Amazon's Kindle 2 is available for pre-order,
and I must admit that if I had the toy money I'd almost certainly buy one. The first one struck me as not quite "being there" on the hardware design, but the 2.0 version looks to have cleaned up its lines a lot. And there's something deeply tempting about the idea of being able to carry 1500 volumes around with you all the time. (That this is naught but techie temptation is shown by the fact that it would take me roughly 75 years to read 1500 volumes at my current rate. But hey, they'd be there.)Family needs and the economy being what they are, I don't see a Kindle making its way into my hands any time soon. Though the consumerist side of me quietly whispers that if I had one I'd be able to carry around the full four volumes of the Latin/English breviary, Pepys' diary, Johnson's complete Rambler and Addison & Steele's complere Spectator -- because of course then I'd have time to read these all on the appropriate days, right? Sigh...
Well, I certainly don't enjoin you to buy one. But if you do, I do humbly ask that you buy it with the handy DarwinCatholic Amazon account, so that at the very least we can continue to feed our book habit in the manner that civilization has done so since the invention of the book.
And perhaps if ten of you buy one, MrsDarwin will suddenly realize that I deserve one too. (It's as likely as eating the 10,000 boxes of cereal in order to win a guaranteed ticket on the first commercial moon flight, right? I hope my ticket is still on reserve...)
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"If you cannot read all your books, at any rate handle, or, as it were, fondle them ... arrange them on your own plan so that if you do not know what is in them, you will at least know where they are."
-Sir Winston Churchill
While I'm not the techno-geek my husband is and am not all that attracted to the idea of reading my books on a screen, I must confess that I might be tempted to make an exception for the Kindle when traveling. Having to pack only one volume rather than half a dozen does seem an attractive economy that might be worth sacrificing the nice feel of paper for. Especially as we add more baggage with each child. Dom's completely sold, though except for not having the toy money.
I haven't even looked at the new version lest I drool too much on my keyboard. I've been borrowing an unused Sony Reader from a friend and I love that little thing. It is fantastic - I much prefer to read on it now more than from physical books. I haven't tried to buy any books for it as I've been getting everything from Project Gutenberg (which does limit my reading a fair amount, but since I like reading old stuff it isn't all that much of a hardship... I just wish they had more writings from the Church Doctors, Saints, and such)
I'm intrigued with the Amazon system for getting new books but I wonder if the instant availability of so many books from Amazon would be a bad thing for my wallet. Well, really, that's a dumb question. But every time I find myself stuck nursing and I've finished all the books on my Reader I think longingly of the Kindle's wifi connection...
It gives me bibliophilic wood. (A reference to Joy on "My Name is Earl" talking about chic wood.)
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