Remember When

[pagansoul]

Remember when readers were $400.00, very few people had them and Amazon was not yet in the game. I can't believe how much has changed in 5 years.

***
Amazon released the Kindle First Generation on November 19, 2007, for US$399. It sold out in five and a half hours. The device remained out of stock for five months until late April 2008.

It is the only Kindle with expandable memory, via an SD card slot.
The device features a 6 inch (diagonal) 4-level grayscale display, with 250 MB of internal memory, which can hold approximately 200 non-illustrated titles.

[Bilbo1967]

I remember when I never saw another e-reader when traveling. I remember being asked what my Sony 505 was.

On my current regular commute, I see literally dozens of e-readers.

[pidgeon92]

I bought my husband a Kindle in June 2008 for $359 so he could read the Wall Street Journal while commuting. I picked up mine in October 2008, when the Oprah $50 discount was available. Then I got the K2 in February 2009 for $359. It's amazing how far the price has dropped since those early days.

[crich70]

I remember when I got my Franklin Ebookman ereader. I don't recall how many books it could hold but it had a (I think) primitive lcd display and a battery charge lasted only 4 hrs at most. On the other hand it only cost me around $50.00 for a brand new one still in the box through ebay. Kindles are far superior.

[Casey57]

Our original K3 now has become a family of Touch, Fire and PaperWhite readers and tablets. To say my family members are major Kindle fans is a gross understatement.

We love our Apple products too. But most of us prefer our Kindle for reading.

I well remember an older lady looking over my shoulder as I sat reading my K3 in a hotel lobby. She told me that she did not think she could ever get used to reading that way. I told her "neither did I, but here I am!"

[xg4bx]

I thought it was something that would remain niche and never take off (if not outright fail), especially at that price. And yet here we are now with ebooks everywhere and readers that can be had for less than the cost of a new videogame.

[piperclassique]

I used to read on a Treo, a very early smartphone, then an Ipaq, then an HTC HD, never thought about a reader until the KK came to Amazon UK.

[pagansoul]

On Sunday I just purchased a Kobo Vox for $60. If you don't know, a Vox is a 7inch/color reader with card reader (up to 32gb). They are nolonger made so what is left is all there is. Only time I've seen a deal like this is when RIM was dumping their tablets. I remember reading on this site that ereaders have made it if you could get them , new, for under $100. Well, that time has come. If you remember at the very end of 2011 the Vox came out for $250 but wasn't good enough to compete with Kindle Fire at $200. It was slow and had many software updates. They dropped the price to $200 right away then $150. I figure this is the end of it.

[usuallee]

I remember seeing a sony ereader at borders circa 2006. I played with it, but it didn't make much impression. It was a curiosity, nothing more. The price tag certainly precluded any thought of actually buying the thing. I was vaguely aware of the Kindle when it came out, but again, that price tag. I was also at the time still in the "I like the feel/smell/look/etc/ of actual books" camp. I guess I sort of thought of ereaders as a fad.

Fast forward to 2010 when I learned that the Kindle 3 wifi would be a mere $139. That price point seemed reasonable & got me thinking about the possibilities of ebooks. I had noticed real books' shortcomings - primarily the unwieldiness of them, as well as the difficulty in certain situations - i.e. for me, at lunchtime, trying to read while eating a sandwich. The possibility of obtaining for free the classics I always had intended to read was also an incentive as I became aware of sites like this one, Project Gutenburg, and Amazon's own free offerings.

Soon enough, having talked about the Kindle incessantly to my wife, she took the hint and got me one for my birthday. I loved it. I have never looked back, and now strongly prefer ebooks over paper, though I still check out plenty of library books when the library doesn't have the ebook or if I don't want to purchase it from amazon.

I don't really remember those days. My first ereader was a touch under $300. Prior to that, I had been repurposing other devices: an ancient second-hand Palm, homebrew on the DS, and an XO for reading in sunlight. I probably would have jumped at an ereader if I realized what they were, but I didn't really make a connection between the announcements of eInk-like technologies in the press and existing ereaders.

[QuantumIguana]

I didn't pay attention to e-readers until the price dropped. I got mine for Christmas 2010. I would have bought it myself, but I had to wait for Christmas.

[morriss003]

I still miss DOS

[lioslaith]

My first 'official' reader was a Sony 505 which I shelled out £180 in 2009, and it was at a large discount if I remember correctly.

Since then I've had Kindles (x3), Kobos (x2) as well as a Nook.

It's hard to believe how normal carrying a reader has become. When I got my first Kindle it attracted a lot of attention when I was out and about with it, when I got my Mum her Kobo for Xmas 2011 she attracting a lot of attention in hospital waiting rooms when I was at Physio by using hers which she kept explaining a lot of the time to others, "was not a Kindle".

By the end of last year it's not unusual to see a lot of people in waiting rooms reading on their eReaders almost common place. It's now more unusual to see someone reading a paper or physical book now in my experience.

[Sydney's Mom]

Right after the Oprah price break, I ordered two kindles, $399 each. I figured I would use it a lot (and I do), the other one was for my daughter, and if it had made her a reader, it would have been worth it (she isn't). I have bought every kindle since - kindle 2 when I left my kindle on the train (got it back several months later when it was being sold to someone else - he took it out of my beautiful Oberon cover, and there was my business card. He returned it to me. (I offered to sell it to him (he was looking for his wife) for $50, but he declined. So I gave him a $50 Starbucks card. The other had a broken screen from when I tried to stick my bag under my seat in Bermuda. Sold both for around $75, including Oberon covers.

Since then, my daughter has broken several 2's (she no longer qualifies for one. She has a mini ipad, anyway). Gave my inlaws 2's, and then first generation fires. My husband got my kindle 2 when I bought my k3, and he got my fire when I bought the second generation. Oh, and I have a paperwhite, too, but I don't use it (prefer the fire for night time reading)

I now have so many ebooks, I will never go back. But, I think I finally recognize myself as a gadget freak.

[crich70]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

I didn't pay attention to e-readers until the price dropped. I got mine for Christmas 2010. I would have bought it myself, but I had to wait for Christmas.

I got my 1st kindle (a K3) when the price dropped down to $139.00, before that they were too expensive for me. I had borrowed a K2 from my public library and couldn't go back to not having one so I bought my Kindle before my loan time on the K2 ran out.