Shiny New E-Book Gizmo: The Amazon Kindle


View Full Version : Newspapers on Kindle - How are they?


CINCNORAD
11-23-2007, 07:59 PM
Has anyone downloaded the available newspapers on this device? I'm curious about a few things:


-How's the formatting on them? Easy to navigate?

-Are they only partial content -- or do they offer the whole paper in electronic form?

-Are images included in the articles?


Any info would be appreciated...

Nate the great
11-23-2007, 08:07 PM
Has anyone downloaded the available newspapers on this device? I'm curious about a few things:


-How's the formatting on them? Easy to navigate?

-Are they only partial content -- or do they offer the whole paper in electronic form?

-Are images included in the articles?


Any info would be appreciated...

I bought one copy of the Washington Post. It was not complete when compared to my paper subscription. It was acceptable formatted. There were no pictures.

I personally would not bother with the WaPo, but that is just one paper. If there is one you might want, buy a copy and check. It's only $.75.

SanAntone
11-23-2007, 11:23 PM
Actually, you can download the paper for 14 days for free. They don't charge your credit card for 14 days. Nice touch.

rflashman
11-24-2007, 05:27 AM
The NYT is similar to the Washington Post, except that it includes one picture per major article. Acceptable, but leaves you wanting for larger/more pictures and maybe a capture of the home page for a 'visual' overview of the newspaper.

rflashman
12-03-2007, 05:48 AM
I should add that now that I have been using the NYT, there is one key issue that keeps frustrating me. When reading an article there's no way to SKIP to the next article. So you have to sit there paging forward until you get to the end of the article you are in. This seems like something simple to add to the menu.

TallMomof2
12-03-2007, 09:31 AM
rflashman - Can you hit the back button to get back to your article list? That's how I navigate the Washington Post, pick out the article I want to read, finish reading, hit the back button to get back to the article list.

azog
12-03-2007, 10:08 AM
I tried the 14 day trial of the NYT, and canceled it about 4 days in. I'm probably being obstinate, but I did not like the layout. It was easy to navigate (and to address the above, yes, you can press BACK).

rflashman
12-03-2007, 10:19 AM
rflashman - Can you hit the back button to get back to your article list? That's how I navigate the Washington Post, pick out the article I want to read, finish reading, hit the back button to get back to the article list.

It works, but it puts me back in the front page (where I usually started reading articles), not in the page of the article I was reading. So I still have to page foward to find the article I was on.

wallcraft
12-03-2007, 11:19 AM
I should add that now that I have been using the NYT, there is one key issue that keeps frustrating me. When reading an article there's no way to SKIP to the next article. So you have to sit there paging forward until you get to the end of the article you are in. This seems like something simple to add to the menu. Can this be done via the "advanced" progress bar? In a book, if you move the cursor to the progress bar it shows your bookmarks and by default these are the chapters. In this mode, next/prev page becomes next/prev bookmark. See section 3.5 of the User's Guide for more details.

Hadrien
12-03-2007, 12:09 PM
I must say that I'm pretty disappointed by how these newspapers look (based on images+videos).

Les Echos look much better on the iLiad for example.

It's a good thing that the Kindle kickstarted newspapers on e-ink for the US, but I really hope we'll see much better looking newspapers in the future (PDF or epub).

rflashman
12-03-2007, 12:40 PM
Can this be done via the "advanced" progress bar? In a book, if you move the cursor to the progress bar it shows your bookmarks and by default these are the chapters. In this mode, next/prev page becomes next/prev bookmark. See section 3.5 of the User's Guide for more details.

Great idea, if there was a chapter per article, but in the NYT there is only one bookmark, at the start (for the front page/table of contents).

gregr209
12-03-2007, 04:27 PM
I subscribed to the San Francisco Chronicle as soon as I got my Kindle but after having read it over the last several days I am going to cancel. I find there aren't enough articles that I want to read that I couldn't quickly scan on my computer when I'm at work. Plus reading the newspaper on the Kindle just isn't the same as reading a book. I don't really care for it and I'm not sure exactly why.

Oh well...next up I am going to try Time Mag. but I have a feeling it will be somewhat the same experience.

My 2 cents.

Greg

rflashman
12-03-2007, 05:01 PM
Just realized how Amazon probably 'intended' we read the newspaper. This seems to work, though is it different from the linear approach I historically used to read a paper (even electronic):

1. From TOC select 1st article.
2. Read to end or until you've had enough of that article.
3. Select BACK to return to TOC.
4. Select next interesting article.

With this 'method' I can skip out from any article and return to where I was in the TOC. As I said it is quite different from how one normally reads a paper, but it works, and seems to provide a smoother experience.

CINCNORAD
12-03-2007, 07:00 PM
Just realized how Amazon probably 'intended' we read the newspaper. This seems to work, though is it different from the linear approach I historically used to read a paper (even electronic):

1. From TOC select 1st article.
2. Read to end or until you've had enough of that article.
3. Select BACK to return to TOC.
4. Select next interesting article.

With this 'method' I can skip out from any article and return to where I was in the TOC. As I said it is quite different from how one normally reads a paper, but it works, and seems to provide a smoother experience.

Yup -- that's how I've been using it. I've had the subscription about a week, and haven't had any problems. I'm much happier reading the paper this way, versus the traditional ink-stained hands experience I'm used to...

TallMomof2
12-05-2007, 10:45 AM
I'd rather have some pictures with my Washington Post but other than that I'm pretty satisfied with the Kindle edition.

rflashman
12-05-2007, 01:04 PM
I'd like to see the front page as a front page bitmap so I can get a glance of what the paper looks like. Some subtle things like type size/emphasis are only visible when you "see" the paper.