Jolenes Reading Information Blog

Posts Tagged ‘Amazon Kindle’

I have done a lot of research on Ebook Reader devices. I know that the Ebook Readers are supposed to be more “green” and the “wave of the future”. I sure hope so as I have created an inexpensive ebook site at: www.jolenesbooksandmore.com . I believe in the future of ebooks and have even read a few of them on my computer. I haven’t, however, broken down and actually bought an Ebook Reader Device.

I love electronic gadgets and am always willing to try something new but I am also always on a tight budget. Thus, my constant researching on the subject. I am still holding out for a decent, easy to use, generic ebook reading device that doesn’t cost somewhere between $250 to $400 to buy. I love the concept of the Amazon Kindle Reading device and have even incorporated a bookstore link page to them at: Jolene’s Ebook Store2. Don’t get me wrong, I have and will continue to buy things from Amazon and their concept is great. But I also would like to be able to upload my own acrobat reader files. According to their own literature on the website the Acrobat Reader Format is not quite perfected yet and any personal files uploaded may be charged an additional $0.10 fee. That is really not such a big charge but HEY! why pay any more for something I already own or have created myself? Plus, for right now, the price is a little too prohibitive for me.

Like I said there are other alternatives to Amazon and one of them is the Sony PRS-505/RC Digital eBook Reader – Redwhich comes in Red, Silver and Black. This product, from all of the literature, would be a great Ebook Reading Device to try and they claim to be able to read the Acrobat Reader files just fine. I have even found them for about $50 to $70 less than the Amazon Kindle. I may be able to try out that one if the discounted price offered at J&R Computers and Music holds out until I can save the money to get it. As soon as I get one to play with I will post another review.

Getting back to my original title of this post. “Going Green” is pretty important to me. I try to recycle as much as I can and I am looking into ways to convert from electric to solar for our home heating and cooling needs. (That is the subject of a very long post in the future). I have read and written articles at work for helping our environment with recycling, turning down or up the thermostat to comfortable for that particular season, using hand-dryers instead of paper towels (also another great subject for later) and cutting down on the trips back and forth for work by working longer shifts and taking more days off (that hasn’t been accepted yet but I am still hopeful). I am not as good about buying glass jars of food and reusing them as I have clumsy teenagers running around the house all the time and they have a tendency to break glass. I also own approximately 600 books. I keep the books that I buy and only give the ones I don’t want to read again to the library or exchange books at the local used bookstore. The concept of electronic books hasn’t really taken hold in our household yet!

There are always good and bad points about anything. The good about electronic books is that they do not collect dust, invite pests, take up room on a bookshelf, can fit about 100 of them into one device and only weigh as much as they device they are stored in. The bad about electronic books is that you have to have a device of some kind to read them, requires some form of electric power to see them, as of yet there isn’t a market to swap or exchange them for new ones, and if they device gets broken you cannot tape it back together again.

Now, I am homeschooling my daughter and starting next week I will be homeschooling my nephew as well. We are using a service offered by the Florida Virtual School. There are no textbooks, no papers to turn in and no reports or notes written to the parents. The whole thing is electronic. Everything is turned in via attachments from our computers. The tests are online, the grading is online and available 24/7. The teachers communicate via email, online bulletin boards and over the phone. This is a truly “green” service. I’m sure if the books that are required for reading in language arts classes were available in ebook form they would find a way to get them added to their virtual library.

Our local library and the University of North Florida offers the Net Library to check out electronic books as well. These, of course, require that you belong to one of these institutions with privileges to check out electronic books. The Net Libraries however are limited in that you have to check out the book on their site and read it with software on your computer at their site.

The other drawback to electronic ebooks is that not all authors are happy with the service. Some have stated that they would not want their books to go electronic because they can be “hacked” and sold without their consent. I hate to tell them but after the initial sale of the books by bookstores or from the publishing houses their books are sold, traded or just given away by those who own, traded or received the books for free anyway. Electronic books are protected under copyright just as the printed versions are protected so long as the guidelines are followed. Any infringement can be taken to court just like any other work. Copyright protection can be established for the courts by anyone who writes a novel, textbook or short-stories simply by printed out a copy, sticking the pages into an envelope addressed to yourself and mailing it. Once you receive it back, “DO NOT OPEN IT”, just file it away and the date of the postmark becomes your copyright date. The US Copyright office does not require that your work be published at all. If you fill out the application, pay the fees and turn in a copy of your work as required in their publication you will have your letter from them in a few weeks!

Finally, “GOING GREEN”, with electronic books is a good thing all in all. For it to take a good hold on our economy and our way of life the devices themselves will have to come down on price, be in “True Color”, and have more authors willing to accept it as “THE MEDIA” to publish in.

Till next time, be sure a read a book, whether it is electronic or paper!
Jolene