Voyage to Nowhere: The Amazon Kindle Story

Post by lambdaelite » Mon, Apr 13, 2015, 10:51 AM UTC

ane wrote: post #96

cthalupa wrote: post #78

>and white light is the worst for reading in bed. It’s proven to keep you awake. This is not a great argument. First, because the Kindle allows you to dim the screen, and in fact, does so automatically in dark rooms. Pulling my Voyage out and comparing it to my screen with Flux, anecdotally, it looks to be producing less light than my laptop does. And what are the alternatives? Not lighting the kindle display, and ha…

Plus, the article gets it wrong: the Paperwhite screen isn't backlit, the leds are oriented perpendicularly from the reading angle, so there is no direct light shining your eyes. Add that to the automatic dimming, the Paperwhite isn't going to keep you awake. As an anecdote, I am immensely susceptible to falling asleep when reading in the dark with the Paperwhite.

Post by ane » Mon, Apr 13, 2015, 10:59 AM UTC

lambdaelite wrote: post #111

ane wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plus, the article gets it wrong: the Paperwhite screen isn't backlit, the leds are oriented perpendicularly from the reading angle, so there is no direct light shining your eyes. Add that to the automatic dimming, the Paperwhite isn't going to keep you awake. As an anecdote, I am immensely susceptible to falling asleep when reading in the dark with the Paperwhite.

I don't understand your point: the orientation of the lighting is irrelevant with respect to suppressing melanin production. The cold temperature of the Kindle LEDs, ostensibly selected to make the screen appear white in the presence of warmer ambient lighting, is likely to have enough of a blue component to disrupt sleep. Total luminescence isn't a factor in suppressing melanin production either, as someone else has…

Post by joshuapants » Mon, Apr 13, 2015, 11:17 AM UTC

ekianjo wrote: post #24

joshuapants wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does KOReader fix the Kindle typography? That is, get rid of the rivers of white running through the poorly justified pages?

Yes, it fixes most of it. I would not say it's perfect either but it's much, much better than the default Kindle Viewer. it also gives you a lot more options on how to tweak the way it reflows text, as well as font choices. It makes it a much better device for reading.

Post by regularfry » Mon, Apr 13, 2015, 11:26 AM UTC

epsylon wrote: post #106

jayvanguard wrote: post #23

This person seems extremely picky. I have pretty much every generation of kindle and they just keep getting incrementally better. Resolution, backlight, multiple dictionaries, x-ray, etc.

Completely agreed. The worse argument is the one about the backlight not being red... If you care about that kind of thing you already have a bedside luminotherapy lamp. Which means you will use it to read (which is way more comfortable). The backlight's primary function is to counter the effect of the sun in daytime park / balcony / beach / etc... reading. You need a lot of luminosity, and certainly not weak ass red…

Post by lambdaelite » Mon, Apr 13, 2015, 11:29 AM UTC

ane wrote: post #113

lambdaelite wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand your point: the orientation of the lighting is irrelevant with respect to suppressing melanin production. The cold temperature of the Kindle LEDs, ostensibly selected to make the screen appear white in the presence of warmer ambient lighting, is likely to have enough of a blue component to disrupt sleep. Total luminescence isn't a factor in suppressing melanin production either, as someone else has…

Yes, you're right. Perhaps my original statement was a bit too extreme in that sense. I'd wager, though, that having the screen not be back lit at least reduces sleep disruption, that is, it fares better than backlit screens in that regard. I don't know if there are any studies that have proven this to be the case though.