When Sony launched the PRS-500, I knew that sooner or later an ebook device would be mine. As someone who never listens to music on the move, an ebook device was going to be my iPod. I'm wary of importing products that aren't officially supported in the United Kingdom, so I held off until Sony officially launched the PRS-505. I got one, and it was everything I hoped it would be. The minor difficulties in getting content onto device were soon forgotten as I got used to having something to read with me all the time. When I ran out of anything to read, all I had to do was download something new.
This worked very well for a couple of years, but I started to notice that the cost of the books on the Waterstones website was getting increasingly silly. I wanted to read Malcolm Gladwell's What the Dog Saw only to find that while it was about £6 in paperback, the ePub version was £14. I understand that ebooks attract VAT, while dead tree books don't, but that doesn't justify that kind of price difference.
Then the Amazon Kindle officially launched in the United Kingdom, and I was mildly tempted, but I really couldn't justify buying a second ebook device. So instead, I downloaded the Android Kindle application for my trusty HTC Desire.
First impressions weren't good – the application simply didn't work. However, an updated version became available and before I knew it I was reading a sample chapter from What the Dog Saw on my phone. Having been very impressed by e-ink devices, I was surprised how readable the Desire's screen was. I set the background colour to sepia, choose a font size that suited my eyes and off I went. I expected that I would find the whole experience less than optimal, and I would be racing back to my trusty PRS-505 but so far, I haven't. In fact, it's now sitting in a drawer.
Now, to be fair, I only ever read on the Tube home, so that's about 20 minutes at a time. If I read for longer periods, say at home, perhaps the LCD display would be tiring in a way that e-ink isn't.
What's strange is that, moving to this new platform was only prompted by the cost of ebooks, which I think is the greatest barrier to further adoption of ebooks. After I finish the current book on my phone, I'm going to try again with my trusty Sony Reader and see what it's like to go back to e-ink after using a smaller LCD display.
The other barrier the Kindle system (by which I mean the Kindle store and any device which can access it) removes is finding content. The Waterstones website, at least when I last used it, is very fiddly and counterintuitive whereas the Amazon site makes it much easier to find the content you're looking for and get it onto your device.
Whatever ebook device I use, I'm completely committed to ebooks. I'm not one of those people who's nostalgic for the smell and feel of a physical book. It's just data, and I just want to download it.
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