Amazon Kindle (ebook thingy)

I thought both those things before I had one - I don't travel much or have a commute, and spending money for the opportunity to spend money wasn't appealing - but when I unexpectedly got a Kindle for Christmas, I'd downloaded well over $140 worth of public domain books by the end of the day.

I haven't decided if I think it's worth its current price - that was the nice thing about getting it as a gift, I didn't have to worry about that - and Kindle ebooks are going to have to come down in price relative to "real" books. I mean, one reason I hadn't bought a Kindle already is because when I checked the books then on my wishlist, not only were few of them available, a large number of the ones that were were priced higher for the Kindle than in paperback. The paperless version should always be cheapest. I can't give it to friends when I'm done, I can't sell it to Powells (no one local buys used books anymore), it's harder to flip through it if it's something I'm using for work - whatever the behind the curtain reasons affecting the price, I'm still paying a couple bucks more for something I'm getting less out of.

Not to mention the percentage of unsold SKUs that just doesn't exist with ebooks. Publishers have treated ebooks as an excuse to charge more for books. They seem to think it's worth fucking with while the format's in its infancy. What they don't realise (impossibly) is that people are so disgusted they're either withholding purchases altogether or just straight-up nicking them off the internet. And then there's people like us here in a non-elite country who are not allowed to buy some books because the publisher has arbitrarily said no, despite us waving money at them.

Travel. If you're in the US you probably have a 32 kg baggage limit, even on international flights. When we fly internationally we're restricted to 20 kg (unless we're going to the US). The difference is a lot of books. My Kobo saved my sanity last year.

...what I meant to say is that publishers don't realise people are increasingly learning how to get ebooks off the darknet due to the high prices, just like they did with music, movies etc.

If publishers provided ebook tokens with hardbacks like movies do w/blu ray I'd buy way more of them, for certain.

The travel thing cannot be underestimated imo. Not just from the intl travel aspect, but from the commuter aspect as well.

I think a kindle wouldve been rad as an undergrad English major.

Re: those table of contents, it can be a tedious pain in the ass to encode those TOCs - it's ridiculous that so many publishers aren't doing it properly

gbx you actually can totally do it yourself! I do 90% of the work in text editors. But you have to ask yourself if it's worth the hours of time you'll spend learning to write .NCX files and compiling .mobis with Kindlegen. Though in short, as you guessed you put in the anchors in HTML and then edit the .NCX file (just a strict XHTML doctype) and that's it, followed by compile.

Tell me more...

this thing is in my hand iirc

I think a kindle wouldve been rad as an undergrad English major.

I can't decide. I mean, I can't decide if it would've been good for me as an English major, anyway ... everyone reads differently. Reading for work (I write a lot of encyclopedia entries, textbooks, things like that) is a lot like reading for college, and I'm finding I'm not crazy about the Kindle for work-related reading - I end up reserving it for things I need to read but won't need to cite or take notes from. General background reading. When I need to really use a book, I need to be able to shove three fingers in there, keep my spot at different parts of the book, flip back and forth, keep one book open while I grab another one so I can compare what Smith and Jones said about Johnson, fill it with bookmarks - even being able to tell at a glance how many pages I've bookmarked in a stack of books is something I depend on.

right

so i have the 3g model, downloading from the magic catalog above should be free right?

i'm nervous about incurring some crazy charges before i know what i'm doing here.

all free iirc

sweet.

Aside from actual non-free book purchases, is there anything else i'm likely to be charged for then?

First impressions are great

If you use send-to-kindle and don't use your @free.kindle.com address, you will be charged ($0.10/MB, I think) for documents that you send to your device.

not anything i'm likely to do by accident so. Cheers.

Yeah, should be fine. There was a built-in surcharge for buying books in some countries but I think that's gone now.

I end up reserving it for things I need to read but won't need to cite or take notes from. General background reading. When I need to really use a book, I need to be able to shove three fingers in there, keep my spot at different parts of the book, flip back and forth, keep one book open while I grab another one so I can compare what Smith and Jones said about Johnson, fill it with bookmarks - even being able to tell at a glance how many pages I've bookmarked in a stack of books is something I depend on.

interesting, i'm the opposite, i totally use it for books to take notes from, especially on the iPad. Can leave bookmarks with a tap, see them all at a glace on the bottom bar, search and best of all is not having to type the quotes, you just highlight and they sync.

Before I got a Kindle I was all "why would people want to annotate/mark text with an ebook reader", but since I got the thing I've been doing it almost daily.

Re the ipad (I know this is off topic): I've been toying with a few note-taking apps, and being able to annotate/draw on a PDF is a revelation.

I used to fold the bottom corner of pages I wanted to make notes from, and then never do it due to idleness. no more!

I don't use an iPad, though, I use the Kindle (and I tend to use it in landscape orientation, so the keyboard's not as handy - that's a minor point though, because if I used the keyboard more, I'd reorient the display). I don't know, everyone reads/note-takes differently - I'm used to making multiple passes through books, skimming quickly the first time to see which parts I need to read, folding down or otherwise marking pages, etc etc. Some of it is stuff I could re-learn, although the "compare two or more books at once" business is clumsy with anything but actual books.

I'm also okay with it not replacing books for me. mp3s didn't replace CDs for me. It's not a perfect analogy - I can create mp3s from CDs and vice versa, so they don't have to compete for my money - but still.

Yeah, I think some people are a bit weird about ebooks being a lifetime commitment, like from that moment forth you can't just pick up a book and read it.

This is cool:

http://kindleworld.blogspot.com/2011/04/11-000-local-libraries-in-kindle.html

yeah this is a big deal, overdrive compatibility had been one of the selling points for the other e-readers but not anymore

Hi. Can anyone recommend an epub->mobi converter that isn't Calibre? Thanks.

(Accidentally asked this on rolling fantasy, science fiction, speculative fiction &c. thread, oops)

Sadly no. I've looked and I don't think there is one.

i found an online converter, rather than one you can d/l and use, but it worked perfectly, i'll try to find and post the address tomorrow

after a year of whining about being jealous of my wife's kindle, she and my parents got me one for my bday. pumped.

anyone have thoughts on cases? any of you using a non-amazon case?

i got a non amazon soft leather/plether folding case for about ten quid, no light but perfect besides

the amazon one is so expensive for what it is

You reckon? It's leather and it's got a light in it. It could be cheaper but it feels very well made.

I bought one with mine and can't live without that light

amazon doesn't even appear to be selling the nonlighted covers anymore. when did that happen?

battery needs recharging after c. 3 weeks of constant use

This thing is brilliant.

Kindle is really convenient but a totally dull reading experience. Grey. Dull.

as opposed to what? i don't necessarily disagree but i'm not exactly sure what you mean.

i usually only read books on plain paper with black type so in that respect it's not made any difference, maybe red ink is a thing for other ppl i dunno

cheapskate's kindle case I saw recommended online was a bubblewrap mailer.

My battery life is really variable. Sometimes I get several weeks of actually using it, sometimes I'll charge it and then not get round to using it for a week and it'll be dead. Is anyone else's like that?

The jackets that you can still read it in are a nice idea but all the ones I've seen are expensive, even without a light. So I just got it a little neoprene suit so it doesn't gather so much dust when I'm not using it.

I was surprised when I got it at just how readable it was, but I've got to admit that if I have a choice between an unread paper book and an unread Kindle ebook (and I have very many of both right now) I'm probably still going to go for the hard copy.

agree with every word of that last sentence

http://i.friendfeed.com/dc2cd905013dea7fcd12071d9a00ecea9ecf1bcc

this info's probably on here somewhere already but here's how to install your own screensavers

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/37424/jailbreak-your-kindle-for-dead-simple-screensaver-customization/

My sony reader screen has gone all messed up and wrong :( I'll have to take it back to Argos and sort it out, I hope they don't get funny about it.

not sure if this has been mentioned on here, but is anyone else annoyed as fuck by the pdf highlight problem? as in, you click to highlight a passage in a pdf and it actually highlights a different set of words, further down the page. anyone know if this has been fixed in an update?

ps. thanks v much for that link n/a

new Nook looks pretty awesome. Might get me into the ebook thing.

I wonder where you download pirated ebooks

google.com

also i fucking love this thing--

just did a bit of travel and managed to read two books of the game of thrones series (or w/e its called), which would've amounted to like 1500+ pages of book that i didn't have to carry

yeah that's one reason i read those on this.

also tbh the fact that i can adjust the font/size is awesome.

what kind of a file is it you use with a kindle? also , why the hell don't they just all use .txt I shall nev3r knlw