The Kindle arrived yesterday, right on schedule. Here are my initial thoughts about the device, both as a device and as something to publish to:

  • They nailed the weight — light enough for easy reading, heavy enough that it won’t blow away in a stiff breeze.
  • The e-ink display is rather nice, though they really need to offer a backlight option for night reading, since there’s no place to clip a book light (maybe license Timex’s Indiglo?).
  • I can see why people complain about constantly bumping the prev/next page buttons. I’d've strongly considered going with a jog dial, myself.
  • The keyboard is no great shakes — there are a handful of cell phone keyboard designs they could’ve used that would have been better. It should be a slider, too, as you’re not typing all that often.
  • The included cover/case is a joke.
  • Why they went with a hardware switch for Whispernet is beyond me. This exacerbates the case problem, as you have to take the Kindle out of the cover in order to toggle the switch.
  • Now that I have monospace code listings at least tentatively solved, I need to see what they look like on e-ink, particularly in greyscale. I might have to go pure monochrome on the code listings (right now, they’re colorized by default) if some of the colors aren’t readable.
  • No touchscreen makes it interesting for selecting things — I haven’t tried a hyperlink yet

I’ve seen where people think the e-ink platforms are dead and that iPhone/iPod Touch-type devices will rule the ebook scene. I rather doubt that, only because they’re going to be too small for a lot of people and many types of books (e.g., programming guides). I’ve read ebooks on a Sony Clie (NX70), and I currently own an iPod Touch, and there’s no question the reading experience on a Kindle would be superior, except in low-light conditions.

Next up: I plan to use the Kindle as my review platform for the Android book, using its highlight/note capability to flag problems for eventual editing. That’ll give it a pretty good workout, and it’ll save me printing ~400 pages just for the editing process.