Amazon’s Kindle is the latest and most promising attempt at introducing a widescale ebook reader. It has been tried before but so far it’s been an idea that never quite caught on, unlike its audio counterpart the MP3 player… but could this be the dawn of the ebook age? The idea has appeal: an e-reader lets you carry hundreds of books, search or jump to any spot in the text and scale up the type size when your eyes get tired. Alternatively, printed books are dirt cheap, never run out of power and survive drops, spills and being run over. And their file format will still be readable countless years from now! Sony already has its own version in the shops at present and it is selling quite well… literally! So what makes Amazon’s e-reader so promising… well, The Kindle store offers best-seller lists, Most Popular lists and a Search box. The catalog includes 90,000 books so far, including 101 of the 112 currently listed as New York Times best sellers… The pricing is another breakthrough: Kindle books generally cost less than half of what printed books cost (and much less than Sony’s e-books). It’s common sense; why should a digital file cost as much as a physical object, manufactured and shipped? Most Kindle hardcover books cost $10, including “I Am America (and So Can You”), “Deceptively Delicious” and “Freakonomics.” Their hardcover prices are $25 or $26. Older books cost $3 to $6. (Sources: www.nytimes.com) So the only question left is will it succeed?
