Reading books and surfing the web with Amazon Kindle

I recently receive as a birthday gift a new Amazon Kindle. I had only seen the kindle in the Amazon web site, so I couldn't tell exactly how it looked like in actual use. Although I thought that it was cool, it is much more impressive when you can actually use it.

The Kindle is a reader for electronic books. It can be used to read any of the thousands of electronic books sold on the Amazon store, as well as in other web stores for ebooks.

Initially, I would like to explain what makes the Kindle a good ebook reader. Then, I will explain why the Kindle is more then simply a reader and can be used as a very valuable web access device.

The reason the Amazon Kindle is a good reader is that it is ergonomically designed to provide the best reading experience. Its size and shape have been created by Amazon to remind of the physical sensation of reading a normal book.

For example, the Kindle has a screen that uses a different type of lightening. The end result is that it is easier to read, and doesn't make you tired to read after a few minutes, like normal computer screens.

The buttons in the Kindle have also been designed to make it easy to move back and forth in the pages, like in a normal book. You can move pages in the Kindle very easily and without interrupt your reading position.

In all, reading a book in the Kindle is almost like reading a real book. With the only difference that you can change font sizes, and create electronic bookmarks (try to do this in a real book..)

But the Kindle is not only a book reader. It can also be used as a device to access the web. The main advantage of the Kindle in this respect is that it comes with wireless connection.

Of course, many devices have wireless access, but the Kindle can do it for free, and independent of a computer network. The Kindle uses a EVDO network, which just means that it uses the same connection as a cell phone. You can connect to the web from everywhere in US, as long as there is a mobile connection.

With the wireless you can access any web page, not only Amazon web site. For example, you can get thousands of web pages from wikipedia, with valuable information, for free.

You can also see other pages. The only disadvantage however, is that the internal web browser is not as good as a PC web browser. So, it won't show animations, javascript effects, and other niceties of modern web pages. Still, it gives you the information, and it is much better than what most cell phones are able to display (even if you are paying a data plan). 

The web access is also ideal to find content for the Kindle. FIrst of all, there is the Amazon store, where most Kindle books are sold by a fraction of the price of the original book. Most popular books are solve for $9.99, or even less.

But also, with the free web access, you can find lots of free materials that you can read, in all conceivable topics. For example, you can have access to blogs. Or to free e-books in the project Gutenberg. There is no end in the amount of content you can have with your Kindle. 

I truly believe that the Amazon Kindle is a bargain. It has a price tag that a little more than you would normally pay for a reader. However, the Kindle is more than that, it is a device that you can use to store lots of information.

You can transfer files from your computer, find files in the Internet, or buy from Amazon. Many other features that I didn't mention are also available, such as the possibility of playing music (mp3), or creating your own annotations in the electronic screen.

I think the Kindle is one of the most useful devices I ever had. Each day I am amazed with the amount of material that I have access with the Kindle, and how easy it is to read all of this content.