It's been a while...

It's been quite some time since I've talked Kindle and ebook stuff, so let me correct that.

I'll start off with my impressions of both the iPad (which I've been testing for a project at the Day Job) and the Kindle Fire.

Meh.

Ok, that's not terribly fair. Let me expand.

Back in the fall, I got my wife a Kindle Fire, thinking it would solve her need to have an external light.  She's the type that likes to read herself to sleep at night.  But then aren't we all?  What do you mean no?  Humpf!  I also hoped it would be a decent on hand web browser, email client etc.  As her phone is not a "Smart" phone type, though it at least now can text and browse WAP sytle internet, it seemed an inexpensive and convenient compromise.  I have an android phone, and bought almost all my apps through Amazon instead of through Google, so...should be easy to add those games, etc, to the Fire.  Well, we could.  And it was not bad.  Especially considering the price.   But my wife didn't find the reading relaxing on it the way she does with the regular Kindle. (strike one)  And the screen seemed a bit small to her. (strike two) And transferring TiVO videos was a lot more complicated and tricky than we'd thought.  (strike three.)  So it went back.   I still think for it's price point it's a good machine.  It just didn't wow us the way I'd kind of hoped it would.

As I mentioned, I'm testing out an iPad for work, so I'm finally getting to see what all the "hoopla" is about with it.  I can see why people like them.  Smooth and easy to use.  I'm testing out the wifi only device, and I downloaded the Kindle app to check out some of my books.  Both the technical ones for work, but also just some random others to see how they look.  It's fine.  The app isn't as good as I'd like.  Feels just about the same as the Cloud reader.  And I suspect it pretty much is the same.  Or at least based very much off the same code.  And that's one of the weaker versions of the app.  I much prefer the PC app or the real app to the cloud reader.   There's just more options in the others.  I could tangent into talking about the cloud app, but I won't.  Suffice it to say, the kindle app on iPad is sufficient if not superlative.  I wish they would implement a better way to organize.  (Though that's still one of my peeves.)  My over all impression in regards to the iPad?  Get a wifi only one, and put your monthly money into a good 4G wifi hotspot instead.  Why?  Well, the technology for the hot spots/cellular connectivity will change.  It will change at a rate probably faster than wifi itself.  So, why lock yourself into a technology that will become obsolete or severerly changed when you don't need to?   Wifi will likely remain the way it is, with backward compatibility support for years to come.  IE, your iPad won't be a dinosaur in the near future.  Well, okay, not because the cellular system gets overhauled, again.  Plus, you can support many PCs/devices from one hotspot.  If you're cellular is built into your iPad, it's more of a pain to share it out to friends, at conventions, on vacation with the kids, etc, etc.

One last thing, the iOS version of the Kindle app was supposed to have better support for Kids books.  So I went ahead and bought one in a series that I thought my sons would enjoy.  Bleh.  Not impressed.  If by better they mean because the screen is bigger you can read the text at all, instead of the almost impossibility of it elsewhere...I say, there's still a lot of room for improvement.   I get it, kids books particular the ones with lots of text/graphics interactions, can't be trivially handled by the system.  But if this is the best they can do....

Overall, Kindle continues to need to work on better ways to store and organize books.  I've got hundreds on my account.  Between the ones I picked up for me, the ones I picked up for the Mrs. and the ones I snagged because they were free (like all those classics from bygone eras) it takes a long time to sort through the list.  Even allowing that some of the versions of the app (and only SOME) support Collections, just getting the books sorted into collectiosn is a long and time consuming process.  Better than when you are reduced to just sorting everything by author, title or Recent.  But lacking just the same.  And I don't get it.  At the least, can't they do like Amazon Music and include genre?  Or allow tagging?  There should be more ways for generic sorting even before we decide to personally set them up into collections.

Now a new feature they rolled out, and I just learned about is the ability for you to "reset" a book to start.  This is a godsend.  My wife and I have more than enough overlapping reading habits that the cool feature of Sync is almost essential.  But heretofore, it was a first come first served feature.  If my wife read a book before me, she got the use of it.  If I read something before her, I got the use of it.  For a single book, it's no big deal.  But I've been fortunate enough to snag an omnibus edition here or there.  (Like the first four books of Song of Ice and Fire)  Imagine being somewhere in the middle of book three and having your device battery die.  Then I hand you my freshly charged Kindle but you have to guesstimate and find your way through to the "location".  Being able to reset a book means you get the ability to read anywhere and pck up where you left off, no matter which device you use.

Last observation: kids and lock down.  Yet again, Amazon implemented a good feature, but it only applies to the latest devices.  Well, OK.  That's awfullly disappointing in itself, but at least I get it.  Even if I don't like it.  But, from what I can tell, it's kind of a pain, and not nearly as useful as I would hope.  My understanding is, you can lock down access to all books.  Or none.  Well....um...that's useful?  I guess it was designed with the Fire in mind.  But really, shouldn't there be some way you can set up a variation of your books for your kids?   What I'd love it to be able to put a selection of books on his device (computer, whatever) that are just fine for him to read, without having to go through the effort of setting up seperate accounts through amazon, etc.  For DRM free books, that would probably work.  But I don't want to give him free reign.  He's not quite old enough for that just yet.

So what about you?   What features do you think are missing from your favorite e-reader?