How to beat Amazon’s Kindle. - By Farhad Manjoo - Slate Magazine
This article caught my attention today. I wonder if/when there will be competition with Amazon’s Kindle? The ideas in this article aren’t bad I think and at the same time, the Kindle really is its own reading “ecosystem,” which will be a tough act to change.
It’s here that Kindle’s rivals will find it hard to compete. Amazon is the Internet’s master retailer, and the Kindle’s killer feature is its convenience. When you buy a Kindle, it comes pre-loaded with your Amazon account info; you don’t even need to enter your credit card number to buy any books. And then there are all those customer reviews and the amazing recommendations—not to mention the huge selection of popular, cheap titles.
How could anyone compete with that? Here’s one idea: Pull down the restrictions. The Kindle’s biggest problem is its “Hotel California”-content model: You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave. Because Amazon uses its own proprietary eBook format, every book you buy is tied to the Kindle and other devices Amazon deigns to approve, like iPhones and iPod touches. Sony recently embraced the ePub document format, which—though it’s still copy-protected—works on multiple devices. This lets you buy a book for your Reader but be assured that your library won’t get deleted if you get some other gadget in the future. The ePub format also lets you hook into other sources for books—for instance, the Reader lets you borrow eBooks from your local library. Google just put 1 million public-domain books online—these will work on all devices that read ePub, which means everything but the Kindle.
FLYP
Normally I don’t click on ads on sites that I visit, but this one caught my attention. I clicked and went to this new kind of online magazine that combines print with video in a compelling way. I read an article on Amazon’s Kindle e-reader and found the experience quite enjoyable. Subscription is free, and there’s also an RSS feed if that works for your taste, too. The site does require the latest version of Flash though.
~ Share and Enjoy~
Tags: online reads
Remains of the Day: The iPhone vs. Kindle Edition
So I downloaded the Kindle app for the iPhone the other day to check it out. Yeah, it’s pretty cool. I don’t have a Kindle (yet), so I thought this might be a way to check out the iPhone/iPod Touch’s e-book technology. It’s good, I must admit. Supposedly these two things stay synced somehow, so that the Kindle will know where you left off, and the iPhone will also. Neat.
Along those lines, I’ve also been fooling around with Stanza, a free e-reader for the iPhone. They’ve got a desktop app that allows you to upload a bunch of different documents, including .pdf files, which I did last night. So far, I like it. And free is good too. 
Kids and Kindle - James Fallows
My wife is only days away from receiving her exciting new new-to-her Kindle, which is to say that I expect soon to get my hands on a Kindle 2. Meanwhile this note from a good friend about the machine’s effect in his household:
An (unreported?) Kindle phenomenon: 11-year old girl, drove parents crazy by not reading books because totally addicted to electronics, has now transferred total addiction to Kindle 2 - and now does nothing, ever, but read books, one after another. In bed, in the car, while eating - while crossing streets!
[My wife] says, “Let’s buy Amazon stock. In six months, the world will have discovered this particular phenomenon.” (She is the one who had the sudden insight that this might work for [our daughter].)
This from one of my favorite writers who blogs for The Atlantic Monthly magazine, from yesterday. Perhaps the Kindle and other e-readers will spark an interest in reading for some students? Having approached the issue of reading before, this one got me to thinking is all . . . .
Are Our Brains Becoming “Googlized?”
So, if the brain has this ability to remap new functions into low traffic areas of our cortex, are we in fact remapping our brains to be more adept in navigating online spaces? Carr contends that our attention spans are getting shorter and he worries that soon we’ll be unable to make our way through a book or even a moderately long magazine article. Or, if we take the alternate point of view that seems to emerge in the UCLA study, is regular use of Google keeping our mind more limber, regularly exercising the synaptic connections between cortical areas? The fact is, the flexibility of our cortex evolved to enable humans to better adapt to dynamic environments. As our world got more complex, we needed to move beyond the programmed responses of the limbic system to something that gave us a little more latitude to respond appropriately to situations. Yes, if we use the Internet frequently, our minds will accommodate by building skills in this area. But this doesn’t imply that we’re getting the virtual version of a frontal lobotomy or, conversely, supercharging our intellect. It just means that we’re using our inherent hardware for new purposes so that we can better keep up with our world. It’s the same flexibility we all come born with, and it’s what makes humans rather remarkable.
I read this article today and it got me to thinking about my own use of the Internets and Google and my ability to focus, read, reflect and basically think. I can’t say that I disagree with this completely, but what I have found in the course of my life over the past 15 years or so is that I tend to sit and focus on a task like reading far less than what I used to do. The only time that this really isn’t the case is when I have to read something for a class. So, that being said, what I’ve been considering is why this is and how (or even if) I want to spend more time off-line and back in the “acoustic” world of magazine articles and books. It’s something I’ve been thinking about lately. There are several books that I want to read and I find that when I read books I experience a level of relaxation that I haven’t felt while reading online. It’s only my experience here, but for me, there is something to this. So, now I think I’ll go grab that book . . . .cheers!
It’s Time to Reboot America. | Rebooting America
This came via dana boyd’s blog and I’ve started reading the introduction. What I think about in terms of this book (which can be downloaded here as a pdf file) is that it is our students that will continue to have the chance to change the way our representative government works. Change is slow and churning at times I know, but it seems to me that the essays in this book address a wide range of issues that involve our connectedness in ways not too often expressed. It’s worth a look over, I think.
Literacy Debate - Online, R U Really Reading? - Series - NYTimes.com
The above linked article is well worth the read. Will Richardson blogged about this article, which is how I found it. I found his blog post via Twitter, for those who are interested.
Some of my thoughts, briefly tonight, are that reading and literacy need to be taught to our students. By reading I mean all kinds of reading–both online and offline. There really needs to be an exposure to all kinds of text, including long novels, good non-fiction essays, and even short blog posts read through an rss feed aggregator. I agree with this quote on page four from the article:
Even those who are most concerned about the preservation of books acknowledge that children need a range of reading experiences. “Some of it is the informal reading they get in e-mails or on Web sites,” said Gay Ivey, a professor at James Madison University who focuses on adolescent literacy. “I think they need it all.”
This is a good article and a good topic to consider. As school begins in a little over two weeks for me, this article is one that I will ask teachers to read and discuss.
Tags: article, nytimes, Reading
Tags: words
How we read online. - By Michael Agger - Slate Magazine
This article was good, short, readable online. Possibly some good links, too. I’m considering a Kindle and this makes me continue to consider. Good read.
Lazy Bastards: How we read online.
By Michael Agger
Posted Friday, June 13, 2008, at 1:00 PM ET
You’re probably going to read this.
It’s a short paragraph at the top of the page. It’s surrounded by white space. It’s in small type.
To really get your attention, I should write like this:
- Bulleted list
- Occasional use of bold to prevent skimming
- Short sentence fragments
- Explanatory subheads
- No puns
- Did I mention lists?
Below is a checklist of questions about email, from Seth Godin. When I read it, I thought, “hmmm . . these are good reminders.” At least I think so, especially when email is the major way of communicating with colleagues. Enjoy!
Seth’s Blog: Email checklist
Email checklist
Before you hit send on that next email, perhaps you should run down this list, just to be sure:
1. Is it going to just one person? (If yes, jump to #10)
2. Since it’s going to a group, have I thought about who is on my list?
3. Are they blind copied?
4. Did every person on the list really and truly opt in? Not like sort of, but really ask for it?
5. So that means that if I didn’t send it to them, they’d complain about not getting it?
6. See #5. If they wouldn’t complain, take them off!
