I don't own a Kindle, but I am seriously looking at getting an Android tablet so that I can use the FREE kindle application with it, and the KOBO one too, not to mention a number of other eReaders that are available now.
Currently I use the Kindle App on my iPhone and on my PC, and I love the fact that I can download free classics (I am currently reading Dorian Grey) and read them on the move. I also love the way I can look up words whose meaning I am unsure of. Ever read a word and THOUGHT you knew what it meant but was wrong? Well now I can just tap that word directly on the screen and the definition will pop up to confirm my idiocy or celebrate my genius!
But the real big advanatge is no more back strain from lugging around heavy (1000 page) tech manuals. Now that is what's really selling me on the concept of the eBook.
I am not really in love with books in their physical sense. I see no romanticism about lugging around a large, heavy mass of paper with lettering whose size can not be altered. I would have killed to have an eReader when I used the London Tube to get to work! Can you imagine being able to just slip it in and out of a pocket and read it with one hand while holding onto the bucking carriage with the other. No more waiting for the tube train to get to a straight calm bit so you can turn a page!
Physical books hold a greater disadvantage for me now. As I get older, the small size of print in some thick novels (yes Game of Thrones I am looking at YOU!) is a big problem. My eyes are problematic at the best of times, which means even with glasses I cannot read small print at night. An E-Reader (or e-reader application on a tablet) would overcome that for me. Besides, why do I want to keep filling my house with book after book that I rarely re-read? I used to do that when I was a teenager, but now I realise there are so many books to read and only so many years to do it in...
The brutal truth is; books take up space and the older I get the more of a pain this is, and before you say "use a library" (if I can find one the Torys haven't closed) then be aware that most E-Readers have a lending facility built into them!
Books are great, but they've had their day. Like VHS and cassette tapes, they are a medium that will begin to fade away, although they probably will never die. I'll be sad to see them go, but I will not mourn the major disadvantages of paper (a terribly destructible medium) and it's inability to be easily customised to the reader.
I keep imagining this situation where an academic of many centuries ago is looking at this newly fangled printed and bound book and saying "sorry, if it's not written on a scroll I just don't feel the same way when reading it...." and then earlier still is a caveman saying "Seriously, if you want true story telling it has to be primary colours on a cave wall".
Time moves on! You think the next generation are going to be as in love with "real books" as we are? Or do you think they will want to see a book on a touch screen where they can delve into a word or a character and know more straight away? Right or wrong, that is the future and if publishing firms fail to grasp that fact then they will wither and die on the vine as so many other firms have when faced with Tech-shock.
That said I will not be buying a Kindle and here's why. I find the interface of the kindle (the hardware version not the application) profoundly disappointing. I have written books on how to use computers so I know a cheaply designed front-end when I see it and that's the Kindle e-Reader - the Kindle Fire is something different. The Kindle Touch eReader will probably overcome many of the interfaces shortcomings by simply being a touchscreen, a difficult interface to do cock-up (but for tips on how to do it badly, see MicroSofts latest phones!).
That said, I won't buy a Kindle Touch eReader either for two main reasons, firstly I don't like the eInk technology. When a 'page' is turned the screen inverts its colours, turning everything that was black to grey and everything that was grey to black. It does this EVERYTIME a page is turned and is, for me, a distracting deal-breaker. Secondly, if I buy a kindle (even the Fire) I am locked into buying books from Amazon, and to be honest with you, I have had enough of being locked into a ring fenced market with my iPhone.
So I am going to buy an Android Tablet. Probably this one:
http://www.archos.com/products/gen9/archos_80g9/index.html?country=us&lang=en
The advantages will be that I can buy from a number of different sources (not all ebooks I want are on Amazon). I can also use the tablet for other things, like email and websurfing, even a bit of video watching. The 8 inch format will also be portable and less of an eyestrain than using my iPhone as an eReader. I will also be able to read this tablet in poor light conditions, such as a darkened room. I will also be able to see illustrations in my tech manuals in colour!
The disadvantage will be a poor battery life (in comparison to the Kindle eReader) and a screen which will be difficult to read in bright sunlight. However for me, the pro's outweigh the con's. I want a device that can cope with more than one job and that doesn't lock me into one economical model. Rather ironically though.... Guess where I will be buying my Tablet?
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Archos-501840-Tablet-Memory-Android/dp/B005DRAOG0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1326700767&sr=8-1
Well-considered and balanced article, Paul. I think there will always be a market for books, but clearly not on anything like the scale of before. For many people, books will remain objects of beauty, and for those such as my wife there is an intimacy in the relationship between a reader and a printed work they'd struggle to replicate with an 'android' (if that doesn't sound too Philip K Dick.)
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