Kindle – Page 5 – Auxiliary Memory

To Ebook or Not To Ebook

This week Barnes & Noble lowered their price for the Nook to $199, and came out with a Wi-Fi only model for $149, and on the same day Amazon lowered the price of the Kindle to $189. Unfortunately, the iPad remains $499. Once again I’m thinking about buying an ebook reader, but there are so many things to consider that I’m left undecided.

For instanced, I’ve been to three local bookstores trying to find a copy of Texasville by Larry McMurtry without coming home with a book to read. If I had an ebook reader, either Nook or Kindle, I could have started reading it immediately after realizing I wanted it.

Score 1 for ebooks. If the book is available ebook readers win on instant gratification.

Score 1 for paper. On the other hand, both Amazon and Barnes & Noble sell the ebook edition of Texasville for about the same price as the trade paperback edition, so I wouldn’t have saved any money towards paying back the investment of $149, $189 or $499. Why buy an ebook when the real book is the same price? I could read the real book and give it away or sell it, which I can’t with an ebook.

Score 1 for paper. I just ordered Texasville as a used hardback for 1 cent and $3.99 postage. You can get used books but not used ebooks.

Score 1 for ebooks. If I had bought the ebook edition of Texasville, Larry McMurtry would have been paid. Buying used cuts out the author. If all books sold were ebooks then writers will always get their cut.

Score 1 for paper. If everyone buys ebooks bookstores will go out of business, now that would suck, wouldn’t it?

Score 1 for ebooks. The price of The End of Biblical Studies is significantly cheaper for the ebook edition. It’s $21.77 for paper and $9.99 for the Kindle, but it’s not available for the Nook. Bummer, because I was thinking about getting the $149 Nook. But that’s $11.78 I could apply towards the iPad, since it does have Kindle and Nook reader software.

Score 1 for paper. I’m going down my Amazon Wish List to test things, and it’s score another point for paper, because The Year’s Best Science Fiction 2010 is not available for ebook readers. Actually, paper will score many points here because many books on my Wish List aren’t available in an ebook edition. That will change.

Score 1 for iPads. There are books that are available for the Kindle but not the Nook, and other books like Darwin’s Armada that’s available on the Nook, but not the Kindle. The iPad has software readers for most dedicated ebook readers. But $149 + $189 is still cheaper than $499.

Score 1 for ebooks because they offer large print and that makes reading easier for me.

Score 1 for ebooks because they are environmental friendly.

Score 1 for paper because I can share books, give them away or sell them.

Score 1 for ebooks because they are easier to hold.

Score 1 for paper to save money. By buying used, going to the library, getting books off the free table at work or borrowing books from friends I could significantly reduce my annual reading budget. It’s even possible to spend no money on reading if I stuck with paper.

Score 1 for ebooks because they stimulate the economy. Not only do you need to buy an ebook reader, but you have to pay for all your new books. This is bad for libraries and bookstores, but great for publishers, writers and the economy. The move to a Green Economy means creating as many environmental friendly jobs as possible.

Score 1 for iPads because they are good for magazine reading.

That’s 6 for paper and 9 for ebooks, with a leaning towards the iPad. I’m leery of spending $499 for the iPad. I spent $199 for the iPod touch and $399 for a Toshiba netbook and really don’t use either. I’d hate to spend another $499 for another gadget I’d end up not using too. But I’m wanting to read more but I can’t because small print strains my eyes. An ebook reader promises help for this handicap.

Finally, my stand on giving up paper means I don’t read magazines like I used to, and I miss that. I can read magazine articles online from my computer desk, but that’s not the most comfortable way to read for fun. The iPad “appears” to offer a better solution, but I won’t know until I bet my $499.

I look at my wall of books next to my computer desk and I wonder what life would be like if all those books were inside an ebook reader. Many of them are reference books with photos, drawings and diagrams – so I can only imagine those working on an iPad.

I had to move my wall of books when we put down new flooring and all of those books were very heavy and hard to move. It would be strange to hold all of them in one small device.

If I was born in a future age of ebooks, would my ebook reader at age 58 hold every book I had ever read? That’s a weird thought. Writing this is making me lean towards buying the iPad, and maybe even spending $599 to get the 32gb model, although I’m also tempted to hang onto paper for just a while longer until the iPad 2 comes out next year.

I keep thinking of more things to consider. Will I take my expensive iPad into the bathroom to read? If there are four best of the year SF anthologies to consider and only two of them are sold in ebook editions, will that force my buying decision? Will I choose Dozois and Hartwell over Horton and Strahan because they don’t have ebook editions?

Once I buy an iPad will that make me prejudice against books that don’t have ebook editions? It’s like my friend who took a rotary phone to show his fifth grade class and one girl asked “How do you send text messages?” If I get used to an ebook reader and then pick up a book, will I think, “Where’s the button to change the font size?”

JWH – 6/27/10

Am I Becoming An Old Fogey?

I started taking programming classes in 1971, and in 1977 I got caught up in the microcomputer mania. By 1981 I got swept away with the PC revolution and during the 1980s I was quite passionate about BBSes and online computer services like CompuServe and GENIE. And I was wowed when my university got connected to the Internet years before the WWW. I’ve always been an early adopter of any computer gadget, but somehow I’m letting the smartphone mania pass me by. Is this a sign of aging?

At some computer news sites there are more stories about smartphones than computers, and some digital pundits even predict smartphones replacing computers. They sneer that the desktop is just a boring office device. I guess I’m getting old because desktop computers are still as exciting to me as muscle cars were to me in my teens.

I’d love to have a smartphone, but I just can’t justify spending a $1,000 a year to use one. The iPhone 4 is one seductive piece of hardware and if it was only $199 I’d get one in a snap. I can’t stop thinking about getting an iPhone 4 or one of the new Android smartphones – but I keep remembering that I barely use my cell phone, and that I have both an iPod touch and netbook that both go weeks without being used. And my GPS sits at the bottom of a desk drawer, and my three digital cameras seldom get snapped.

I add $50 to my T-Mobile pay-as-you-go phone and I can talk for 6-8 months. Now I might justify paying for a smartphone if I could ditch my house phone, but cell phone service from my home is terrible, for both AT&T and T-Mobile. My wife does have an iPhone. She works and lives out of town and greatly benefits from her smartphone but she practically lives on the damn thing. But Susan is a couple years younger than me and loves Farmville, Facebook and going to live rock concerts. Her favorite band is The Foo Fighters while I enjoy people like Laura Bell Bundy who sings a tamer country rock.

I spend all day at work at my desktop, and all evening at home at my desktop, and my commute is 8 minutes. So I don’t exactly need a powerful smartphone or laptop. But the smartphone mania keeps gnawing at me. They’re like a toy that every cool kid owns, and I don’t.

When I saw the video for the new iPhone 4 at the Apple site I thought the face time video calling was fantastic until I remembered Susan and I bought webcams two years ago for Valentine’s Day and only used them once.

Now I’m not trying to be the Grinch that steals Christmas but is all this smartphone mania some new kind of addiction? I know some people who don’t have home phones, and who don’t have a computer at home, or Internet access, and the smartphone is a great, affordable solution for them. These folks are the kind of people that a smartphone will be their computer, and the ones the pundits were talking about.

And if you’re an on-the-go person that’s already spending a pile of money for cell phone calling and texting, it’s not that much money to add a data plan. I suppose kids and young people who stay constantly in touch with their friends via cell phones can’t imagine living any other way. And that might be the reason why I question all of this. Am I too old to see the necessity of such a wired lifestyle?

Will spending a $1,000 a year for smartphone use just become a necessity of life? And what is that cost for a family with three teenagers? On one hand, I know the smartphone mania is a great boost for the economy, so I shouldn’t complain, but on the other hand, it seems so wasteful. But I guess I’m just an old fogey.

And now the 3D TV mania is starting. HDTV was sexy to me, but 3D TV leaves me limp. I wonder if I need a Viagra for my techno lust? And did I give up cable TV and my two DVR boxes to save money, like I thought, or was it because I’m getting old and couldn’t stand all those channels, like I felt. Now that I think of it, I did sell my Kindle, and I’m actually reading books. Well, I’m not as bad as my friend Lee, he’s returned to listening to LPs. I wonder if that will happen to me too?

JWH – 6/13/10

Web Sites I Want – Best Essays from Printed Magazines

Even with the social bookmarking sites, reading from the internet is like drinking from a fire hose. What I’d like to see is highly selective bookmarking site, and in particular, the one I’d love to have most would be Best Essays From Printed Magazines. The top writing on the net is usually reprinted from the major print magazines, but those essays are overshadowed by the gigantic volume of web journalism. Hey, I’m a blogger and love getting readers, and I love reading blogs, but the heaviest of the heavy duty essays are still from print magazines. The cutthroat survival of the fittest in the print magazine industry by its very nature acquires the best writing.

That’s why I’d like a site that helps me find the best essays over 1,000 words. Adding the length requirement is important because too many magazines have gone to filling up their pages with short web level writing. Social bookmarking sites like delicious and StumbleUpon are great for snacking on popcorn and candy level reads, but not so yummy if you’re looking for literary steak. Yes, they will link to long quality essays from printed magazines, but you have to wade through zillions of peanut size stories of questionable value, more akin to Television’s funniest videos in informational nutrition.

No, I want a site that’s very specific and limited. I’d like an editorial board that selects the Top 100 magazines that publishes their content on the web, and offers a system that lets users bookmark and vote on the best essays they are reading. Hell, I’d even pay to subscribe to such a site if they got permission to reprint articles that don’t get reprinted on the web.

The web has gotten too big and mangy, so when I want to know something I go to a specific site, mainly Wikipedia. I’ve given up subscribing to magazines, mainly because I’m against paper for environmental reasons, but also because when I was subscribing to dozens of magazines, all too often I’d only find a good article here and there. Most of the content was filler, like the web. I guess I’ve gotten spoiled by the iTunes model – who wants to buy an album when it’s the hit song you want. This is why I prefer Netflix to cable TV. We need more ways to cut out the noise.

Here’s are examples of the kind of long essays I’d like to read:

Publish or Perish (The New Yorker)
How to Save the News (The Atlantic)
Geek Power: Steven Levy Revisits Tech Titans, Hackers, Idealists (Wired)
A Draft Sequence of the Neandertal Genome (Science)
Yes, Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare (Times Literary Supplement)
L.A.’s Pot Revolution (Reason)
Green Giant (The New Yorker)

I guess what I really want is a web version of the Best American Series to be published monthly, instead of the yearly printed volumes they have now. And if they wanted to make extra money, reprint the monthly web site editions as ebooks for $9.99 for Kindles, Nooks, iPads, etc.

JWH – 5/12/10

The iPad and Screen Evolution

I got to play with an iPad today for the first time. It was beautiful. I’m going to have a hard time keeping my resolution to not buy one before the second generation comes out. I’ve been trying to find a carry around the house computer for years. I tried a Kindle, iPod touch and a Toshiba netbook. I sold my Kindle to a bookworm friend, and my other two devices just sit around losing battery charge. I use each occasionally, but they have the wrong size screens.

I liked the Kindle for reading fiction, but I wanted something to read electronic magazines, RSS feeds and the Internet while reclined in my La-Z-Boy. The iPod touch lets me read stuff the Kindle didn’t plus my Kindle fiction, but the screen is too small. I installed several ebook reader programs on my netbook, but 10.1” landscape screen is all wrong. Seeing the 9.7” inch portrait screen of the iPad today convinced me it was near perfect for electronic magazines, RSS feeds and Internet reading, and probably for fiction too. It was heavier than I expected, and that might be a drawback. But it was damn close to what I want.

The iPad should do a lot to eliminate paper, which is one of my environmental goals. The iPad also well illustrates the role and purpose of the computer screen. The small screen on the iPhone/iPod touch is perfect for carrying around all the time. The interface is tuned to it’s 3.5” screen. iPhone apps that aren’t rewritten for the 9.7” iPad screen will miss their mark. Putting Windows 7 on a 10.1” netbook screen just isn’t right either. Tiny desktop applications don’t cut it, they need to be redesigned to the screen real estate.

For example, Windows Media Center works great on my 52” television screen. It’s an application designed to work on a TV screen with viewers across the room. It doesn’t need a keyboard. Using regular Windows apps on my big TV is clunky. I can make browsing OK with IE 8 by using the Zoom magnification, so I can play music and read Engadget or Slashdot from the couch, but some pages like Pandora just doesn’t resize or work well on the big screen.

It would be damn cool if Pandora, Rhapsody and Lala all were rewritten to run inside of Windows Media Center. In fact, it would be extremely neat if there was a version of IE for Windows Media Player so I could browse the web with just a clicker. It would need a virtual keyboard like the iPad/iPhone, but that’s doable.

Back in the 1990s pundits started talking about digital convergence. They expected TVs and computers to merge, and that’s rapidly happening, but I don’t think they planned for giant screen TVs. Nor did they expect the convergence with telephones, GPSes and books, or even game machines. Now it’s all a matter of fitting the task to the screen size:

Screen Size	Device	Best Use
1-2”	MP3	Music Audiobooks Voice Recording
2-4”	Phone Camera Video Cam Portable Game	Smartphone GPS Photography Videography Games
5-6”	Ebook	Fiction
9-11”	Tablet	Nonfiction Magazines RSS feeds Photos Games
10-16”	Netbook Notebook	Work on the go
18-24”	Desktop	Work at the desk
26-60”	Television	TV Movies Music Home video Internet TV
> 60”	Projector	Lectures Education

You can watch video on all these screen sizes, and even use all of them with computer applications or games. Telephone features like video conferencing, Skype and web cams have moved to the various screen sizes. I think the iPad has been in development since before the advent of netbooks, and I bet Steve Jobs was sick to see them succeed because that 9-11” screen size was territory ripe for exploitation. I tend to think tablets will win out in that form factor and 12-13” will become the ultimate netbook size for extreme road warriors who want to type on the go, while 16” will be the common size for notebooks. I expect 24” to become the ultimate size for desktop machines, although I’ve discovered I like having two monitors at work, one in portrait and the other in landscape.

Now, is there room for a new form factor and unique applications? I don’t know. Will the future just be ones of refining these screen territories? And will there be some repositioning of functions? Do you need a smartphone if you carry around an iPad? Would a dumb phone be good enough? Some people like everything on one device, like an iPhone, but I prefer the right tool for the job. The iPod Nano is perfect for audio books. They are harder to use on the iPhone. Time will tell how everything shakes out, but I think screen size will be the factor that will determine the ultimate use of each device.

JWH – 4/8/10

Books versus Ebooks

I love science fiction and futuristic ideas. I love computers and neat gadgets. I love reading. So, you’d think I’d love ebook readers. I’ve owned several, including a Kindle, but I’ve sold or given them away. I’m still anxious to have another ebook reader, but I’m not so much waiting for the ultimate ebook reader as I’m waiting for the revolution in publishing that will create super-books that have to be read on an ebook reader. Right now ebook readers have a few conveniences that might appeal to some bookworms, like being able to change the font size, carry many books around at once, going green and saving trees, but for the most part, reading an ebook isn’t different from reading an old fashion book.

What I want is an ebook like the magical books we see in Harry Potter movies, where the pages have moving photos and words and letters dance with animation. I love reading about science and history and I believe that adding multimedia to the words I read would create a quantum leap in learning fun. Actually, web pages are heading more in this direction than ebook pages. Take for instance my blog here. I can add videos, photos, maps, music to my page to spice it up. I can link to other pages all over the web. These additions are still clunky, so the page isn’t seamlessly animated like a book in a Harry Potter story, but I’m sure WordPress.com is working on that.

Last year I was at a book giveaway where I picked up several modern high school textbooks. They were stunning productions, taking the potential of the printed page further than I’ve ever seen before. No current ebook reader can come close to duplicating what they can. If the iPad had a 15” screen it could, and if the layout was adapted, its 9.7” screen, it could theoretically compete well. The iPad represents a new generation of ebook readers, and it has the potential for being a fantastic device. Will it become the fabled Dynabook, we’ll have to wait and see. Tablet computers have been around for awhile, but no one has really programmed the content to showcase the design. The iPhone is a huge success because programmers maximized the design of their networked programs for the 3.5” screen.

Whether writers and publishers jump on the tablet ebook potential is a whole other story. I was thinking about buying a Kindle 2 or a Sony ebook reader, but after seeing the iPad I doubt I will. The iPad’s larger full color screen, able to show high definition video, play sound, and computer animation makes me think I could have a Harry Potter magical book. But remember, the iPad is worthless without the content. I’m surprised Steve Jobs didn’t commission a writer to produce an ebook that showcased the iPad’s real potential. If I was just going to read novels, I’d get a Kindle.

I recently reviewed The Bible: A Biography by Karen Armstrong. It has 34 pages of footnote citations. I own this book in hardback and unabridged audio. I’d like to have an iPad edition that has both the text and audio narration built in, and hyperlinks to the full pertinent portion of the texts to all the footnote references. Armstrong summarizes the work of hundreds of individuals over thousands of years. I’d like links to their original work (it should all be in the public domain). Also, if her research for the book included documentaries and interviews, I’d like the videos and sound recordings added.

But most of all I’d want two extras that I haven’t seen before, even on the web. First, since the book is about The Bible, I’d like her annotation of The Bible presented and for each verse I tap with my finger I’d want Armstrong’s text related to that passage, and a listing of links to all the people who offered commentary on that verse that Armstrong reviewed. Second, I want a time-line. Armstrong is summarizing thousands of years, so I’d like a year by year listing of when various portions of The Bible was written, related history happened, or commentary took place. That way I could read the text of Armstrong’s book in three orders: As it was published in print, in time order, and in Bible passage order.

I’m sure other people can think of other features to add to this super-book version. For example, having a fun trivia type game to test me on content would be an another extra feature. Hell, another cool idea just popped into my mind. Since The Bible has spawned endless denominations of Judaism and Christianity, I’d like a family tree of denominations showing how each sect got started and by whom. All the philosophers and theologians Armstrong mentions created a spider web of interconnected ideas, with many branches forming new churches.

Essentially what I’m asking for is what’s already in the book that Armstrong wrote and her notes, annotated with what she read and studied to write the book. I’m just asking to see the same information from a variety of angles, and to follow different paths through the information. For example, Armstrong gives us a taste for many Christian thinkers, like Origen, but because her book is short, she flies by these philosophers rather fast. Including the Wikipedia entry for each person mentioned would also be helpful. This is the second book I finished this month that mentions the Christian theologian and heretic Origen, the other being The Rise and Fall of Alexandria by Justin Pollard and Howard Reid. Neither paint him as well as his Wikipedia entry.

This would not be practical as a printed book. I’m not even sure if EPUB formatting can handle it. But when publishers start selling books like this, then people will see the obvious value of an ebook reader like the iPad. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think the iPad is special. I think HP, Asus, Acer, Toshiba, Samsung, MSI and other computer makers will quickly take over the market and create iPad like devices that are better and cheaper. They might all be called iPads, like all copiers are called Xerox machines.

Ebooks should revolutionize the textbook and non-fiction book industry. Each book should have multiple ways to read through the content, and reading might take place with the eyes or ears or both. Can you imagine a fully multimedia math book? Or what about textbooks for studying French and Spanish? What about a detailed history of astronomy?

So far I’ve been talking about super-books. But what if a publisher took the 10 best books on a subject, like The Bible, and blended them together to for a super-super-book? Certain books would have fantastic synergy is woven together. This would be perfect for college courses too. Also, use the same techniques to annotate fiction. Imagine what could be done with On the Road by Jack Kerouac.

The reason why ebook readers haven’t been convincing buys to many bookworms yet, is because they haven’t presented the potential of Reading 2.0. Or is it Reading 14.0 by now?

JWH – 1/31/10