Is Amazon Kindle DX using the right business model?

[taosaur]

Originally Posted by Ankh

IMHO, Kindle DX is still a very poor substitute for laptop.

Originally Posted by DaleDe

And a laptop is a very poor substitute for an eBook Reader.

For college textbooks, a laptop may actually be a more effective reader, in addition to being useful for other tasks. Depending on the subject, textbooks often rely extensively on both color and page layout, embedding a great deal of information outside the main stream of text, hence the reliance on PDF. A laptop can have several full-color PDFs or instances of a single PDF open at one time along with other applications, allowing the student to easily 'flip' to different areas of the text or different texts in lecture, as well as taking full advantage of any graphs or graphics on first reading.

From what I understand, eBook Readers are optimized for single-stream text. Period.

[taosaur]

Originally Posted by sirbruce

You're suggest the laptop can substitute as an ereader. But it can't, because it doesn't have the battery life, and long-term reading on one can cause eyestrain.

So you're carrying a laptop around whether you have physical books or an ebook reader.

Many laptops now have more than adequate battery life for a day of classes, and campuses typically have numerous places to plug in. Eyestrain depends on the particular display and how you use it, but it's less of an issue for a college-age person than for your typical Kindle owner in any case.

Textbooks are really a <ahem> textbook case of why dedicated eBook readers are a technological dead end or, at best, a niche market. At the point when a majority of readers are reading electronically, it will almost certainly be from the same device they use for mobile internet: hybrid laptop/smartphone devices leaning more in one direction or the other depending on the user, and maybe integrating eInk or some resultant technology, but not solely or primarily an "ebook reader."

[sirbruce]

That's irrelevant. You can wait forever for "digital convergence" to come but there will always be new gadgets being invented and integrated into our lives. The issue is what's a viable solution right now, and right now all-laptop is not an option, nor will it be in 5 years, so laptop + ereader is better than laptop + lots of big heavy textbooks.

[Gideon]

As a student...

We're all dragging laptops around all the time... much more fragile than a Kindle (I generally have both.) As things stand, that's not an issue. If the KindleDX is super fragile - well, that might be. We've all got laptops, iphones/ipod touches, nintendoDSs, etc... we're used to having somewhat fragile tech with us.

Second - whether this is cost effective depends on your major. I'm a Religious Studies major - the original Kindle isn't even cost effective for me (though most of my books would be fine on it.) We use tons of small books. But any of the sciences use enormously expensive books, even used. And gen-ed books are also often very expensive (government, history, psychology, etc). I generally spend 300-600 a semester on books. My ex-girlfriend who was a physics major was often in the 600-800 range. Book prices come into play here, but if you're looking at a discount of 10% a book (assuming 10 semesters at around $600) you'll pay for the KindleDX. That's assuming your books are available.

Third - Those same books weigh a TON. My girlfriend had severe problems just getting them hauled around... her math book was like 10 lbs and so was her physics book (and she was only about 100lbs). For students in these disciplines that alone might make the KindleDX useful. Long hours on campus + needing lots of giant texts + hauling them around all day = worth spending money on.

Fourth - Most of us are drowning in PDFs that can't be converted that well. This is actually where it'd help me - I have an enormous amount of PDF's that I can't convert to my Kindle 2 in any reasonable way. And I don't want to print them all out, and I don't want to read them on my computer.

But all that being said... it probably won't be a success. Zeitgeist changes take time, and the first product on the market really aimed at them isn't going to get the job done. All the practical issues regarding usability, etc... all come into play. Tech's a bit immature and alien.

[Ankh]

Originally Posted by sirbruce

You're suggest the laptop can substitute as an ereader.

The average student is young person in his twenties. Those tend to be absolutely convinced that they will live forever and frequently in need of cash.

Yes, they will use laptop as electronic reader. Quite a few of us did too, in the good olde days before the arrival of e-ink.

Originally Posted by sirbruce

But it can't, because it doesn't have the battery life, and long-term reading on one can cause eyestrain.

Of course it is an inferior solution, except I would like my employer to hear you and give up on insane idea that dual LCD screen solves my need to read all those technical specs.

The problem of laptop battery life is something that students face anyway. Everything is web based today, handouts are frequently powerpoint presentations, not to go into projects that frequently require a specific piece of software... Can one go through the University without a laptop these days?

Originally Posted by sirbruce

So you're carrying a laptop around whether you have physical books or an ebook reader.

Prerequisite for success of ebook reader is availability of electronic textbooks. Laptop can deal with any DRMed or non-DRMed format, it is universal, albeit inferior for prolonged use, handler of the electronic content. Physical textbooks will go, easily. I am not so certain that dedicated ebook reader will replace them yet. The price has to come way down.

[taosaur]

Originally Posted by sirbruce

That's irrelevant. You can wait forever for "digital convergence" to come but there will always be new gadgets being invented and integrated into our lives. The issue is what's a viable solution right now, and right now all-laptop is not an option, nor will it be in 5 years, so laptop + ereader is better than laptop + lots of big heavy textbooks.

The issue is whether Amazon will be successful marketing the DX to students, which brings up the broader issue of whether ereaders have even enough flexibility to fulfill their single use, reading books, in the manner required for college classes. All-laptop is definitely an option, and given the laptop's superiority in retaining the layout of texts, cross-referencing and multitasking, along with the elimination of one more device and half your gadget expenses, it may be a superior option for a lot of students. If you have a trust fund, then no question, get both; you gain screen real-estate and for the initial close-reading of texts, the Kindle is easier on the eyes. If you had to make do with one, however--and just as a replacement for textbooks, ignoring the laptop's additional utility--the Kindle would not suffice.

Maybe when the cost of eInk devices comes down around $200, they'll make more sense as a student accessory, and/or when they integrate color and/or when standards stabilize to the point that textbooks are being designed for these displays. Given the current state of the art, however, including the rate of ebook adoption in the textbook industry, you're probably better off with the physical book + PDF on a laptop than Kindle + laptop. You read from the physical book at home/dorm and carry the laptop to class.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by sirbruce

You're suggest the laptop can substitute as an ereader. But it can't, because it doesn't have the battery life, and long-term reading on one can cause eyestrain.

So you're carrying a laptop around whether you have physical books or an ebook reader.

Actually, I have to disagree about the eyestrain. I use an LCD monitor on my home computer and the one on the laptop and I do not find I get any sort of eyestrain at all. I can see getting eyestrain maybe if it's too bright, but you can adjust for that so there should be no issue.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by taosaur

For college textbooks, a laptop may actually be a more effective reader, in addition to being useful for other tasks. Depending on the subject, textbooks often rely extensively on both color and page layout, embedding a great deal of information outside the main stream of text, hence the reliance on PDF. A laptop can have several full-color PDFs or instances of a single PDF open at one time along with other applications, allowing the student to easily 'flip' to different areas of the text or different texts in lecture, as well as taking full advantage of any graphs or graphics on first reading.

From what I understand, eBook Readers are optimized for single-stream text. Period.

Plus some students use the laptop to take notes during the lecture and with built-in mics or external mics, they can use the laptop to actually record the lecture.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Gideon

As a student...

We're all dragging laptops around all the time... much more fragile than a Kindle (I generally have both.)

Why do you think laptos are more fragile? I have to take much more care to avoid bad force application on my Cybook than I have to do for my laptop. To me it seems obvious that the Cybook is more fragile. Also it is probably hard to sit on a laptop by mistake so it breaks.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

I see a laptop as being much more useful overall to any student, and already being used besides. If I had a choice between using my laptop (which I already had with me) for e-books, or carrying the laptop AND an additional $500 device that wasn't even in color, for e-books... guess what I'd do?

Eyestrain is clearly in the eye () of the beholder. I don't get eyestrain from LCD screens, for example, especially thanks to brightness and contrast settings, and ClearType. Obviously, LCD manufacturers are listening to all the "E-Ink is better!" talk, and trying to find ways of making their screens even easier on the eyes, or adopt something new... it'll happen.

Power is probably the biggest issue for laptops during a school day. This, too, is improving, as campuses make more outlets available to students... and never underestimate the power of creative thinking (for example, bringing solar cells or multiple laptop batteries with you to school).

Bottom line, a laptop is much more suited to student use as an e-text device. Amazon would have been better off making the Kindle an accessory, and opening the Kindle store to whatever devices people already had (which I've said before).

[Gideon]

Originally Posted by tompe

Why do you think laptos are more fragile? I have to take much more care to avoid bad force application on my Cybook than I have to do for my laptop. To me it seems obvious that the Cybook is more fragile. Also it is probably hard to sit on a laptop by mistake so it breaks.

My Kindle's always struck me as pretty rugged. I sure as hell wouldn't want to drop my laptop from three feet. Mechanical hard drives can be sensitive, as well as the glass monitor, all sorts of things can become loose or dislodged.. lots of things that can break.

The screen is the only thing I have to worry about with the Kindle, and as long as the cover is on it I've not even had the hint of a problem.

[tomsem]

Originally Posted by daffy4u

Do you think the Kindle version will cost as much as the paper version? If they cost significantly less, there may be no need to re-sell.

Now that I think about it, I wonder if sharing books on the same account will work with the DX or if textbook licensing will prohibit that. It would be cool if students could group together on one account and share textbooks (provided they share many of the same classes).

The KDX's in the student trial are going to be preloaded with textbooks, not from Kindle Store. So it would have nothing to do with Amazon accounts. Who knows how the publishers intend to distribute these things; but my guess is that they'll work with campus booksellers who will load them onto the student's KDX, perhaps with some DRM foo to tie it to that device or to otherwise be able to track copies back to a specific person. The publishers are not going to want to blow off the campus textbook retailers who they have been in cahoots with all these long years, at least not when they still need them.

So for the trial at least, it is likely they are in PDF format since that would be the easiest thing to do.

But beyond that, I don't think there's a long, prosperous future in textbook publishing: sooner or later, open source digital textbooks are going to kill the textbook market just like Wikipedia killed encyclopedias. But in the meantime, the textbook publishers will try to rake in as much profit as possible for as long as possible before closing their doors.

I don't think Amazon is even expecting to make any significant money in the textbook market. They just want to grab mind share and market share for book sales as a whole. So it's just more publicity for Kindle. If students actually buy some, so much the better, they'll be buying something from the Kindle Store, and that is where Amazon makes money, not on sales of Kindles.

I agree with others that KDX is not and never will be a must-have device for students; a laptop is.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Gideon

My Kindle's always struck me as pretty rugged. I sure as hell wouldn't want to drop my laptop from three feet. Mechanical hard drives can be sensitive, as well as the glass monitor, all sorts of things can become loose or dislodged.. lots of things that can break.

The screen is the only thing I have to worry about with the Kindle, and as long as the cover is on it I've not even had the hint of a problem.

Have you seen all the threads about people breaking the screen of their readers?

My laptop does not have a glass screen and seems much more rugged then the glass on my E-in k reader. If the laptop is turned off I do not think it is so sensitive to dropping since the head on the hard disk is parked. And some laptops hard disks have detectors that detect a drop so you can protect the hard disk by parking the head.

Also I do not drop things so often. The problem with E-ink reader is that they easily break if you carry them wrongly.

[RWood]

With the plastic displays coming within the next year, all of the concerns about screen breakage will be eliminated. (Raise your hands all of you who remember when eye glasses had glass lenses.)

In a front page post, California is in the process of requiring open sourced textbooks for high school math and science classes. Add to that the original source material for many general studies classes (and literature classes) from PG and the MobileRead download area, and the content costs trend toward zero thus allowing funds to be spent on the readers -- e-ink and traditional LCD/laptop.

I find e-ink far easier on my eyes than my LCD monitor and I find that far easier on my eyes than the old CRT monitors were. (My final CRT monitor was a b+w paperwhite monitor because it was sharper and easier on my eyes than any other then available CRT monitor that I could afford.)

I think Amazon has made a good thrust in the educational market with the KDX. I also think the KDX will do well in the business market.

[Gideon]

I've not noticed many threads about Kindle's breaking... though I have seen a lot about some others. But I'm sure it could be an issue... I pretty much treat my Kindle like a laptop, I make sure that whatever I'm carrying it in gives it some protection but not excessively. But it certainly might be an issue, it depends. Bigger screen makes it more vulnerable (and one good reason to get the accidental protection!)

I've got a Macbook.. it has a glass screen that is both gorgeous and very worrisome. I love my Macbook, but I hate reading on screens like that and won't do it unless I absolutely, positively, have to. Scimming is fine, but I don't like deep reading on LCD's.

Maybe it's just me being an older student (30), I dunno.