>>>Geeking out on the idea of getting a Kindle DX. Anybody pre-order yet?
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>>One intriguing thing I have read is that it will revolutionize college textbooks (and boy does that business need revolutionizing), with students buying Kindle versions of required texts instead of hard copies. We'll see. We have seen the wild enthusiasm and predictions that often accompany new gizmos many times.
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>Right now you can get pretty much anything Amazon sells on Kindle. They are partnering with Washington Post, NYT and others. I know here at Case where they've always been on the cutting edge of technology stuff they are going to be making it something every student will have.
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>I visualized this thing 30 years ago and it is very very cool to see it coming about. Just makes perfectly good sense to me. If I'm feeling rich (or more likely, delusional ) in a couple months when they are shipping I may actually pop the $500 for one.

We have some things in common. I love new gizmos, too, and have been predicting for a long time (not 30 years) that e-books will be a Really Big Thing. It hasn't happened as quickly as I thought it would but with the boost from Amazon and the Kindle it seems to finally be taking off. This afternoon on the airplane I read that about 30% of Amazon's units sold are Kindle sales for titles that are available both ways. (The article was mainly about the backlash against some titles coming out now at more than the standard $9.99 Kindle price, which is apparently a loss leader, or maybe an attempt to squeeze the publishers depending on your POV).

When I was hired for this gig a few weeks ago I indulged myself in one thing. Well, two, the first being a nice but not extravagant meal with the girls at our favorite Italian restaurant. The second was a Kindle. So far I only have made three purchases, for a total cost of about five bucks -- the complete works of Shakespeare, the complete works of Dickens, and (hold onto your hat <g>) the Bible. Titles are cheap when the author is long dead and there are no royalties to pay. I am sure there will be many to follow, more in the $9.99 vein.

The killer feature of e-books: the ability to search for something, then zip back to where you were. How many times have you been reading a book, especially one you may have put down for a while, and not quite remember who a character is? With an e-book it's a breeze. As a habitually promiscuous reader, that alone is worth something to me.