iPad Anyone else NOT like reading on their iPad?

[scottjl]

why all the concern about the margins? do you not just read all the lines of text and hit next page? when i'm into a book, i don't even notice the house burning down around me, let alone what the page margins look like.

[Rique]

Originally Posted by scottjl

why all the concern about the margins? do you not just read all the lines of text and hit next page? when i'm into a book, i don't even notice the house burning down around me, let alone what the page margins look like.

Margins and line spacing with iBooks doesn't bother me too much, either.

I would prefer that iBooks had more choices for fonts, backgrounds (such as a sepia option like the Kindle app has), and better access to a night mode. I also prefer single page landscape reading (I think I'm in the minority on that), so I would like to see that option, also.

I have more quibbles with the store - I wish I could scrub out the Apple Fairplay DRM from the titles, that the bookstore provided access in more ways than the iPad (e.g, iTunes access and browser access), that there was a more intuitive interface, better selection and better pricing.

Given that, I'm doing my buying from Sony and Amazon these days. But iBooks is definitely "in the mix" as a reader app.

-- Rique

[Bremen Cole]

Originally Posted by scottjl

why all the concern about the margins? do you not just read all the lines of text and hit next page? when i'm into a book, i don't even notice the house burning down around me, let alone what the page margins look like.

lol, I agree... but I would like the option, I love options! I guess I'm lazy too, I don't like to have to turn pages

[scottjl]

maybe you ought to switch to audio books bremen!

[Bremen Cole]

Originally Posted by scottjl

maybe you ought to switch to audio books bremen!

And the iPad is a great device for audio books as well! But I hate audio books.... just is not the same to me...... My wife was into them some years ago, but talk about expensive !!!

[volwrath]

This is what I do. Load my epub books into my Sony PRS-505, my iPad, my HTC Touch Pro 2, my iPod Touch and my computer at work.

My PRS-505 is prefered for my novel epubs, but if its at night and the wife is asleep, I will pickup my ipod touch and stanza, if I am at the doctors office or anywhere I dont have anything else, my HTC TP2 with Freda which is a great program, if I have my ipad it will be my secondary reader with iBooks, since I have it most of the time, but sometimes I will take a break at work and read on my computer using FBreader. The last book I read : The Windup Girl which I recommend heartily, I used all 5 platforms.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Bremen Cole

I find myself using Stanza more and more on the iPad. It is not as pretty as iBooks, but the HUGE margins and line spaces are IMHO absurd. I know most folks like it because it looks pretty, but I would like the option in iBooks of setting my margins and lines as I please.....

What I do is strip the DRM and then fix problems like margins, font size, line spaces and if need be, I embed the font of my choice. So when I am done, I have an ePub that's easy to read and looks nice.

I do wish that iBooks had the options to change the margins. Even 1/2 less would be good.

[scottjl]

I'm confused, do you actually have an iPad Jon? your profile there says you have a 505.

[montsnmags]

Originally Posted by Tamara

I was thinking the same thing. I understand my 6 year old niece being easy to distract but an adult should have learned to focus .

Hi, Tamara. Yes, one would think so, but, alas, at 40, distractions are the bane of my existence. I can see it being a problem for me, though that is also why the whole "multitasking" thing doesn't bother me. If I can maximize my window (if you forgive the metaphor), it usually lets me focus, to the exclusion of other things. I am curious how I will respond to using an iPad as a reader (I don't have one - I may be getting one next month). Will I be distracted? Will I not read, but simply lie in bed at night browsing the MR forums (as I do now, with my iPhone)? I will be interested to see if I am as easily distracted as your 6 year old niece. (<--- That's a genuine smile, right there. I have a 5 year old nephew, whose lack of focus I get along remarkably well with ).

Originally Posted by scottjl

why all the concern about the margins? do you not just read all the lines of text and hit next page? when i'm into a book, i don't even notice the house burning down around me, let alone what the page margins look like.

I haven't seen of which he speaks, but, for me, those distractions can impinge on the experience. In the same way that I don't like my Iliad e-ink screen as much as I thought I would (nor my LED booklight's colour), typographical variations are something that I might find off-putting (see above response to Tamara). I don't expect that this will at all be a general thing other people might also find annoying, but then I'd be getting the device for me, and not for other people. So, I can see the possibility of overlarge margins being annoying, but, then, I haven't really experienced the margins to know if they're "over" enough to impinge on my consciousness. It's not a either/or thing...just an ambiguous, subjective degree, on certain things (for instance, I dislike it when first letters of chapters are turned into elaborate symbols. It's strictly a personal thing, but it unfocuses me). Without those distractions, I am strictly focussed - my general day-to-day experience involves me trying to remove all distractions to obtain that unbreakable focus (just ask my partner, who may currently be screaming my name without me hearing it ).

Originally Posted by kjk

...

But sometimes it takes more than just a 5 minute hands on demo to fully appreciate how you will use a product.

It's funny you should say, because I had a 5 minute play with an iPad just the other day. I do have both an iPhone and iPod Touch, which I have thoroughly enjoyed, and the iPad gave me that same, slick feeling of satisfaction - the kind of device I want. I found, looking at iBooks, that I seemed to like it in landscape format, with the two pages next to each other, rather than portrait. It was only 5 minutes though, and it will be interesting to see if I maintain that preference (talking of distractions, in the middle of a large department store...well, let's just say there were a lot of distractions. How has that coloured experience?). So, yes, I think I experienced that limitation you suggest.

I am looking forward to getting an iPad. Of course, I am one who has a tendency to still go with the "comfort food" of paperbacks, so consider this and the above strictly personal, individual observation and hypothesising.

I do expect bedtime MR-browsing to be more pleasant on the iPad than on the iPhone.

Cheers,
Marc

[Bremen Cole]

Originally Posted by volwrath

This is what I do. Load my epub books into my Sony PRS-505, my iPad, my HTC Touch Pro 2, my iPod Touch and my computer at work.

My PRS-505 is prefered for my novel epubs, but if its at night and the wife is asleep, I will pickup my ipod touch and stanza, if I am at the doctors office or anywhere I dont have anything else, my HTC TP2 with Freda which is a great program, if I have my ipad it will be my secondary reader with iBooks, since I have it most of the time, but sometimes I will take a break at work and read on my computer using FBreader. The last book I read : The Windup Girl which I recommend heartily, I used all 5 platforms.

I think that's cool

It is the reading that counts, not the device. We are all different, so naturally we pick different mates, and devices to read our ebooks on. To me an iPad is the best, to someone else a Kindle..... Why worry about it..... Just read and enjoy, be kind and rewind.......

[John F]

Originally Posted by Bremen Cole

..., I also like the fact I can buy an eBook just about anywhere and read it on my iPad. The Sony's we had were so limited in book and format, but heck even they are more open that a Kindle......It's cool to buy a book from Amazon, B&N, Kobo, Apple, Fictionwise, eReader etc... and be able to read them on a single device..... and a device that is as portable and just plain "useable" as the iPad....

I'm the opposite. I dislike how each store has it's own app, with different library management, different GUI, different drm, different ways of getting books onto the iPad...

You would think someone would come up with a standard.

[scottjl]

well, no one is saying you have to use multiple stores. just pick one app and stick with it. some people like choices.

you won't get a store standard until you can get a format standard, and that is never likely to happen.

[Tamara]

Originally Posted by montsnmags

Hi, Tamara. Yes, one would think so, but, alas, at 40, distractions are the bane of my existence. I can see it being a problem for me, though that is also why the whole "multitasking" thing doesn't bother me. If I can maximize my window (if you forgive the metaphor), it usually lets me focus, to the exclusion of other things. I am curious how I will respond to using an iPad as a reader (I don't have one - I may be getting one next month). Will I be distracted? Will I not read, but simply lie in bed at night browsing the MR forums (as I do now, with my iPhone)? I will be interested to see if I am as easily distracted as your 6 year old niece. (<--- That's a genuine smile, right there. I have a 5 year old nephew, whose lack of focus I get along remarkably well with ).

My iPad is scheduled for delivery this week. Right now, it's at the Fedex facility in Memphis so I'm hoping that it gets here tomorrow

I get along very well with my little niece too . We're going to have a lot of fun together with the iPad. I may have to fight her for it like I do my iPhone. She loves the iPhone but she hasn't caught on yet that all "her things" on my phone are educational.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by scottjl

you won't get a store standard until you can get a format standard, and that is never likely to happen.

There is a format standard - ePub.

[Rique]

Originally Posted by HarryT

There is a format standard - ePub.

Harry, I wish that were so! And I hope/think that is where we are headed. But as long as Amazon doesn't play along, can we really call ePub the standard?