I haven’t actually seen a Kindle, but a friend of mine has a Sony device.  That in and of itself will save you $100, different specifications though, I’m sure.  I say give it two years, and the thing will be $50.  And the price of the books will come way way down. 

I haven’t investigated this yet, but I know that once I use my computer at the library, I have access to everything they have electronically over the internet.  So, I’m not sure whether you’re into the gadget itself, or just want to feed your voracious reading habit.

I just did a survey our electric company offers, enumerating our house’s usage.  The second fridge, a little 3.2 cu ft job (or thereabouts; 3 feet tall and 2 feet wide), costs about $100/year.  I can imagine a freezer.

Whoa....how much is your electricity per kWh?? When the lad comes home for the summer, he drags his 3.2 cu ft fridge with him and we use that for the summer. Last summer it consistently used .66 kWh per day (I plugged it into the Kill A Watt meter). Per year use would be about $24. The freezer I have my eye on uses 276 kWh per year. It’s a very small chest freezer with just a tiny bit more energy use than the 3.2 cu ft fridge. Of course, if I bought it, I’d probably unplug the fridge.

Steph, it’s partially gadget envy. However, being able to store a library on a book-sized handheld device, rather than trying to find room for more books in the house, does have a lot of appeal. Not to mention, having your library with you wherever you go. Some books I’m happy to borrow, but there are others that I will add to my library and having them in digital format is fine with me as long as I can get to them. (Currently, most of my books are in boxes in the attic.) Reading on the Kindle is nothing like reading a computer screen. It really is like looking at a printed page. Super easy on the eyes, with adjustable font sizes, too. Feels nice in the hands, too. It’s very light-weight.

From what I understand, the Kindle has several advantages over the Sony, mainly the wireless component to download books almost instantly. And built in software that will convert other ebooks from other sites into a compatible format. There are also extended bookmarking functions and annotation and clipping features. And Amazon stores all your material so that if anything goes wrong with your device, you don’t lose your library.

My local library doesn’t do ebooks. Just audio ones. I wish they did, but I don’t expect to see that offered in the very near future.

It’s not so much the $/kwh, it’s the energy and fuel adjustment.  We get upward of 95% of our electricity through oil-burning plants, and that has to be shipped in.

You may well ask about solar and wind and geothermal sources.  So do we.  Not much, so far.

Soon you’ll be able to borrow books for free from the library to read on your Kindle. I think we are witnessing the beginning of a profound change in the reading mechanism. Maybe not for our generation, but for the next.

My other half has a Kindle and just loves it.  He’s a voracious reader and all of his books are cheaper through Amazon than the dead-tree versions.  A friend of mine was so impressed he bought one for himself and another one as a gift.  It’s catching on and I hope they drop the price soon. 

Meanwhile, if you do buy one, consider buying through the link on my site!  I wish I could say you’d get a discount, but no.  You’d be helping a worthy cause - that would be me! 

I survived yesterday without buying one, but the day will come in the not too distant future when I will buy one. I don’t think this is a flash in the pan want. It makes sense for my reading wants and needs. (Especially as my eyes grow aged....)

And, I have to say, fewer paperback books in the world wouldn’t be a bad thing.

I’m saving up my mad money so that I won’t feel quite so guilty about spending that much on one. I would like to see the price go down. Four hundred dollars really does seem high for what the device does. Then again, I don’t think the iPod has gone down very much in price since its early days, it just does more and holds more data. So who knows.

It looks as if a number of the early Kindle adopters have been our generation, Pablo. It’s the younger ones who have complained that it doesn’t do enough...it isn’t in color, it doesn’t have social networking capabilities, the web browser is rudimentary, etc. The early adopters have said, “Yes, but this is supposed to mimic a BOOK, if you want all that other stuff, get an iPhone.”

It’ll be interesting to see where Amazon takes this. They are certainly in an ideal position to make this take off. I also noticed that their book prices are quite a lot lower than what Sony offers. Sony’s best sellers are in the $16.00 range while Amazon’s are $9.99 or slightly less. Many of the older classics are somewhere in the vicinity of 25-49 cents per book. And the Philip Pullman trilogy (His Dark Materials) goes for about $3.50 per book. Very Nice.

I also read that Jeff Bezos acknowledged that he’s quite open to developing a (rental) subscription service (kind of like Netflix) for books, too. I’d sign up in a heartbeat.

And Alan, since you asked so nicely, I will remember to hit your link when the time comes. I’m all for helping worthy causes. Now how come you don’t have one? Does your other half share? I’d be wanting to steal it every chance I had. ;)

Linkmeister, we don’t have much in the line of solar or wind power, either. We do have some nuclear and some coal, but mostly gas powered power plants. Trying to get wind power established around here is like pulling teeth. Our dear Senator Kennedy (whom I adore in most respects) has thrown up every roadblock imaginable with regard to wind power. He doesn’t want those turbine towers mucking up his pretty view. Perhaps when he’s sitting in the dark in a few years, he’ll reconsider. I believe our power authority has stated that we’re heading for serious shortages (blackouts) by the year 2015 if we don’t DO something really soon. Demand is growing at an enormous rate and we just don’t have the facilities to meet it after a couple more years. Of course, conservation is rarely mentioned. But that probably will only go so far, too. I don’t anticipate that many households would consider a daily consumption of 5-10kWh actually living. Unfortunately.

No, no, there’s no sharing of the Kindle around here!  It comes pre-loaded with your account information and only your books that you’ve bought can reside on it - at least as far as I understand it.  So, as soon as I get a few more dollars in my Amazon account, I’ll be sending it right back to them for a new Kindle.  Circle of life, eh?

Well, keep an eye on your Amazon account then, ‘cuz I have a feeling....patience not being one of my better virtues....

Thank you, Kate!  Everyone I know with a Kindle says they don’t now how they lived without it.  You’ll probably be the same.

Don’t go for the Sony.  My husband got me one as a Christmas present last year and it died with 4 months.  And I wasn’t that hard on it.  Also, their book selection is not the best. 

I want the Kindle myself, if for nothing than to save space on my bookshelves.  Think of all the trees they’re not cutting down to make the paper books!  Maybe you can find a used one someplace.

Oh me oh my, Lorinda. I have a slightly used Kindle in my grubby mitts. It’s been used for about 24 hours and I have to say, it’s fabulous. I knew this was going to happen and I didn’t resist very hard, either. And I don’t even feel guilty.

Love this Kindle. Love it, love it, love it. I’m already half way through Pride and Prejudice (a whopping 25 cents) and my ‘save for later’ list is already 3 pages long. AND I can shop for books from my bed. On the Kindle. With the free mobile wireless feature. Reading in bed has never been so easy. No bulky books to balance or hang on to. And I increased the font size so I didn’t even need my glasses. When I fell asleep reading, the Kindle saved my page automatically and shut itself off. As Alan said...how did I live without this thing?