Amazon.com is putting out a free application that lets people read Kindle electronic books on their Windows personal computers. Microsoft demonstrated the new Kindle for PC app at the Windows 7 launch in New York City. It's the latest move by Amazon to extend its vast store of electronic books, magazines and newspapers to other devices beyond its Kindle readers.The company is expected to expand Kindle book access to Macs and BlackBerrys in the next few months. Now I've followed the smoldering e-reader revolution for a while now, but something is only now coming into focus.
Once upon a time, personal electronics were designed to be single-function. Cameras were cameras, only. Phones were phones, only. The computer was a heavy stationary thing. But engineers slowly figured out how to build smaller chips, store greater memory and consolidate
functions. Today a single smart phone can do all of these things: Take
pictures, make calls, go online. It's the Swiss Army Knife theory of technology.Today it seems to me that there are at least three major classes of popular personal technology that have yet to be fully consolidated into a modern Swiss Army Knife: cell phones and computers and I think e-readers will soon fill that trio. The arc of personal tech history dictates that functions don't remain separate for very long. Someday the idea of an e-reader designed merely to read will seem as limiting as the cell phone that doesn't receive emails or the desktop that won't fit in your satchel. It will still have an consumer audience, but it will be seen as behind the wave.
Returning to today's news: B&N and Amazon's offer to access e-books on computers, iPhones, BlackBerry's and future hybrid devices, means that anything with an internet connection is functionally an e-reader. We don't need an e-reader to "e-read." I think that means Amazon and Barnes & Noble are inherently handicapped in the e-reader arms race. They're building e-readers that can go online. That's nice, but the upcoming Apple Tablet is so much more: a ultra-portable netbook/entertainment center that can also read books. The Tablet isn't merely designed for today's e-reader technology. It's designed with the expectation that consumers want their personal technologies integrated. It's not just another awesome corkscrew. It's a Swiss Army Knife.
Am I the only guy in the world who needs reading glasses, and therefore finds the iPhone to be nearly unusable? Unless I want to wear bifocals all the time, just so I can use a goddam phone.
Am I the only guy in the world who likes to read books and magazines on the beach, or in the living room, or in other places where I don't necessarily want to try balancing a laptop (or desktop) on something other than a desk?
Is Skippy The Wonder Device going to be a good replacement for all three devices? Or a half-assed-almost-but0-never-quite-good-enough device? How am I going to fit a phone with a 8X10 inch screen in my pocket?
I agree with your general idea. After all, I have a computer, a smartphone, and a Kindle. However, the REASON I have a Kindle is not easily addressed. I have the Kindle because I enjoy the e-Ink screen. I spend all day in front of a computer, and it hurts my eyes. I COULD read on my iPhone, but I don't want to.
Until e-Ink displays are good enough to use in computers/phones, I don't think the convergence will happen. As far as I can tell, e-Ink that is that good is a long way off.
I have to agree with wiredog. Even with my reading glasses, I find it hard to read text messages sent to me on my phone. Call me a Luddite, but they'll have to pry my paper and ink books "out of my cold, dead hands". (And note that I'm writing this on a computer! How's that for irony?)
And a floating car is the same as a boat, right? I have a computer and I have a Kindle. I can already read books on my computer and have been able to do so for years and years - where is the 'revolution' in that? BUT e-ink is an entirely different experience, antithetically different. Boats have seats and move, cars have seats and move, computers have screens, Kindles (and nooks, and Sonys) have screens - yep, look like the same things. NOT!!!!
I am very happy to disagree here. It is a fascinating topic and I believe there is nothing coming into focus just yet. Unlike music and video, the business of the e-book is moving very cautiously, with long, calculated slow steps. The problem is, as somebody pointed out above, that reading a file in a computer is not reading a book. Every pdf you own is, in principle, an e-book. So, why the readers like Kindle, Nook or Que? Because the book is a physical item, and the last analog amongst us. And the book's has been absurdly succesful for the last five hundred years or so.
In my opinion, that's what the big names in this industry have been doing for several years now, trying to replicate the reading experience in a physical item. And, with all those fabulous gadgets cramped with functions and capabilities, the arising of an e-book reader is a very complicated formula. But I cannot help but to side with the other commenters regarding the one-dimensional readers. I don't want to be interrupted by mail, message or music when I am reading my recently acquired novel. And I don't want to be online in the beach, also. Probably when I go back to my hotel room, but not in the benches. And a reader fills that spot perfectly.
But if there is an Apple tablet, after all? With an iTunes book store? Very hard to tell. Still, e-ink is the greatest element in play here. No computer/tablet screen is for reading books. I can't tell why I can surf for hours without a problem and why I can't read a book on my laptop. That's the very grey zone where this discussion belongs.