Kindle, iPad, MacMillan, and the Death of a Business Model
I bought a Kindle 3-4 months ago. Met a guy in a coffee place, and he essentially did Amazon’s sales pitch for them, told me how wonderful the thing is. I don’t regret the purchase, it really is pretty much what he told me it is. You buy a book, and you’re reading it within two minutes max. While the selection of stuff available isn’t overwhelming, it’s clear that most of the publishers are aware of what’s going on, and most of their books are available. The newer ones, anyway.
When the iPad came into play, I looked at the articles, and thought about it. The Kindle has a very weak and inconvenient web browser on it; I’ve barely used it, because I don’t really want/need such a thing. I have a laptop, and I use it for my computer tasks; I have a Kindle, and I use it to read. I suppose if I had something that could do both things I might be willing to combine them, but I don’t know if the iPad is the thing. And I’m certain it’s not much competition for the Kindle.
For one thing, it’s more money. The Kindle (when I bought it a few months ago) was $300. The iPad is $530, with another $80 or so if you want 3G wireless connectivity, so you can log on wherever you are. The Kindle does that for the base price. So the iPad is about twice the price, to start. Then, if you’re going to buy books through it, the prices in the iBookstore are higher. You can do more on the iPad, though many people are grumbling about the lack of Flash support and the absence of a webcam.
So, you can spend a lot of money, and buy a bigger iPhone without the phone. It can do a lot of stuff, but it can’t do webcam stuff or Flash. It can do books, but it costs about twice as much as a Kindle all around. To my mind, as it stands, why wouldn’t you stick with your laptop or desktop, and buy a Kindle? Maybe the iPad will, in the future, get competitive, but for now it’s a big toy that can do books. If you have to have one (for your business, for instance) the book feature might be worthwhile, to save you carrying a separate piece of hardware. That is, if you have the extra money to pay for the books.
