Kindle

This blog isn't going to be a haven for product placement (barring the odd book review) however I am going to post up a bit of a product review now.

As the title suggests; Santa brought me a kindle for Christmas. I must admit, I was VERY dubious to start with. I am a traditionalist when it comes to books. I love the smell and feel of a book. I enjoy browsing in bookshops, picking up books at random and discovering some truly magnificent (and some truly terrible) reads. Second hand bookshops especially are a source of joy; combining the browsing and discovery with the glow of a good bargain. I also secretly enjoy tracking my progress through a book by looking at the thicknesses either side of where I'm reading.

I was deeply suspicious of the kindle when I got it. For the first week I didn't touch it. It lay under my bed. Eventually I plugged it in and started prodding suspiciously at the buttons. I became a convert shortly afterwards. Firstly, it's really easy to use. I won't say it's intuitive because intuition is a subjective experience however I (as someone who is technologically inept) find it straight forward to use. It also has good battery life. I use it while commuting so there's lots of switching on and off as I change modes of transport. 

The screen is also brilliant to read from. Reading from an electronic display was one of the things I worried about most as I am acutely aware that I do not assimilate information well from a computer screen. Those worries disappeared swiftly. I forgot almost instantly that I wasn't reading from the printed page. Surprisingly, it's even more comfortable to read from than some books.

Finally, the pricing of books on amazon is good. To buy popular books costs around the same as it would to buy them second-hand on amazon. A major bonus given cash is quite tight at the moment. Added to that is the massive number of classics that are available for virtually nothing . I bought the entire works of Oscar Wilde, Arthur Conan-Doyle and Dickens for less than a pound a piece. The complete works of Burns comes free. This has prompted several sprees of buying books I've been meaning to read for a while and still having change from a tenner.

There are a couple of downsides however. It's very easy to press the buttons to turn pages unintentionally which can mean lots of searching around. It can also be difficult to get an idea of one's progress through the book despite the percentage indicator at the base. This isn't a huge deal but it can sometimes be a bit off-putting. I'm also not a huge fan of the fact that it's impossible to gain any kind of control over the picture displayed on the screen when it is set on sleep. It seems like a bit of a pointless feature. It is also very, very difficult to navigate around within a book after you have started reading.

Unfortunately today my screen broke. Since I haven't heard of this happening to anyone else, I think it's just me being unlucky. I was steeling myself for a bit of an ordeal to get it sorted out however I was pleasantly surprised. Upon phoning amazon, I was promised an immediate replacement which was sent out straight away as well as a pre-paid label to use to return the damaged one. I know it's a new product so it's in their interest to get a reputation for good customer support as well as the product but I was still impressed and it is another reason I would recommend getting one if you were thinking about it.

All in all, I have been pleasantly surprised to be proved wrong in my suspicions and would confidently suggest that friends and family should get one if they don't already have one.

JR