Comments on: Details on Amazon’s Kindle Reader (updated)

By: Gerry Manacsa

Gerry Manacsa — Sat, 24 Nov 2007 17:39:18 +0000

DRM stands for “Digital Rights Management,” better known as copy protection. Some DRM can be draconian, preventing the book’s owner from doing simple and legitmate tasks, like copying a file to another device that she owns. Some are a bit more user friendly, but they are often still tied to a particular vendor’s software. If software support ends, the file with DRM can potentially become unusable.

Ebook formats like .pdf, .mobi and .epub can be either DRM’d or not, depending on the vendor. Non-DRM’d files are far more flexible. Even if a vendor ends support, the content can still be accessed by third parties for reader software or format converters.

For example, the .pdf files provided by WOWIO do not have this type of DRM, and can thus be opened by third-party pdf software apart from the pdf reader software provided by Adobe.

By: J.S. Peyton

J.S. Peyton — Sat, 24 Nov 2007 14:39:43 +0000

I just heard about this yesterday, so excited about the wireless download aspect I researched for more information on the product. I think the makers of Kindle have an excellent idea, but I was dismayed to learn that you can’t use e-books you’ve already purchased on the Kindle, and the raters on Amazon kept talking about something called drm’d. I don’t know what that is, but the fact that they kept intimating that this prevents you from keeping the ebooks as long as you’d like was definitely a turn off. And it it’s not a big thing but a little color would have been nice.

By: Gerry Manacsa

Gerry Manacsa — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 11:46:05 +0000

Liz, not having seen a Kindle in real life yet, I don’t have a hands-on sense of its size. However, it’s similar to (but somewhat larger than) the Sony Reader, which I am familiar with.

I think the reaction to the size depends on your expectation. Compared to a handheld device like an iPhone or other slim phone, there’s no doubt that both reader devices are bulky — not pocketable except in the biggest cargo pockets, and not compatible with small purses.

On the other hand, compared to a typical paper book — or more dramatically, a stack of books — it compares pretty well. My perspective of these readers came after attempting to do my book reading on laptops and tablet PCs. By these standards, the Sony Reader and the Kindle are actually quite svelte!

By: Liz

Liz — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 11:56:08 +0000

Isn’t this kind of bulky for a handheld gadget? I see the convenience but I can’t get past that aspect…

By: Ray

Ray — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 19:04:28 +0000

As long as it’s more a technical device than paper with additional features it will probalby only have a small influence on the market.

By: Gerry Manacsa

Gerry Manacsa — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 18:26:28 +0000

From the consumer’s standpoint, that certainly seems like a fair deal. I doubt that it will happen, though, given that Amazon probably would have to eat the cost of the both the downloaded book and the bandwidth. The publisher undoubtedly sees a book download as an additional sale in a different medium — like an audio book — rather than an extension of a previous print edition. Amazon’s potential financial exposure would be enormous.

By: betterretail

betterretail — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 17:56:38 +0000

One thing I can say is that it would be awesome if Amazon let me have digital versions of the books I have already bought through my Amazon account.