The Kindle Needs To Target Students
I just finished watching Jeff Bezos (founder and CEO of Amazon) on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Bezos (after maniacally laughing for a few minutes) was showing Stewart the new Kindle 2. I’ve never seen a Kindle but I hear they are really great. The problem is the cost. $350 is not cheap. So my guess is that until the price comes down, the Kindle will be reserved for the “innovators” and the very wealthy.
There is one target market that would love the Kindle. That market is me, a student. I spend hundred of dollars on textbooks every semester and would pay greatly for the reduction of weight in my knapsack (yes, I carry a knapsack. I know it’s lame, but between textbooks and a laptop, the health of my spine comes before looking good). If Amazon could start stocking all the new textbooks, students around the world would buy a Kindle tomorrow. Is anyone out there know anyone working at Amazon? Any chance of this happening any time soon?
i have been checking every semester for my text books to be out for kindle and so far after the 3 semesters it has been out i have only had one text book on it
hopefully they pick up the pace because your absolutely right it would be great for students!
I don’t just mean college students. I remember carrying around knapsack that weighed as much as I did in 3rd grade. This would be amazing for elementary school students as well.
Kindle is a practical step toward saving trees since it’s more practical than carrying around a stack of books.
I think the Kindle is actually cool, except I have a few problems with it:
1. The batteries on my paper-based books never die, and they never need to be recharged.
2. Reading a screen puts more strain on my eyes than reading a paper book (although the Kindle, from what I’ve seen, does an *excellent* job of reproducing print on screen).
3. I do the bulk of my reading on the weekend – Friday night and Saturday specifically – which wouldn’t work with the Kindle.
4. I imagine the books have some form of DRM on them which would frustrate me.
That said, I *do* think it’s cool that the Kindle can connect for free to cellular wireless networks and surf the web (related: http://xkcd.com/548/).