymore than anyone else would probably want to read it. A friend of mine, though, recently had a chance to put his hands on Amazon's new horribly named Kindle device, and his boss apparently told him he thought it would do for e-books what Apple's iPod did for MP3 players. I don't think so. So here's a small bit on why...
First of all, I think the biggest factor in whatever popularity e-books enjoy may very well be the "self-fulfilling prophecy" angle. Technologically proficient people assume that since technology can do something, that it eventually will. Maybe it will happen, maybe it won't; that's part of the larger argument I'm trying to avoid here. There is a niche market, though: commuters, travelers, and people like me (I had eye surgery - I use a Sony eReader to spend two or three sessions every day, eye patch over one eye, to try to counter the effects of amblyopathy - I didn't want to start a library of large print books (they're expensive) and I either read books in the public domain or the ones that came with it). But will it "kindle" the industry?
What Apple did was come up with a name for their MP3 player that didn't have any other meaning (i.e. Zen, Jukebox). This helped give them an identity that other manufacturers lacked. With iTunes they gave non-techies a simple way to populate the thing with songs.
The crux of my point is that the groundwork had been laid by other products and technologies for a number of years before the iPod was introduced. That groundwork wasn't an underground movement, it wasn't unreported or obscure, and it made the consumer base aware that there was a new electronic device suitable for playing music. It's very important to note that playing music has always required an electric/electronic device; an MP3 player was merely an incremental advance.
As far as e-book readers go, no such groundwork exists. Instead of the device being an incremental improvement or "new" option for reading books, it's radically different in that traditional book reading doesn't require a device of any sort; it requires a book. Being able to wirelessly download content may be compelling, but my guess is that only for that small segment of people that have already bought into e-books (commuters, travelers, pirates) but this is NOT the reading community at large. It better not ever be or we will all be in trouble.
I love my Sony eReader. I can increase the text size for my eye/brain therapy and I can read the works of G. K. Chesterton from Project Guttenberg for nothing. This is a very good thing and I've saved a ton of money over either buying large print books I don't want or else going to the library to read large print books I'd rather not.
It might be nice to be able to buy a book wirelessly if I actually bought e-books. Aside from the fact that they're more expensive than mass market paperbacks (explain that to me), Amazon charges for each page you upload that you didn't actually buy. Rather than promote e-books this seems more in line with hurting public domain ones. The Kindle is a transport mechanism and to the extent you hamper my ability to transport what I want, you're shooting yourself in the foot.
I'll stop. I think I'm rambling. I wrote a few notes the other night and pasted them in here and I'm not really taking the time to ensure cohesiveness. If that bothers you, and you were reading this on a Kindle or an eReader, you could throw it in the sand or at the wall or spill your drink on it in disgust. But then your "book" would be ruined.
posted by Rick Ollerman at 4:14 PM
2 Comments:
Yeah - but the wireless is Sprint's EVDO (which rocks!) - and sadly, wouldn't help you up in the Appadirondozarky Mountains.
EVDO may be as keen as R2D2 but neither one of them will help me build my library. And aren't you riffing on someone else's mobile phone commercials? (See, I said "mobile phone" instead of "cell phone" - I'm starting to get it.)
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