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Originally Posted by davidfor
I don't know what your point is. Kobo should do things just because Amazon does them?
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Basically, yes. That's how markets evolve. By standarizing features. If you can't buy a new car today without ABS or Bluetooth connectivity is not because every car brand has single-handedly decided to include them in their cars. It's because these features are nowadays standard car features. That's why current cars have better equipment than cars being sold 10 years ago.
Quote:
Originally Posted by davidfor
And, what I think is your second point, "more customisation" hits the point I made. It costs money to do it. And they have to decide where is the best place to spend the money.
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I might agree with that if Kobo were just that small store in the corner of street. They are Rakuten, which is nothing less than the japanese Amazon and a company with a $11.6 billion market cap. I don't know much about them or their financial status, but I bet they can indeed afford some extra hours of their professional programmers to enhance their readers. Same with support staff.
Quote:
Originally Posted by davidfor
Of course, there is a risk with "more customisation". It can overcomplicate the interface and that will alienate a lot of users.
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Deciding how to implement software features and how interfaces should present them to the users is what professional software designers are paid for. I'm a teacher and I've never programmed anything other than a microwave, but I don't see how a "Save" button, a "Restore" button and a combo box displaying saved reading settings would "overcomplicate the interface".
Quote:
Originally Posted by davidfor
Honestly, most users want a simple interface with fewer options. One of things that people here forget is that we are not typical users. In fact, we are not the target market for Kobo, Amazon, tolino or any of the other dedicated ereader manufacturers. Their market are people who just use the devices, set the font once, maybe adjust the light once or twice a day, do not care about ligatures, widows and orphans, DRM or any of the other things we spend all our time here discussing. They just want to buy a book and read it. Adding either of these two options mentioned is not going to help the bulk of Kobo's users.
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We are no typical users. Those don't read ebooks. The ones who do, do it on their phones, tablets or computers, and the few of them who use an ereader own a Kindle. Looking at anything different from a Kindle is, at least where I live, indeed untypical. We are using a niche product inside a niche market. Right.
But I wasn't requesting something exotic only connoisseurs would appreciate. I was requesting a way of having something we already have in a more flexible way. It was a "just let me back those ok settings up so I can try some others without losing them". That's simply a natural extension of features as simple, universal and standard as changing font, margins or line spacing. In an ereader. It is something so elemental that even Kindles have it.