Come on, Baby, Light My Fire

Posted 21 November, 2007 in Book News |

Amazon’s Kindle e-reader was released on Monday, to almost universally dismal reviews. Steven Poole at the Guardian lists fourteen things that a traditional book does that the Kindle device doesn’t do, and suggests that these fourteen things — such as never needing recharging and the ability to convert into a flat surface suitable for rolling cigarettes without fearing that stray leaves will slip into the device and short-circuit the motherboard — are a bare minimum for what a viable e-reader should boast. In a similar vein, Ed Champion provides a list of ten reasons books are superior to a Kindle. Cory Doctorow, one of the earliest and most vocal “information wants to be free” advocates, explains why he won’t be buying a Kindle, but fails to explain how he reconciles this with accepting money from Amazon for selling his blog’s feed (which is free online) via Kindle. And the website dive into mark has a terrific satirical post about what’s wrong not just with Kindle, but with e-readers in general.

My own view is that the Kindle is fundamentally flawed at the conceptual level, as are all e-readers that have been marketed to date. Why? Because they don’t do anything that traditional books don’t already do, and they have significant drawbacks that books don’t.

You might recall my reaction to the Sony Reader earlier this year. Not much has changed where the Kindle is concerned.

In its promotional video, Amazon touts the various benefits of the Kindle as against previous e-readers and, indeed, traditional books. According to the video, the Kindle “lets you read books, magazines, newspapers, and blogs anywhere, anytime.” Really? How about reading in the bath? Make sure the water’s not too hot, because the steam might damage the delicate circuitry, and for pity’s sake don’t drop the thing.

The Kindle is roughly the size of a typical trade paperback and weighs 10.3 ounces. Great. It’s lightweight and portable. So are books.

It uses E-ink, which eliminates the eyestrain of many earlier readers, and the screen is not backlit, which is also easier on the eyes. However, traditional ink-on-paper is also easy on the eyes, and books aren’t backlit, either.

According to the video, “Kindle automatically saves your place in everything you’re reading so you can always pick up right where you left off.” Funny, I can do this with books, thanks to this nifty new gadget called a bookmark. Most bookstores give them away for free, but in a pinch you can also use business cards, subway transfers, or that phantom scrap of paper that seems to perpetually reside in your coat pocket.

It’s got a rechargeable battery that can last for days. Books don’t need a battery: they last in perpetuity.

Most New York Times bestsellers are available for purchase at the low, low price of $9.99 or less — after you’ve forked over $400 for the unit itself. And if you lose or break the Kindle, never fear: Amazon keeps a backup copy of your reading material, which you’re welcome to access once you’ve paid another $400 for a replacement device.

Matthew Ingram, writing in today’s Globe and Mail, compares the Kindle to the Segway, the two-wheel scooter that dropped like a lead balloon when it was released: “Cool device, great idea, but nobody wanted one, apart from a few rich bored geeks.” He’s right, as is the Guardian’s Poole: until e-readers can — at minimum – duplicate all the positive features of traditional books while eliminating most of the drawbacks of earlier devices (including, but not limited to, the prohibitive price), they’re not likely to make much of an impact on the reading public.

P.S. I’m not the first person to point this out, but I wonder if the marketing geniuses at Amazon could have come up with a worse name for their device? A unit associated with books and reading whose name evokes fire and stuff burning. Brilliant.

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