I am probably the among the lowest-tech people you know. I have no numbers programmed in my cell phone, I’ve never bought or sold anything on eBay, and I only just found out that “Twitter” was something other than a bird call.
But I am now the proud (and very happy) owner of a Kindle. (I would have had one even sooner if Amazon had been able to keep them in stock.) You wonder why? Wouldn’t an old-fashioned girl like me prefer to hold a real book in her hands?
Sure – but not while in transit. I take Amtrak between Boston and New York about twice every month. I often commute to work by subway. And once in a while I even fly somewhere. Nothing is more tiresome than trying to jam 3 or 4 paperback books into a shoulder bag.
So no more. Although I must admit that I’m still finding the Kindle’s little wheels a bit difficult to manage I’m sure I’ll get used to them. In the meantime, I’ve bought my first book in electronic form: the Pulitzer Prize-winning “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.”
I can’t wait to get on the train.
1. Kate Belt | 05.20.08
I’ve had my Kindle since January 3 and I feel the same way about it as you do. I could have written every thing you said. You’ll want to join the Yahoo Kindle users group. Someone in our group has Kindleized over 1,500 free classics/public domain books and published a Kindle directory of them for free. You can download them using Whispernet.
Many of us, including myself, have found we prefer the Kindle to paper once we got used to it. The free samples are great.