As the reborn Kindle proves, looks don't count for everything.
It's not as attractive as the iPad, but Amazon's formerly derided e-reader is cheap and, most important, efficient

John Naughton The Observer, Sunday 29 August 2010

The latest Kindle e-reader. Photograph: Reuters


The newest version of the Kindle e-reader is out. And guess what? "Due to strong customer demand," says the Amazon website, "Kindle is temporarily sold out. Order now to reserve your place in the queue... orders placed today are expected to dispatch on or before 17 September."

This is interesting, is it not? It's not all that long ago, in the fevered run-up to the launch of the Apple iPad, that conventional wisdom held that the Kindle was a dead duck – roadkill for the iTunes/iBooks steamroller on the highway to the future. I mean to say, the Kindle was sooo clunky: you had to press buttons just to turn the page and how 1980s is that? With the iPad, you just swooshed your finger and – hey presto! – the page turned. Cool.

Then there was the impact of the iPad on publishers, who saw the Apple iBook store as a way of breaking Amazon's stranglehold on sales – and, more important, the pricing – of ebooks. And so it came to pass that the Kindle was consigned to the role of brave but outdated pioneer. Amazon might have triggered the ebook revolution, but it would be Apple that would wind up running the show.

The problem with this kind of thinking is that it is based on an elementary schoolboy mistake, namely the assumption that, in a networked world, it is the hardware that matters most. According to this view, because the iPad, viewed purely as a device, was seen as incomparably superior to the Kindle, it followed that Apple would triumph in the ebooks market.

Let's deal with the hardware issue first. The iPad is indeed a much more powerful and versatile device than even the latest Kindle. But as an e-reader, it has some major deficiencies. First, at 730g, it's pretty heavy, so any extended reading session requires support from a lap or table. Second, its reflective screen makes it difficult to read in bright light. And it's damned expensive.

On these three factors, the new Kindle wins hands down. At 247g, it's much lighter; the screen is readable even in bright sunlight; and it's much, much cheaper — £149 for the model which comes with Wi-Fi and free 3G connectivity. You can begin to see why Amazon might have trouble meeting consumer demand for its new baby.
Full story at The Observer.