I have recently been drooling over the concept of Amazon Kindle.
If you have not heard of or seen this device yet, you should at least stop over at Amazon and check it out.
Amazon describes some of its features as follows:
* Revolutionary electronic-paper display provides a sharp, high-resolution screen that looks and reads like real paper.
* Simple to use: no computer, no cables, no syncing.
* Wireless connectivity enables you to shop the Kindle Store directly from your Kindle—whether you’re in the back of a taxi, at the airport, or in bed.
* Buy a book and it is auto-delivered wirelessly in less than one minute.
* More than 90,000 books available, including more than 95 of 112 current New York Times® Best Sellers.
* Free book samples. Download and read first chapters for free before you decide to buy.
* Top U.S. newspapers including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post; top magazines including TIME, Atlantic Monthly, and Forbes—all auto-delivered wirelessly.
* More than 250 top blogs from the worlds of business, technology, sports, entertainment, and politics, including BoingBoing, Slashdot, TechCrunch, ESPN's Bill Simmons, The Onion, Michelle Malkin, and The Huffington Post—all updated wirelessly throughout the day.
* Lighter and thinner than a typical paperback; weighs only 10.3 ounces.
* Holds over 200 titles.
* Long battery life. Leave wireless on and recharge approximately every other day. Turn wireless off and read for a week or more before recharging. Fully recharges in 2 hours.
* Unlike WiFi, Kindle utilizes the same high-speed data network (EVDO) as advanced cell phones—so you never have to locate a hotspot.
* No monthly wireless bills, service plans, or commitments—we take care of the wireless delivery so you can simply click, buy, and read.
* Includes free wireless access to the planet's most exhaustive and up-to-date encyclopedia—Wikipedia.org.
* Email your Word documents and pictures (.JPG, .GIF, .BMP, .PNG) to Kindle for easy on-the-go viewing.
They even have a video up on the site of how this works and it seems, well, cool.
I doubt I would get one right now, however, for a number of reasons.
1. Economical - well, I have a hard time justifying any book expenses right now (that is one reason why I write reviews for SI - they give me the book I am reviewing.)
2. I don't generally buy new technology until it has been out long enough to work out the bugs that invariably show up.
3. This seems geared presently to popular works, though as the product matures and finds a market, that will hopefully adjust.
4. While there are already over 90,000 Kindle titles, the titles I would be most interested in are still in short supply. (A search for the words "Bible Commentary" at the Kindle store only showed 127 entries and many of those were not actually Bible commentaries - and some that were I already own in the old fashioned "dead tree" format. Some of the few "commentaries" they actually did have at this point were F.F. Bruce on The Epistles of John and Thru the Bible by J. Vernon Magee and a number of MacArthur Bible Studies - not his commentaries.) By the way, if you like Mac a lot, they have around 20 of his books available for Kindle already.
In light of our current discussion on Fundamentalism and scholarship, I thought it was fitting that they actually had this title available for Kindle - apparently Marsden is as concerned about the charge that Evangelicals were anti-intellectual as I was about the same charge against Fundamentalism.
Anyway, I am not ready for one yet, but it definitely looks like a cool product and if you decide to get one - please use my link :) - $cha ching$. For any family or friends who may be reading this, this is not a Christmas request - wait until next year to see what kind of new titles become available :)
Just my thoughts,
Frank
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