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Not buying another Kindle

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Re: Not buying another Kindle

#91

Post by SwellJoe »

johngossman wrote: post #8

I can understand why one would want to move from Kindle to another device, but this article starts by complaining that support is being dropped for devices from before 2013. I can even understand being upset by this, but I have absolutely no faith that whatever other device I switch to will still be supported in 10+ years. Could be. But I sure wouldn't count on it.

True, but most manufacturers don't go out of their way to break their old devices. Neglect is one thing, this feels more like theft.

Re: Not buying another Kindle

#92

Post by _23sd »

I think the most important criteria with a reader (aside from hardware quality) is whether you're comfortable going outside the manufacturer's store to buy DRM-free books, or at least ones that can be liberated from DRM for future proofing. Calibre still speaks the format of these old Kindles, so they're usable, I expect that will continue to be the case for Kindles. If format conversion is too annoying to deal with then it's better to read on a general purpose iOS or Android tablet. I have a Boox NA4C and it's ok, nice hardware, but I have noticed the constant phoning home and am annoyed by the GPL issues (not that I expected a Chinese Android device maker to be fulfilling their open source obligations). For that reason and others I've mostly come around to just reading on a phone and tablet with non-eink screens.

Re: Not buying another Kindle

#93

Post by at-fates-hands »

jmyeet wrote: post #46
lokar wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's hard to evaluate the cost of a ebook vs physical book without knowing the cut that the author and publisher get of the sales price.

Sure you can. An ebook has zero cost of distribution and no middlemen. A physical book has to be typeset, printed, shipped to stores, shipped to customers, marketed in store, etc etc etc. If a physical book is sold for $10 at least half that is printing, distribution and retail. Like the GP, the price fixing of ebooks at the Dane price as physical books mothers me as well, particularly because physical books can be s…

>> An ebook has zero cost of distribution and no middlemen.

100% incorrect.

ebooks still:

- Have to be edited, proof read and formatted properly.

- Have to have a cover design.

- Unless you're distributing on your own website (which is uber rare), you still need to pay for platform fees and retailer costs for distribution.

- Marketing and tech support which is the same for any book, regardless of what platform its sold on.

Re: Not buying another Kindle

#94

Post by themadturk »

two_cents wrote: post #73

> We are still dealing with a home screen that prioritizes advertisements and promoted recommendations over your actual library. Navigating a large collection of books remains a chore, with sluggish animations and a lack of robust folder management that has been a standard feature on rival devices for years. Such claims make me think that this article is biased. There are two tabs on main Kindle screen - Home and Lib…

Most, if not all, ebook stores have "issues" with DRM because publishers demand it (and authors too often simply go along with it). Amazon and Kobo (and other ebook stores as well) let authors of self-published books decide whether or not to put DRM on their books.

Re: Not buying another Kindle

#96

Post by andrewmutz »

I switched to the Kobo ecosystem about a year and a half ago and have been pretty happy. While the book availability and store aren't at complete parity, I've only had one situation where I couldnt get the book I wanted and it was available on the Amazon store (and I read a lot of books).

Re: Not buying another Kindle

#97

Post by jgeada »

maratc wrote: post #82
com2kid wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A number of authors have written about this and the tldr is that ebooks aren't really any cheaper to produce. Paper is cheap. Shipping is cheap. The incremental cost of making a physical book is so small as to be noise in the overall book price.

When you consider that different ebooks and different font selection can result in lines and pages breaking at any random place, ebooks may actually be more expensive to produce.

Don't think I've ever read a properly produced ebook. Page breaks fall wherever and formatting is dictated more by my size/border/etc choices than by whomever "produced" then book.

Nevertheless automatic typesetting and formatting have existed for decades! TeX and LaTeX are ancient and produce better looking results than any book I've ever read on any of my ereaders, and those aren't the only tools in this space.

Whatever people are paying for such "production" seems wasted.

Re: Not buying another Kindle

#98

Post by sobjornstad »

two_cents wrote: post #73

> We are still dealing with a home screen that prioritizes advertisements and promoted recommendations over your actual library. Navigating a large collection of books remains a chore, with sluggish animations and a lack of robust folder management that has been a standard feature on rival devices for years. Such claims make me think that this article is biased. There are two tabs on main Kindle screen - Home and Lib…

Very frequently when I turn on my Kindle it starts on “Home”. I have never found anything on “Home” remotely useful, and just want to see the books that I already have on the device, but they keep pushing me over to the screen full of ads (and it often takes >5 seconds to switch screens after I tap on “Library” for some reason). I think that's what they're talking about.

Re: Not buying another Kindle

#99

Post by cable2600 »

I have old Kindles that Amazon disabled from downloading new books. They are trying to force me to buy new Kindles, but I just use the Kindle reader app for my PC. Anyone can recommend an alternative to Kindle. Please let me know.
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