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Response to Amazon's Kindle

20.11.07 Kimberly Maul

Now that the long-awaited Amazon Kindle has been introduced, the media has been buzzing with thoughts and opinions of the device. Will it be the ipod of books or just another piece of technology to carry everywhere?

Views range from Evan Schnittman of the Oxford University Press Blog, who said the Kindle "represents perhaps the most significant moment in the history of eBooks," to readers on Engadget who commented that the Kindle was a "misstep" by Amazon and "the Ugliest Device of the Year."

While Engadget readers commenting on Engadget praised the device for being able to hold a lot books, they were disappointed that it was necessary to purchase books for additional fees, on average $10.

"I think I could get used to reading e-books vs. paper books, but certainly not on this device," commented a reader named Michael Emmons. "I don't mind the up-front cost so much as the cost per book. $10 for each book? Most paper-back books are $7.99 so I don't understand why I am paying a premium for an electronic one."

Schnittman praises the device, but also puts a lot of pressure on the success of Kindle.

"The risk here isn't just to Amazon," he said. "If Kindle fails, the ebook is over, the theory of the 'iPod model' is wrong for eBooks, and publishing must face the reality that consumers just don't want to read immersive content on electronic screens of any sort…but let’s not rain on this glorious parade just yet. I think Kindle and the inevitable rivals it will spawn are here to stay."

Laura Dawson, who writes her technology and book blog on LJN Dawson.com, doesn't think this launch is as drastic as Schnittman makes it seem.

"We've been living with books for 500 years, people!" she said. "To expect us to wake up one day and start reading them on screens—or it's all over, we'll NEVER read them on screens—is a little much."

"As you'll see from the pictures online, this is not a beautiful piece of industrial design—though it's not quite as ugly as those early prototype pictures on the Internet would have led you to believe," said Michael Cader on Publishers Marketplace. "When we look back on this launch (and compare it to those of Gemstar, and Sony, and …) I think what will stand out is not a transformational reading platform, but the introduction of the first major consumer EVDO product that isn't a telephone."

Today's papers are also weighing in: The Independent believes that the arrival of the "long-awaited and undeniably natty" device marks a "new page in the history of the written word", that "the battle to persuaded us to abandon the familiar spine-creased paperback in favour of words on a flickering screen" is hotting up, and that the Kindle, "with its almost unlimited inventory of titles for sale via the internet, threatens finally to up-end the economics of book publishing".

The article quotes Amazon founder Jeffrey Bezos, talking at yesterday's US unveiling: "The question is, can you improve upon something as highly evolved and well-suited to its task as the book? And if so, how?" Bezos asked. " [The book] has to disappear."

The newspaper asks whether it is possible "that this will turn out to be the gadget that reverses years of decline in book-reading as popular entertainment and gives novelists and non-fiction writers a wider audience again?"

Scott Devitt, an analyst with Stifel Nicolaus quoted in the Daily Telegraph, said Amazon's device "has the capacity to recreate the e-book business, as well as several other long-term options".

"With time, we believe Amazon Kindle could be Amazon.com's Trojan Horse into a complete 'always on' connection to all Amazon offerings," said Devitt.
 

US Kimberly Maul amazon Kindle

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