Subscribe to

I try to not talk too much about my gadget obsession, mostly to avoid spending too many nights on the living room couch. But a few weeks ago I got a Kindle, and Amazon’s little reading device has far surpassed my expectations. Sure, the battery time is great and you can’t beat the wireless connectivity. There are enough interesting Kindle books on Amazon to keep me reading for the rest of my life, and there’s also a fair amount of good free content. And reading on the Kindle is a breeze. I actually like it more than reading a normal book as I don’t have to turn pages anymore.

But here’s where my Kindle has surprised me the most—it has turned me into an avid newspaper reader again. I stopped reading newspapers about 10 years ago when I felt that too much ink and paper were put to waste. Plus, newspapers are rather un-viral as I am not one to scan an article, and I only use snail mail when writing “I’m sorry” cards to my girlfriend. Now every morning I get up with a copy of the New York Times waiting for me on my Kindle. It’s easy for me to take notes, forward articles to friends and even bookmark entire pages. Compared to reading news on my laptop, the Kindle is much easier on my eyes and it won’t burn my lap in the bathroom. Plus saving a day of news doesn’t result in piles of paper anymore.

I got a Kindle to change the way I read books. Oddly enough, it’s is changing how I consume news and made a irrelevant medium relevant again.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 3rd, 2008 at 5:59 pm and is filed under Gadget Talk. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.