Last spring I bit the bullet and decided to buy the new Amazon Kindle. A couple of my students had the original Kindle, but it was just a little too bulky for my taste. When the new '2' weighed in at 10 oz. and only 1/3 inch thick, I was in! Not since the iPhone have I gushed over a 'tech toy'. I'll try to keep it to a minimum, but as an avid reader and a professional teacher, this device nails it. My top ten (apologizes to Letterman)
1. Travel, travel, travel. When traveling, Kindle is your best friend.. Every trip I always plan and fully expect to read AND finish Herman Melville's Moby Dick, Victor Hugo's The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and Steven King's The Stand. With it stashed in my backpack, I've actually accomplished all three this summer! You literally can have 350,000 books at your fingertips.
2. Its not just about books either. Do you have professional document you need to review on that flight? Email it to your Kindle. Do you have technical or training you have to tackle? Email it to your Kindle. If you have a soft copy of a body of text (including word docs, Adobe pdf files, or plain email type text files), you can simply email it to your Kindle, and it can serve as your electronic briefcase.
3. It's appearance is hi-tech. This new Kindle is sooo much thinner and streamline, its thinner than my IPhone.
4. The touch is just right. You know how some keyboards have just that right touch and feel? That is how my Kindle is. Not clunky, nor ambiguous. And the buttons are laid out as if someone at Amazon actually designed it with humans in mind.
5. If you already own a Kindle you can download for free a Kindle reader and not have to buy the book twice. Using the patented Whispernet technology you can 'mark' where you left off when reading a book on your Kindle, then pick right up at that point on your iPhone. And vice versa. An electronic bookmark that coordinates between both devices.
6. Wet environments are no problem. This was a pleasant surprise, that I found out by accident. On a recent vacation, I took it out to the pool. My wife warned that the kids were sure to splash my new toy into oblivion. Ha! I got through five Kurt Vonnegut short stories without a hiccup. I might add next to us were two women reading, and their paperback romance novels were damp and 'wavy' shall we say?
7. I love to highlight what I read, especially any self help (and I sure need them) books. This feature is perfect and even has feedback when you take a note.
8. The dictionary is now a built-in feature and has instant lookup, without having to go to a separate page for the definition. Just move your cursor to the word that you want defined and it appears on screen. I can't tell you how 'smart' that makes me!
9. The illustrations now come in sixteen shades of grey which is infinitesimally better than the previous four!
10. This is the future. You may not want to hear it. Just as video killed the radio star, electronic books will not obsolete paper but the improvement can't be ignored. Amazon hit a home run with the electronic book and they will have a corner on this market for some time to come.
Dylan Thomas is a history teacher whose love for reading is only rivaled by his daughter's. Hear what Kindle users have to say about it in these Reviews and find out Where to Buy Kindle. Buy from the no.1 online store in America, and Give the Gift of Reading.
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