Why I bought a Kindle 2 and why the haters should STFU

On a cold Michigan Saturday, I pre-ordered a Kindle 2 from Amazon. I must admit, I have not been this excited for a new gadget since I was a kid and was waiting for Christmas to finally come and get my Nintendo 64. You see, I am a huge reader. I read at least a book a week and I often go into my local Barnes & Noble on a whim and leave with 3 or 4 books, dropping 50-60 bucks after 30 minutes of browsing. This puts me in a pretty rare category, as a full 25% of Americans didn't read a single book last year. The average American read 4 books last year. I am WAY beyond that.

I bought the Kindle 2 for the following reasons:

• It is sexy - the iPhone for books
• Small form factor
• While I love what books have in them, I don't like having to use two hands to turn the page. Yes, I am lazy.
• I have a lot of technical books, they are huge. Lugging around 3 or 4 1,000 page books gets annoying very quickly.
• I'l get to take my entire library with me, wherever I go
• No more runs to the local Barnes & Noble, I'll just use the integrated wireless data connection to download books
• Built in dictionary - Although my vocabulary is quite impressive, there are still words that I don't know
• Wikipedia - While reading my book I can quickly look up a relevant article on Wikipedia
• Cheaper - Most books in the Amazon Kindle store are $10 or under, including new books that are only out in hard cover. Hard cover books are generally $25 to $30.

The "haters" as I like to call them are dissing the Kindle for a variety of reasons. Most of them are simply because the Kindle (and other ebook readers) were never targetted at them, and never will be. Here are the reasons I have seen cited for why the Kindle will fail, and why I think the arguments are full of crap.

• Costs too much, I can buy a netbook or laptop for that and it does more!

Granted, $359 is not cheap, but e-ink technology is still in infancy, prices will come down as people like myself purchase it and manufacturing costs go down. As for buying a netbook or laptop... they don't even compare! Have you ever tried reading a book on a laptop? I have, and my eyes kill after 30 minutes. When I work on my computer, I take breaks all the time so that my eyes don't get tired. I oftentimes read a book for 2 or 3 hours without looking anywhere else. With that $359 comes not only the device itself, but also the Amazon Whispernet (Sprint Data connection) that will allow you to download a book or go on Wikipedia whenever you want. There is no monthly fee for Whispernet, that has got to be worth quite a bit!

• No SD card!!!!

This seems to be the argument that pops up most often from Kindle 1 owners, and to be fair it is a legitimate one. I am not sure why Amazon decided to remove the SD card from the K2, probably because it saves them 15 cents on manufacturing costs. The main reason people are arguing for the SD card is that they like being able to play MP3's and Audiobooks off of their Kindle. My argument would be that my iPod does a much better job of playing MP3's than the Kindle, and that it has more storage than an SD card anyways. But, I can certainly see why some are disappointed about the lack of a SD reader. I think that if Amazon hadn't put the SD card in the K1, no one would be complaining about it now. The Kindle does have a mini-USB connector, perhaps with a software update down the road they will allow it to mount a jump drive and use that as storage?

• Integrated battery... what happens when the battery dies?

This hasn't been a huge issue from what I've seen, and most people were worried about how to reboot the Kindle if something went awry. Well, Amazon fixed that potential issue by making it so that if you hold the power button down for 14 seconds it will reboot. The more legitimate complaint is what if the battery died. From a "techy" perspective I can see the issue here, as people who like to tinker with things would love to be able to replace the battery by themselves. But if the battery dies, you can send the Kindle in to Amazon and get it replaced for free if it is still within warranty, or for $59 if not. That doesn't seem outrageous to me, as laptop batteries are over $100 for the battery alone.

• DRM sucks, get rid of it!

Another valid complaint, and I would love to see the DRM go away. However, I don't think Amazon has much choice here, the publishing industry isn't going to budge on the DRM issue for now. I wish the publishing industry would learn from the music industry and see that DRM isn't the way to go, but they haven't yet. For now, if I am going to trust anyone with holding onto my books, it is Amazon.

Some of the arguments make sense, some don't whatsoever. I can understand where people are coming from on most of them, and the fact that they won't buy a Kindle 2 is fine with me, but I wish they'd just STFU already. I looked at all the pros and cons and decided that the Kindle 2 was the best option for me. I am not forcing anyone to buy it, and if there weren't so many people bitching about its glaring flaws I would have never even wrote this post. The Kindle is, quite simply, a gadget that is going to solve a problem that I have. I am willing to pay a premium for that. If you come to a different conclusion, congratulations, you are a thinking adult who can run the numbers for himself!

Comments

[Karl L. Gechlik | AskTheAdmin.com]

Awesome post and I think you just talked me into buying one! I read 1 or 2 books a week and this might just make my life a hellofalot easier. The integrated (no monthly fee) data connection is worth looking into at least!

Thanks Rob

[Rob Steenwyk]

Thanks for the kind words Karl, glad I could point you in the right direction! If you end up buying one, consider clicking the Amazon referral links in this post lol :P

[Ryan]

I don't read enough to justify the purchase, but I can see how an avid reader would love this. The integrated wireless and backup functions are reasons enough. I hope one day Colleges use something similar to this for text books too. The printed version of a college text is way to costly, but a 9.99 .pdf I can stomach. Until then I'm left carrying my 20 pound global concerns books around :p

[Paul Bauer]

Maybe I'm a hater! LOL! I like the idea of the Kindle, but it is too expensive. Like you said, it is in its infancy. I will wait a few years until the price drops considerably.

-EDP (http://www.Bauer-Power.net)

[Sergey Ivanov]

If you’re the sort of person who likes with their books print and audio, you might find the Kindle very interesting. I bought Kindle 2. It reads like real paper. I like it.