Amazon announces Kindle DX
This enormous document reader will kill us all, said newspaper sources.
― Alba, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 15:32 (fourteen years ago) link
native PDF reader is nice and tempting....but I'm still waiting to see what Apple can offer. For almost $500 I'd like more than just a way to read books and papers.
― dulce est desipere in loco (Euler), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 15:47 (fourteen years ago) link
If it can integrate with Papers or Sente, annotate and bring those back into the above, VPN into the campus library, search academic databases download papers over the air and work with knovel. I might be interested.
― Prince of Persia (Ed), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 15:50 (fourteen years ago) link
imna design one of these kindle book bitches - its basically just stripped down html right - im designing in indesign for print and then converting to pdf for one ebook format but then id like to convert to the native kindle format as well - anybody got any tips for me
― ice cr?m, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 15:54 (fourteen years ago) link
the coming huge iphone tablet thingy is obv gonna be amzing - itll be way more expensive than the kindle tho - more like a iphone/laptop/kindle hybrid - the kindle will still hav its niche likely
― ice cr?m, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 15:56 (fourteen years ago) link
yeah, it's not really the price of this thing that's my problem, it's the price for what it can do, which is just display books. Yeah, you could bitch about the original iPod also "just" being a music player, but it was easy to get digital music for no cash, either from ripping your cds or.... But with the Kindle I guess you could scan books into PDFs, but it's a lot more work to get right than ripping a cd.
― dulce est desipere in loco (Euler), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:00 (fourteen years ago) link
There is a decent piece of free software for Windows called mobipocket creator, and on the Mac, there is something called Calibre, I think.
― schwantz, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:01 (fourteen years ago) link
thx dude calibre looks promising - ill check out mobipocket in parallels if that doesnt work out
― ice cr?m, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:04 (fourteen years ago) link
lol
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_bc5-zw3yTPk/Sfi9PAQVgvI/AAAAAAAAAGE/FjuUKw1-8Fw/s400/kc-chart1.jpg
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:10 (fourteen years ago) link
u got to think the the ebook piracy damn is abt to break - people just hav to crack whatever drm is on there - right now theres not really enough people reading ebooks to hav a critical mass but once all those college kids get readers for text books its over
― ice cr?m, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:11 (fourteen years ago) link
tho obv there are so many fucking out there especially when u consider out of print titles that prob a huge % will never make it to file sharing - i could see piracy driving down prices to something more like $5 - which seems reasonable when u consider how much publishers are saving on printing/distro/wholesaling - this should be pretty interesting def - every book ever published at a mouse click - plus tons of people self publishing
― ice cr?m, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:15 (fourteen years ago) link
I think the graph is more interesting than lol. Amazon's selling a lot to older people who struggle with reading regualar books because of the small type size.
― Alba, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:20 (fourteen years ago) link
i can lol if i want to i can leave e-books behind
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:21 (fourteen years ago) link
Are they ever going to sell this fucker in the UK?
― stet, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:26 (fourteen years ago) link
its interesting the oldies are early adopters here - says something def for the simplicity of the device - also young people just read bloggz
― ice cr?m, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:30 (fourteen years ago) link
this is pretty nuts http://www.businessinsider.com/henry-blodget-kindle-sales-now-a-shocking-35-of-book-sales-when-kindle-version-available-2009-5
― ice cr?m, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:40 (fourteen years ago) link
I think they also have the cash and are more willing to pay for the luxury of adjustable font sizes and not having to carry a pile of print around. The kindle's lack of fashionability, butt-ugly grey facade and inability to mod probably drives away the younguns and mothtoflames the seniors
― I’ve seen a lot in my days as an mp3 blogger (forksclovetofu), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:41 (fourteen years ago) link
yeah that is nuts!
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:41 (fourteen years ago) link
irl i have only seen kindles in the hands of old(er) people on planes
― Ømår Littel (Jordan), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:42 (fourteen years ago) link
i hav never seen a kindl :(
― ice cr?m, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:48 (fourteen years ago) link
an older woman on my bus has one, she seems weird. she wears old school walkman headphones and listens to a discman and for awhile i swear she listened to static for white noise purposes. now i'm not so sure. i heard music, real music the other day. she's the kind of person who on an empty bus will place her bag next to her so no one sits next to her. not sure what this says about the kindle. i sometimes sit next to her. she was reading some book about thomas jefferson last week. the print was clear and easy to read, i'll say that much. kindles make it much easier to see what yr fellow bus rider is reading.
also dude in one of my classes had one. youngish guy but he's super geeky and dorky and stuff.
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:52 (fourteen years ago) link
i have never seen anyone using one on the bus but someone would probably punch you in the face and steal it and run off the bus like with iphones
― erudite e-scholar (harbl), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:56 (fourteen years ago) link
actually lol who am i kidding no one would steal one of these things
theyd take it and then be like wait wtf is this thing a really old ipod
― ice cr?m, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 16:59 (fourteen years ago) link
why does this ipod have a keyboard
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 17:00 (fourteen years ago) link
this isn't an etch-a-sketch?
― "Together we could rape the universe" (omar little), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 17:00 (fourteen years ago) link
― erudite e-scholar (harbl), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 17:01 (fourteen years ago) link
maybe they would just punch you in the face and *not* steal it
*punch* what, regular books aren't good enough for you, fucker?
― throwbookatface (skygreenleopard), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 17:33 (fourteen years ago) link
They might punch you in the face and then hand you a Sony eReader
― snoball, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 17:35 (fourteen years ago) link
I'm interested in how the textbook thing plays out. Textbooks are damned expensive due to the resale issue and this removes that but whether you have to buy individual titles for this thing or universities will get a site license as they do for journals and things like knovel. I suspect the latter so I wonder if schools will be doling out kindles and they were doing so with ipods a while back. It will be interesting to see apple and gookle duke it out for this space if the ipod tablet surfaces.
― Prince of Persia (Ed), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 18:10 (fourteen years ago) link
apple tablet w/full keyboard would be pretty much the best thing for college - read yr books - bring it to class as yr laptop - txt on there - whatever
― ice cr?m, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 18:18 (fourteen years ago) link
itunes
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 18:22 (fourteen years ago) link
im thinking youd hav some sort of fold up dock that has the keyboard and angles the tablet up and has ports and power supply - then when u want to just take it out and read or whatever u go to the touch screen - the doc could hav wifi so u could connect to harddrives phones or whatever while yr in wireless mode
― ice cr?m, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 18:36 (fourteen years ago) link
Amzon, not google, possibly a prescient freudian slip.
― Prince of Persia (Ed), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 18:46 (fourteen years ago) link
all the classics are available
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51F19998D6L._SL500_AA246_PIkin2,BottomRight,-12,34_AA280_SH20_OU01_.jpghttp://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51jE0LfTCYL._SL500_AA246_PIkin2,BottomRight,-10,34_AA280_SH20_OU01_.jpg
― Dr. Phil, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 18:51 (fourteen years ago) link
etch-a-skindle
― I’ve seen a lot in my days as an mp3 blogger (forksclovetofu), Wednesday, 6 May 2009 19:07 (fourteen years ago) link
i finished my iphone kindle Animal Farm in like three subway rides and a few in-between-bands-glances. I know it's a small book, but i honestly think i read MUCH FASTER on my iphone app than with a regular book
Its these little blocks of text that you can just gulp down in one bite and flip past, instead of staring at entire pages of words.
Ever since I was a kid I would space out while reading long passages. I get as much two pages ahead and realize that I haven't actually READ anything paragraphs, I just LOOKED at the book while I thought about other things. I didn't do that at all with my lil phone--and when i did, i was just stuck on a little page with 40 words and i could just reconnect in 2 seconds. I'm totally into reading books on my iphone.
Next I'm gonna do White Noise, which I only got through half of last time because I left my book inside the Tate Modern and never got a new one.
― sum 41 dude (Whiney G. Weingarten), Friday, 8 May 2009 07:18 (fourteen years ago) link
friend of mine is thinking of getting one since he's gonna be going to africa for a few months and wants to bring hell of books with him
― i like to fart and i am crazy (gbx), Friday, 8 May 2009 07:33 (fourteen years ago) link
what a big fat bald baby this guy is
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jacketcopy/2009/06/for-jeff-bezos-the-great-run-for-books-is-over-really.html#more
Levy: For a special book, do you still want to read the physical book?
Bezos: No. No, in fact, I now ... I kind of am grumpy when I am forced to read a physical book. Because it's not as convenient. Turning the pages ... I didn't know this either, until I started using the Kindles a couple months ago, I mean a couple years ago, I didn't understand all of the failings of a physical book, because I’m inured to them. But you can’t turn the page with one hand. The book is always flopping itself shut at the wrong moment. They’re heavy. You can only take one or two of them with you at a time. It’s had a great 500-year run. [Audience laughter.] It’s an unbelievably successful technology. But it’s time to change.
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 17 June 2009 13:47 (fourteen years ago) link
I wish they'd release it here. I still prefer actual books though.
― I GOTTA BRAKE FREEEEE (stevienixed), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 13:49 (fourteen years ago) link
lol at that bezos quote; surprised he didn't bitch about paper cuts
― (pronounced /ˈfɑrv/sklOf/tO/fewˈ/) (forksclovetofu), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 15:03 (fourteen years ago) link
I think this thing may finally be catching on in "middle America" (lol whatever that is). I mean, all of my Mom's friends (Midwestern middle/working class) are buying these and raving about them.
― the sideburns are album-specific (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 15:06 (fourteen years ago) link
can't wait for the nyt article about whole houses with no bookshelves and the great bookshelf bust as demonstrated by a trip to an ikea and a west elm.
― El Tomboto, Wednesday, 17 June 2009 15:12 (fourteen years ago) link
... and container store; takes three to be a trend, remember?
― (pronounced /ˈfɑrv/sklOf/tO/fewˈ/) (forksclovetofu), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 15:27 (fourteen years ago) link
Fair enough, but it's gonna make book burnin's a lot more expensive now.
― Pleasant Plains, Wednesday, 17 June 2009 15:27 (fourteen years ago) link
Fahrenheit 488
― (pronounced /ˈfɑrv/sklOf/tO/fewˈ/) (forksclovetofu), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 15:29 (fourteen years ago) link
Ha. I was just surprised to see that people I actually knew were starting to buy these in any numbers.
― the sideburns are album-specific (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 15:32 (fourteen years ago) link
it's mostly older people, from what i've read
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 17 June 2009 15:33 (fourteen years ago) link
You know how old people like to jump on trends.
― congratulations (n/a), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 15:33 (fourteen years ago) link