Daily Giz Wiz 787: Kindle 2
Episode 787 of the podcast
| Subject: | Review of Kindle 2 |
| Released: | Tuesday 17 March 2009 |
| Length: | about 27 minutes |
| Download file: | 787.mp3 (12.4 MB) |
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Listen to the episode
Short info
Leave the trees in the ground and read papers and magazines with the Kindle 2.
Audible pick of the day: Superman: Does This Clutter Make My Butt Look Fat?: An Easy Plan for Consuming Less and Living More, Unabridged, By Peter Walsh, Narrated by Peter Walsh. For a free audiobook, visit Audible.com/gizwiz.
(source: twit.tv/dgw787)
Detailed information
Link: Amazon
Amazon's Kindle 2 has made incremental improvements to the E-Book Reader. The page-turning buttons have been re-designed to avoid accidental turning. There's a new navigation system using the 5-way joystick - which Leo personally is not keen about. Navigation through newspapers and periodicals is difficult. It's much thinner and looks slicker than the previous version. It has a new text-to-speech function which reads the text to you, which has caused an objection from the Authors' Guild, and much controversy as a result. Amazon has also released a Kindle Reader app for the iPhone which can synchronise your reading on both devices.Otherwise the screen remains the same as before, using e-ink technology, so the contrast is still limited (black on grey green), but the page-turning is now faster. You can buy books on the Kindle Store, using Sprint's EVDO wireless network. This time, it doesn't come with a protective cover, and Leo got a Patagonia neoprene book case. The price of the Kindle 2 is high but still cheaper than printing the New York Times.
For Jakob Nielsen's review of the Kindle 2, see his UseIt blog.
St Patrick's Day in New York
There's going to be a big parade again, although Dick is not sure if 5th Avenue will still be painted with green stripes, given the state of the economy.
International Heritage
Leo has some Irish blood in him, and Scots and English too, through Mama Laporte, whom Leo describes as a WASP (White Anglo-Saxon Protestant). Leo's father's heritage is all southern Europe, Italian and French, and Leo is a 3rd generation Italian in America. Dick is a 2nd generation Italian. His father was born in Sicily, her mother born in Brooklyn, and that's where they met.
Audible Gift, and now the Kindle?
Bruce from Atlanta, having bought an Audible subscription as a Christmas gift to his wife, wonders if he should get the Kindle for her for their upcoming wedding anniversary in May or next Christmas, and wants an unbiased review from Leo. Leo thinks it's a very personal thing, as some people hate the Kindle, e.g. Bill Handel on KFI.
(source: insidedgw.vox.com)
