In the ongoing questioning that librarians have about their relevance to the future, comes the issue of the Kindle – the new electronic book reader offered by Amazon for holiday gift giving. One library customer asked if the library was planning to buy these and lend them out (not at $399 per device) and another friend confided to me that he would love to get as a gift for the holidays (not by me).
The recent Newsweek article tried to answer the concerns that book lovers have about the aesthetics of curling up with a piece of hardware. Read the article and see what you think. http://www.newsweek.com/id/70983
And then imagine packing your suitcase for a long winter weekend with just one Kindle, instead of 4 hardbound books.
Anyone read a Kindle?
Even as a technologist, I’ve tended to be a late adopter; I’m even more skeptical that the Kindle is actually going to take off. Single-purpose tools aren’t going to fare well, when so many things are either converging on the one device you feel like you’ve always got to carry (the cell phone), or are possible on a larger platform (laptop or PC). And books/magazines/newspapers still have electronic devices beat in a number of ways… paging through a digital book is nothing like navigating print by touch and feel, rapidly flipping through pages, scanning a chapter, etc. Jim Bezos is a bright guy, but it doesn’t mean that Amazon can’t make a misstep.