The Kindle seems like a pseudo-green technology, in that you can buy books w/o it involving the destruction of trees to make paper and without it involving the oil to drive the book on a truck to your door. It's also an example of the digitization of our cultural assets, a digitization of the lifeblood of our humanity. And it also appears to be an extremely convenient gadget, akin to the iPod but instead of purposed for music the Kindle is purposed for written material.
What is the Kindle? It's a gizmo designed and produced by Amazon.COM which offers a book-like reading experience. The written content is delivered wirelessly through cellphone digital technologies. The Kindle is small similarly sized to a paperback book. Amazon.COM offers data services allowing you to purchase content, download it into your Kindle, read it wherever you go, etc. There are a number of user interface elements meant to preserve a book-like reading experience.
On purchasing content (books, newspapers, blogs, etc) the record of your purchases is kept in Amazon's computer network. You can redownload stuff if necessary. You can subscribe to newspapers, magazines or blogs, and new issues automatically download into your Kindle. In this way you could stop subscribing to paper newspapers and thereby escape from the difficulty in disposing of newspapers once they've been read. It raises the question what to call newspapers that are not printed on paper.
Books in the Kindle format tend to be a lot less expensive than printed books, $9.99 versus $25 for instance.
The discussion of the Kindle only mentions wireless data networks in the U.S. and it's unclear whether the Kindle can be used outside the U.S.
The Kindle display is implemented using the eInk technology, 600 x 800 pixel resolution at 167 ppi, 4-level gray scale. eInk's technology is an impressive new form of display technology, different than anything seen prior in production. The eInk design does not wash out in sunlight, and it is supposedly easier on the eyes with a more paper-like look to it.
I'm looking around my office and see all the books here. Because of these books I have to dedicate a whole room to hold the books. Books on paper therefore mean those of us who have large libraries are required to have a large house to adequately contain the books. The larger house directly costs more to own, bigger rent or mortgage, and additionally requires more resources to be built. Hence, a Kindle would give me the option of downsizing to a smaller house that would reduce my living expenses, and help me to participate in simpler living styles. Or, the Kindle would offer the opportunity to have more actual space in the house I'm already living in.
On the other hand let's consider a side story inspired by the book 1984. While fiction that story is eerily like some things which happen in the world today. The story concerns a person wishing for freedom within an overarchingly powerful and dominating society which exerts control over the citizens, and regularly rewrites all of history to suit momentary political alliances and shifting political winds. The ability of the Masters to rewrite history allows them to completely control the definition of truth, and hence to more deeply control their population. Again, 1984 is a work of fiction .. but ..
Suppose all of human knowledge is stored in digitized form on "The Internet". Suppose it's "easy" for a select group of people to control the content of the books and other records that is the record of human knowledge. And, remember that media ownership is consolidating to an ever-smaller circle of companies and that media companies are routinely clamoring to extend the length copyrights are valid, and to extend the powers they hold under copyright law. That's the danger proposed in the book 1984, that the definition of truth contained in those books and other media, if it can be changed repeatedly at whim then society can no longer know what is the truth and can more easily be led astray.
Not that it would happen precisely as suggested by Eric Arthur Blair (George Orwell) in the book. And I am not suggesting Amazon.COM itself would be party to a conspiracy to control society. Amazon.COM is merely a conduit for the media empires to publish their content, Amazon.COM itself does not own content.
The potential scenario devices like a Kindle enables are: media empire has editors who can update the content of all books, the updated books are uploaded to electronic publishers, and the electronic publishing service then transmits the updated version of the book to all devices into which the book has been sold.
 | Nineteen Eighty-Four author: George Orwell asin: 0452284236 |
 | 1984 asin: B00007KQA3 |
 | Kindle: Amazon's New Wireless Reading Device asin: B000FI73MA |
