three things make a post?

[pellucid]

1. In case anyone was in doubt, I think we can fairly safely assume there are no women in Apple's marketing department. The iPad?!?!?!?!? Really, boys? Jezebel is collecting iPad jokesThe idiocy of the name aside, I'm mostly interested to see what this might do to the e-book market. Otherwise, however, Apple's ridiculously proprietary attitude

Comments

[pellucid]

In the sense of saying "Mac's iPad" three times fast? ;)

And I do imagine that most dedicated e-book fans will want an ereader that is just an ereader, for all the reasons Chaila points out below. But I also know a lot of people who do a LOT of reading already on their iPod Touches, and the biggest complaint I've heard from them is not that the screen is backlit or too computery or whatever, but that it's too small for extended reading. So it's possible that for a lot of those people, reading from the new tablet (I think I shall refuse, on principle, to use its name) would be good enough. But I suppose we'll see.

I still think if I were going to go buy an e-book reader tomorrow, it would be a Kindle all the way. But I'm still biding my time until we get through the initial growing pains of the new technology: I'm guessing that within five years, and probably sooner, the costs will have come down considerably, and the proprietary format problems will also have been worked out more to everyone's (or rather, everyone but Amazon's) satisfaction, and that's probably the moment at which I join the e-book world. Unless I should happen to find myself in a place where I have sufficient disposable income and a significant train commute, in which case I might bite the bullet--but that seems unlikely at present!

[gabolange]

I have basically decided that since I have to spend an insane amount of time airborne in the next couple of months, and I don't really need to cart a library with me to China, I'm getting myself a Kindle and chalking it up to trip expense. I had sort of hoped to do what you are thinking--wait and see where the technology comes down--but in terms of sheer convenience at this particular moment, I figure I'll get a Kindle now, and then when the industry reorients itself in a few years, I can either replace it or not. Or something!

[pellucid]

Oh wow, I didn't realize you'd made that decision! I can't wait to play with yours when you get it and I see you, then! ;) Because I am, as you know, quite fascinated, but I will not be investing any time soon, myself.

[gabolange]

So I can use the Kindle as pellucid bait, that's what you're saying? ;)

[abyssinia4077]

But I also know a lot of people who do a LOT of reading already on their iPod Touches, and the biggest complaint I've heard from them is not that the screen is backlit or too computery or whatever, but that it's too small for extended reading.

My biggest complaint is actually that you have to jump through a lot of hoops to actually load any text onto your Touch that you might want to read - it's set up to easily sinc anything in iTunes, safari bookmarks, and photos, but not any kind of document. So you can do it, but it takes hoop jumping.

Yeah, it's small, but I consider that a feature. For extended reading I still don't think anything beats paper.