I got mine about 2 weeks ago. I do like it & I've found myself attempting to turn the page automatically occasionally, rather than use the electronic page turner. That's how quickly you forget its not a paper book. Downloading is a snap, and there are other sites from which you can download w/o charge, because these are books which are out of copyright. I now have books of both types. The fonts are resizeable, so that both my husband have legible type which is comfortable for us. I think it is definitely ideal for travel, since you can load up to 200 books at a time (try packing that many!). You can also add additional memory. There are other pluses to it, but I'll leave them for you to find for yourself.

I've had my Kindle since early December and absolutely love it. I've read more books than I ever would have in the past six months because of the Kindle. It is so comfortable to read and can be propped up in front of me without my having to hold it open. My reading is much more focused and I read faster with the Kindle.

Since November I have not purchased any physical books other than horticulture and knitting books that are not available on Kindle and I wouldn't want them there anyway because they are more like reference books.

The only drawback to my plan for saving money with the Kindle is that I like reading on it so much that I've been getting the Kindle edition for books I already own.

I would never have expected this to happen but between the Kindle and audiobooks I'm "reading" more books than ever without actually touching the real thing, and I don't miss it. This is from a bookaholic who used to sit on her books as a kid to keep a little sister from touching them.

They sound wonderful! I wonder, though, has the price come down at all?

grrrrrrr....only available in the US......

One day, "global" companies like Amazon will actually behave in a global way, and realize there are markets outside the US.

I have a couple of web sites which are affiliated to ABE books, so that I earn a small percentage if people purchase books via my site - helps with the hosting fees. ABE have just changed their affiliation company. I used to be paid by direct bank transfer into my UK account - immediate payment and minimal fees. I now get sent dollar cheques, as the new company cannot transfer into non-US banks - long postal delays and significant fees. How hard can it be to make an electronic payment into a UK bank? I'm so impressed by this, you can't believe....

OK, rant over.

thyrkas, the price has been reduced by $40 to $359.00.

HereÂs a tip for you Kindle lovers that are also into mysteries: Through June 12, you can download the first two books of Julia Spencer-FlemingÂs "MillerÂs Kill" series for FREE. The titles are In the Bleak Midwinter and A Fountain Filled With Blood. This is an excellent mystery series, not cozy but not hard-boiled either. It's become one of my favorite crime fiction series.

I wish I could afford a Kindle, but until they lower their price, it's just too much for me. (Seeing Frances' note.) $359 is the reduced price?! Jeez. The idea is becoming more appealing though, as I try to find room for yet more bookcases.

I'm sure that a day will come when I have a device along the lines of a Kindle. I say this with sorrow. I love books not only for the text they contain but as physical objects of craft and beauty. I also think that while electronic text is much easier and less expensive to disseminate, paper text is much more enduring. If you avoid fire, water, and acidic paper, paper books can last for hundreds of years.

Rosefolly

Thanks for the input. I wish I could actually hold one and read something on it. I know Amazon has a program where they will put you in touch with someone in your area who has one, but I'm not sure I'm ready for that.

Rose-this is for you:

There is an architecture of books as surely as there is one of buildings. When you read a book, you enter by its cover, but you live within the spatial environment that its pages throw up around you. You inhabit its margins, whether commodious or cramped; you ambulate among the serifed glyphs of the typography; you respond to the climate of the page, pure white or mottled beige, and even negotiate the textured terrain of the paper itself, whether it be the alabastrine smoothness of bible stock or the porosity of wood pulp.
James Gardner.

I too will probably end up with a Kindle or its ilk someday, and with the adjustable font I can see the benefit it would serve for my aging eyes....but I love the feel and smell and being of books.

I use the Kindle books only for those that I have no need to have in paper--its not for anything I need/wish to research for future writing. There are many books I wish to read but not keep, or even buy. 3 cheers for the public library!

I had been reading about Kindle on Amazon, and to be honest, the price scared me half to death. Semi-retired income just doesn't cover it, but I'm glad that the topic came up here so I could read what others had to say about it.
Dorieann, I'm always on the lookout for a good mystery series. Thank you. I have just ordered In the Bleak Winter at half.com. I'll let you know how I like it.

Carol

Please do, Carol. I hope you like it. She writes great characters that you enjoy spending time with.

I put kindle on my Christmas list last year, but nobody delivered. I cannot justify spending over $350 on myself.

I have no personal experience with the Kindle, but I see many people with them on airplanes - they all love it. I haven't heard one person say they regretted getting one. Alas, it is too rich for my blood at this time - maybe for Christmas!

I would love to get one-they sound great but so expensive now for this reader. I need all my money for gas!

I have been watching this thread with interest. Some pros and cons seem:
-highly portable
-easy downloads
-choice of font/type size

-high cost
-limited sources of downloads
-limited reader file types

Some unknowns that would interest me:
-battery life between charges
-cost comparison between the Kindle and a laptop
-possiblities of expanding the file types supported
-"handieness" compared to a laptop ie. hard to hold?

Regards,
Bob

Bob, I'll try to answer some of your questions. There are sources of downloads other than Amazon and many free books are readily available. There are support groups for the Kindle that go into great detail on how to access books from various sources and how to handle different file types. Because I only download from Amazon, I can't explain them but know they are available.

The battery life depends on how much you read, I believe, but I can easily go a week between charges, sometimes more.

The Kindle costs much less than most laptops but the laptop is much better at doing more than the Kindle. You hold a Kindle more like a book while the laptop is generally sitting on something (a table, desk, or lap). However, you can also prop the Kindle up in front of you without having to hold the pages open, a great advantage for me.

I don't consider the Kindle and the laptop to be the same. I don't want to read a book on a laptop and I don't want to use the Kindle for Internet access, although it does provide that capability to some extent.

I admit to often being an early adopter of technology, probably because my career has been in the computer field and I'm comfortable with technology. But I have to say that I've enjoyed the Kindle much more than I even expected to enjoy it.

One thing not mentioned is that you can load about 200 books into the Kindle. You'll never run out of something to read on vaction.

Here's what may seem at first to be a couple stupid questions:
-how waterproof/sandproof is it?
-is it lit from behind? Does wearing sunglasses make it difficult to read? Is it hard to read in the sunlight or under an overhead light?
-does it make any noise, like a hum?

People who read in the bathtub or at the beach place the Kindle in a Ziplock bag. It isn't waterproof and I don't know what effect sand would have on it but I wouldn't want sand in mine.

It is not lit from behind and is very easy to read in sunlight or under an overhead light. I just tried mine out in the sun with my sunglasses and it was still easy to read. You cannot read it in the dark without a light on the screen, just like a book.

Mine does not make any noise.

This was just the kind of input I was looking for. Thanks for all the great questions and informative answers. I'm thinking this might be a great Christmas gift...for me.

A ziploc-genius.

By any chance are there newspaper or magazine subscriptions you can buy? I'm thinking of my parents and inlaws, who do not read a great number of books, but do read other media, using a magnifying glass or an enlarging machine, and are having vision issues. The adjustable print might be a great feature. Although my father-in-law doesn't have a computer or internet-but I could bring the thing home and download every few days, I guess. They only live 5 miles away.

There are quite a few newspaper and magazine subscriptions available for the Kindle. One of the best advantages of the Kindle is that material can be downloaded without the use of a computer if the user lives in an area covered by Sprint. Amazon calls it Whispernet. On your Kindle you can access the Kindle store on Amazon, purchase a book or subscription, and have it downloaded directly to the Kindle without the use of a computer. The subscriptions will be downloaded automatically whenever the wireless access is turned on on the Kindle. It can be left on all the time but the battery drains faster when that is done. The download is almost unbelievably fast. If the user is not in a Sprint coverage area, then the download must be done through a computer.

frances_md,
Thank you for your observations. I have a couple of comments and a request, if you could be so kind. My wife currently uses a laptop for internet, and does not like it for reading ebooks. I suspect the problem may be related to the backlight/sunlight issue. I had not thought of that. In doing my comparision shopping homework, I found that I could replace her laptop for about the same $ as the Kindle, and so was looking at other issues rather than cost.

If you have a few spare moments, could you post a link or two to the Kindle user groups, so that I could do a bit more research?

Thank you,
Bob

Bob, I attempted to respond and received a message from Glyphs that I couldn't mention the location where the "kindlekorner" group can be found. I don't know exactly why that is, even after reading their message, but I don't want to be banned by trying to do it. So, to try another way, you can do a search on "kindlekorner" in Google or you can think of the company that Microsoft has been negotiating to buy for quite some time, so far unsuccessfully.

you mean the word that often follows "yippee" in cowboy exclamations?

Thank you frances_md, I found it with no trouble. I do see that the web site for "kindlekorner" is no longer.
Regards,
Bob

Thanks again for all the input. I broke down and ordered a Kindle today. I'll be spending more than a month on the road, and thought this would be a great solution to my reading dilemma.

I'll let you know what I think once I've spent some quality time with the machine.