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Why I hate the Kindle

enlightenmenteconomics.com

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Re: Why I hate the Kindle

#51

Post by Tichy »

dfc wrote: post #45
Tichy wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want to know what others are reading, not others to know what I am reading.

Oh so you are upset that I can keep my reading activities private? That's even weirder than wanting others to know what you are reading.

You are aware that that comment in the blog article (not mine) was tongue in cheek, right? I mean yes, I want to know what other people are reading, but it is not the most important problem in the world.

Also, I think it is weird if you are not at least a little bit curious about the people around you.

Re: Why I hate the Kindle

#52

Post by Tichy »

cmontgomeryb wrote: post #39
Tichy wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wish it would also sync the non-Amazon books, though. Maybe I am not proficient enough yet, but so far I had to copy ebooks into obscure directories by hand (especially interesting on the Android Kindle reader).

Have you discovered the (relative) joys of Calibre? http://calibre-ebook.com It's not perfect, but it's very good and much nicer than doing it manually. Especially for managing collections. Regularly updated too.

I've only used it for converting books into Kindle format, will try to learn more about it's capabilities. Thanks for the suggestion.

Re: Why I hate the Kindle

#53

Post by SingAlong »

sivers wrote: post #3

I am at the Borobudur temple right now : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borobudur I brought nothing on my long walk but water and Kindle. Stopped for a couple hours. Reading an amazing book, with the temple in the background. Highlighting the most important bits as I come across them. The stuff I don't want to forget. The Kindle saves all of these to a file called "My Clippings.txt", which I'll later transfer over to m…

Wow! echo the same feeling here. I just got my Kindle a couple days back.

I'm reminded to take my Kindle with me more than my phone already. I love reading on it and it doesn't hurt my eyes since there's no brightness of the backlight. I didn't know how to use the clippings feature. Thought it was supposed to be shared online instead of a file like what you just said. But that's sweet too. Thanks to you sivers! :)

I got my first computer 8yrs back and only after I got my Kindle I realize how less I've been reading. I wish they start allowing sharing statuses for books bought outside the Kindle store on the new http://kindle.amazon.com site.

I've applied for beta access to the Kindle SDK (not to develop distracting apps!) to see what I can develop that can be useful on the Kindle. Waiting for access. If anyone here is from Amazon and can help me out with it, I would love to thank you in anyway I can.

Re: Why I hate the Kindle

#54

Post by dfc »

Tichy wrote: post #51
dfc wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh so you are upset that I can keep my reading activities private? That's even weirder than wanting others to know what you are reading.

You are aware that that comment in the blog article (not mine) was tongue in cheek, right? I mean yes, I want to know what other people are reading, but it is not the most important problem in the world. Also, I think it is weird if you are not at least a little bit curious about the people around you.

If I am curious about them I will ask them a question and engage them in a real conversation.

If you substitute "what color of underwear" for "what book" it seems super creepy...just saying.

Re: Why I hate the Kindle

#55

Post by Tichy »

dfc wrote: post #54
Tichy wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are aware that that comment in the blog article (not mine) was tongue in cheek, right? I mean yes, I want to know what other people are reading, but it is not the most important problem in the world. Also, I think it is weird if you are not at least a little bit curious about the people around you.

If I am curious about them I will ask them a question and engage them in a real conversation. If you substitute "what color of underwear" for "what book" it seems super creepy...just saying.

This is another one of those online conversations that there are all sorts of people who are very different from each other. I don't think we are even speaking the same language.

Re: Why I hate the Kindle

#56

Post by ja27 »

On a week at the beach, I never saw another Kindle besides ours. I saw multiple people with iPads out on the beach. I was quite surprised. I've seen a few Kindles "in the wild" but mostly in the hands of homeschooling / soccer moms that spend a lot of time waiting for kids at various activities.

I struggle with purchasing ebooks. I'm ok with reading them on the Kindle, but the idea of spending $10 on an ebook that I can't resell, give away, or loan to anyone except other Kindle users doesn't excite me. I love the idea of not adding to my overflowing bookshelves though. So I mostly only read DRM-free books from free sources.

I've found that I get more reading done on the Kindle than I do on other devices. As long as it's the only device I have in my hands, there isn't much else to do except read. If I have any tablet or phone or anything like it, it's too easy to read a couple pages then flip over to email, Twitter, etc. and never get back to the book.

Re: Why I hate the Kindle

#57

Post by ja27 »

safeaim wrote: post #43
DasIch wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can sync non-Amazon books by sending them to you@kindle.com. If you are using something like Calibre it's very simple.

Are you sure that this also syncs on your Android Kindle? It never works on my mobile for some reason.

I have never gotten anything except Amazon purchases to sync to my Android Kindle app. I can manually copy .mobi (and I think .azw) files to my Android and the Kindle app will read them, but there's no Whispersync between devices except for official Amazon purchases. It's the same with my iPod Touch but not many people realize you can manually copy books to the Kindle app.

Re: Why I hate the Kindle

#58

Post by ja27 »

devicenull wrote: post #38

Regarding his #1 point, the Kindle fits perfectly inside a gallon sized ziplock bag. It doesn't cause any loss in functionality, and doesn't look that awful. It's the first thing I do when I bring my Kindle to the beach.

I've carried different smartphones in a quart freezer Ziploc for years. They've survived camping trips, rainstorms, water parks, beach trips, etc. Capacitive touchscreens work ok through the plastic. A great cheap cover.

Re: Why I hate the Kindle

#59

Post by tluyben2 »

dfc wrote: post #23

I was really disappointed with this article. For some reason between the title and the domain name I was expecting insight. The author offers nothing new to the debate and even provides some questionable complaints. How do you cut and paste from a deadtree book to your blog? I think it is weird that people miss being able to show off to the world how smart and wonderful they are with what they are reading. This is no…

I have known this only from US people though; in movies, books and real life, I usually see 'intellectual' Americans sitting with thick, big classics in their hands, more looking to see if people are seeing what they are reading than what is actually in the book. A Doors cover band in the Netherland used to have 'Jim' walking up on stage with a thick copy of Das Kapital open in his hand, but upside down to indicate the fakeness of that showing off behavior.

I've had guys quoting from Nietzsche (in horrible horrible German once) and according to every American movie and series ever made with high school kids in it, all people in the US can quote Shakespeare by heart and actually like it and find it romantic. Other countries (UK included) just don't have that kind of show off thing. Going to Paris is not intellectual per se, and holding a big book and learning some quotes from it is neither, so why does the US keep promoting that stereotype in everything it puts out? See a colored person on deathrow; watch carefully if he reads/quotes some crap poetry from some long death famous author and you, as the viewer of this B movie, know she/he isn't guilty! Ugh.

Sorry got a bit offtopic, just curious why this is :)

I understand the OP point about nothing being able to see and show what people are reading, but personally I would like to keep it that way so I can just read what I want without having to look like 'an intellectual'.

Re: Why I hate the Kindle

#60

Post by dfc »

Tichy wrote: post #55
dfc wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I am curious about them I will ask them a question and engage them in a real conversation. If you substitute "what color of underwear" for "what book" it seems super creepy...just saying.

This is another one of those online conversations that there are all sorts of people who are very different from each other. I don't think we are even speaking the same language.

All I was saying in my first point wass that its weird that people want to show off what they are reading.

My later point is that it there is a fine line between healthy social curiosity and straight up creepiness. If you would not be comfortable asking the person your question its probably creepy.

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