Amazon Kindle flunked by college students

[ShortNCuddlyAm]

Article on El Reg here

Very brief summary - physical books better for coursework (flicking through, scribbling on, etc), Kindle good for reading for pleasure:

One interesting stat from the survey puts the results in clear perspective: 80 per cent of MBA students at the University of Viginia said they wouldn't recommend the Kindle DX as a study aid — but 90 per cent enjoyed using it to read for pleasure.

In other words, students found the Amazonian e-reader to be great for linear reading, but lousy for back-and-forth, search-and-find, "where was that bit?" studying and reference

[GlenBarrington]

I've always preferred instructions and manuals on paper.

[ficbot]

I guess it depends on the major. I was an English major and if I were doing it again these days, I could probably find 80% of my course readings on Project Gutenberg for free Also, I have noticed when I read non-fiction on the Kindle, I do take clippings sometimes and I never used to do the same sort of thing with print books.

[dmaul1114]

Yeah, being a professor who just finished grad school last summer--e-ink sucks as for studying, or for reading and marking up stuff I'm reading related to my research or teaching now etc.

I need to be able to quickly flip through articles, which you can't do with slow e-ink page turns. I need to be able to highlight things instantly with a pen or highlighter, not waste time on the slow annotation on e-ink devices etc.

I have some hopes a big screen LCD tablet will work for my needs and stop having to print out PDFs of research articles etc. But e-ink definitely never will--the Kindle 1 I have is the last e-ink device I'll every own.

[rogue_librarian]

Originally Posted by dmaul1114

But e-ink definitely never will--the Kindle 1 I have is the last e-ink device I'll every own.

I say give it five to ten years...

[dmaul1114]

Originally Posted by rogue_librarian

I say give it five to ten years...

I can't see my self owning one even if they fix the speed, add color etc.

I'm just not an avid reader--so I just really don't need screen tech optimized for reading.

Even with my work reading I'd prefer a multi-feature device where I can do web searches, watch video etc.

I figure in 5-10 years will have full on tablet PCs that get 10+ hours of battery life and can do everything a PC can that doesn't require heavy typing where a physical keyboard will always be fastest.

And that's what I ultimately want. For now I just want something like an iPad, but with a bigger screen and open file system etc. etc. to tide me over.