Amazon’s square peg, round hole

This post is hardly cutting edge; a search shows people asking the same question as my mother, only three months ago. Not quite the same, my Mum’s phone call said she couldn’t find the option to switch off the radio on her Kindle; it wasn’t until after we’d hung up, having agreed to her stopping by after church because I had no idea, that I realised she meant wireless. And indeed this wasn’t a case of her forgetting how, or having lost the hand-written instructions she makes for every device, be it DVD player, iPod or this, her latest device. The wireless on/off option had disappeared. It wasn’t on the main menu, nor had it moved to the settings sub-menu.

Only of course it had. If I’d looked more closely at the blurb under ‘Airplane Mode’, which I’d briefly registered as not having seen before, or if I’d even given some thought as to what ‘Airplane Mode’ might be, I’d have realised this was the wireless option, relocated and renamed and with the on/off options therefore reversed. Presumably done with the noble intention of consistency with other products, the iPhone for example, that’s still a crap user experience.

An iPhone has several functions transmitting a signal and ironically, depending on the aircraft operator, since ‘Airplane Mode’ isn’t standard, it allows you to re-enable the Wi-Fi independently. So if Amazon is determined in its effort to be consistent, to a term that isn’t, it needs a specific option for switching the Wi-Fi on/off, in addition to its ‘Airplane Mode’ - which on my mother’s Kindle can only switch the Wi-Fi off/on. Or perhaps Amazon should concentrate on applying patterns where they fit.

And now for something completely diff… more or less the same.

The difference between an e-book and a real book: £3.04. Having recently watched the brilliant Any Human Heart I thought I’d buy the book; I considered the e-book but settled on the ‘real’ thing after discovering the electronic version was over 75% more expensive. I’m familiar with this kind of occasional discrepancy when it comes to music, but the music industry has at least matured to the point that when I download an album it’s free of DRM and in a format I can play using any brand of player. If I buy an e-book for my Kindle I am effectively bound to Amazon hardware. Yes, there are applications for reading your purchases on various LCD devices, but these aren’t suitable for extended reading; unless you’re OK with multiple breaks to recharge the battery and the (debatable) increased risk of eyestrain.

Ironically though, it’s the increased eyestrain that may make me choose an e-book over the physical form next time around; on opening the book I find I have to hold it at arm’s length. It’s either that or ‘upgrade’ my glasses.

Kindle

I have finished my first e-book on the Kindle, Jane Eyre; which may account for my more than usual downbeat mood for the time of year. As a device it’s great, it's still on its first battery charge and has plenty of charge left. I can’t imagine reading at that length on an LCD display, says the software developer who spends eight hours of every day slumped in front of two 19” LCD monitors. It’s as easy as reading from a book and in some ways better. The iPad, often touted as competition, is I’m sure as good a general content consumer as you can get, but if you’re looking for a device for the specific purpose of reading (for long periods of time) an e-book reader, the cost of which has been driven down because of the iPad, is the way to go.

On the hardware side I have only a couple of gripes. It has to be small but does the keypad have to be that difficult? Also, the Next Page/Previous page buttons situated on both the left and right sides of the Kindle are too low down; slightly heavier than I imagined, I tend to hold the Kindle further up the side – thus the buttons are partially obscured by my hand. These are small complaints; the keypad is rubbish but seldom used (for example a one-off set up for the Wi-Fi connection - there's a 3G version for an extra £40 - and registering the Kindle to my Amazon account) and the Next Page/Previous page criticism may just be an example of my general awkwardness.

The keypad has a purpose; there’s an experimental web-browser for example, useful functions such as search/annotate and not least the ability to search/purchase/download new e-books. But unless you want to risk dashing your new hardware against the wall in frustration I’d stay well clear, though it’s solidly enough built that it would probably survive the impact.

Leaving aside the contentious issue of DRM and the various publishing formats (Amazon use their own proprietary format), you can connect the Kindle using the USB lead provided and download a huge range of free e-books from sites such as Project Gutenberg. However, it’s the ability to purchase/download e-books, including a good range of those free e-books, from within the Amazon ecosystem where the Kindle scores. Use the built in keypad or use your computer, find the e-book on the Amazon website, click Purchase and… that’s it. There’s no download/synchronise option, it just happens; that’s a great user experience.