Kindled

Amazon's entry into the world of e-book readers is sitting right here next to me and twenty-four hours into the adventure, I'm still not sure what I think.

I've downloaded a number of books into it, lots of personal files. I've fiddled, tested, sampled. I'm going to write a full review very soon but right now here are some random thoughts.

PRO:

1. Whispernet is phenomenal: content appears on your Kindle in seconds after purchase

2. Lightweight

3. 90,000 books available for download

4. Intuitive

5. Includes access to Wikipedia

6. QWERTY keyboard is a nice extra

CON:

1. Insanely over-priced

2. Paper-white screen? Not exactly. It's more like battleship grey.

3. Not backlit and it needs to be. You shouldn't have to purchase accessories to use a $400 ebook reader

4. Impossible to keep from flipping pages if you try to use the Kindle without the Kindle cover. The designers forgot to allow room for handling the damn thing!

5. I don't think the righthand NEXT bar will last long. Only 24 hours in and it's already starting to feel a little wonky to me

6. The sorting software is moody at best. Alphabetical sorting has been around a long time. It shouldn't be this fluky

7. My eyes felt strained after using it in medium light. This =shouldn't= be a problem

I have some serious problems with the Kindle but the truth is I devoured more words in 24 hours than I have in the past 24 days. I'm gobbling them up like Christmas cookies. Maybe they really are on to something after all.