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# Monday, November 19, 2007

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omar@Kindle.com

Well that didn't take long. I RMA'ed my Sony Reader (since it's less than 30 days old) and ordered the Amazon Kindle. Since I'm Amazon Prime, it will arrive tomorrow morning for $4.

I just love Amazon. I can't wait to play with the Kindle.

Amazon's moto should be do no evil. They are a fantastic company, part of the fabric of my geekiness. I've known them since the intertubes became a vital part of my life, and they never cease to impress me. I'm looking forward to going along for this journey with them and help them continue to branch out from their first business, selling real books. These days I buy diapers from them...

BTW, I love that Amazon reserved omar@kindle.com for my device email address. Did you know you can email your Kindle? I love that it has EVDO and that I don't have to pay a monthly fee to use it.

So far I don't have a Kindle, but Amazon already:

  • set up an email address for my device
  • authorized my email address to send mail to the kindle
  • set up my one click settings to I can start getting books for it
  • delivered a thank you letter to my device

One of the best parts about this device is that no PC is necessary to use it.

Gear
Posted Tuesday, November 20, 2007    Permalink    Comments [3]  View blog reactions

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Monday, November 19, 2007 8:43:32 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Wow. I mean, I love Amazon way more than the next person (Prime for a while now, and typically two packages on my doorstep every day; I'll buy from Amazon before any place else if it's possible), but even I'm not buying into this thing.

An extra device to carry around when I want to read? So I'm supposed to sling my TabletPC into a bag and then ALSO put in a Kindle? Why can't I download books to read on the TabletPC (which is an incredibly excellent reading platform)? And I can't even copy the books I download to my phone (for when I don't want to carry the Kindle) or my laptop (for when I have it but not the Kindle)? And if I have an existing file that I want to read on the Kindle, I have to email it to myself and pay for the privilege of then downloading it? And if I want to read blogs, I have to pay for them? And there's no way for me to just copy text out of a book and paste it into something for quoting? I can't even take screenshots and blog them?

It just doesn't make any sense at all to me. Amazon Kindle as an application I could run on my phone and PC (like the defunct Microsoft Reader) could be great; as a device and service, it's too restrictive and weird. And that's not even counting how godawful ugly that device is. I mean, wow, that's not just pre-iPod, it's pre-NeXT. It looks like a circa-1984 Macintosh.
Mike Kozlowski
Tuesday, November 20, 2007 8:39:51 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Mike: you don't have to email files to get them onto the Kindle. You can transfer them via USB. The input formats that you can copy on are more restrictive than via the email service, but it still works. It mounts as a USB drive: http://amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=200137060

And, not directly for Mike, but why is everyone so up in arms about what the thing looks like? It's functional and reasonable. Why does the style of a device matter so much? Sure, maybe style can be a distinguishing characteristic when there are a lot of choices in the market but there are not a lot of choices right now.
Tommy Williams
Tuesday, November 20, 2007 4:03:32 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Tommy: The lesson of the 21st century is that design is no longer optional. Functionality and aesthetics are both important.

(The aesthetics can be deliberately techy and no-nonsense, as on the ThinkPad, and they can be charmingly retro as on those toasters with analog dials; but they can't be no-nonsense techy retro. Or rather they can be, but ugh.)
Mike Kozlowski
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