*michael parekh on IT*

ON A COOL KINDLE FEATURE

ONE SMALL STEP

I've been an avid user and fan of Amazon's Kindle book reader since the original launch, having now bought and read hundreds of books on the Kindle and the excellent Kindle for iPhone (free) software App. 
One of the big differences between reading a book on the Kindle (either generation) and the iPhone App has been the ability to highlight the content of the book and write notes in the margin as it were (can't do all that on the Kindle App...yet).
But once the notes are in the Kindle, attached to a specific book, they're kind of trapped in there.  The opportunity around making this stuff available on the web is of course a no-brainer.  Today Amazon took a baby step in this regard, as this TechCrunch piece explains:

"Amazon opened up a new feature on the Kindle: the ability to read your notes and highlights on the Web. Readers have always been able to make notes and highlight text on the Kindle itself. Now those annotations appear on your account at http://kindle.amazon.com. Once you sign in, you can see all your notes.

While this opens up all sorts of possibilities, Amazon is taking a very conservative approach. You can’t share your notes with others. You can’t even edit them in your browser.

All you can do is read them. That makes the feature little more than a Web archive of your notes and highlighted text snippets. It is a convenient feature, but why not enable sharing?

Why can’t I share an excerpt with my friends on Facebook or Twitter (with the beginning of a quote and a short link)?

Amazon needs to connect the Kindle to the rest of the Web.  Hopefully, this is the first step in that direction."

Couldn't agree more.  Hope Amazon's listening.

ON ANDROID BEYOND THE iPHONE

ALL THE REST

The newest Smartphone using Google's long-anticipated "Android" platform will finally be available to users on October 22nd, via T-Mobile, on hardware by Taiwanese smartphone behemoth HTC.

Dubbed the G1, it's a promising first attempt as a whole lot of hands-on reviews on Techmeme would indicate.  I'd recommend the ones by Mossberg, Pogue, Engadget, Gizmodo and Crunchgear amongst others as a start.

What's interesting to note that almost every review compares the G1 to Apple's iPhone, which of course is the "Gold Standard" competitor of most mainstream interest.

And the general consensus of these reviews seems to be that the G1 is a promising start as compared to the iPhone, with more improvements to come from Google, other hardware and wireless providers.  This observation by Om Malik of GigaOm on Google's software platform, stuck in my mind:

"Amazingly robust operating system with little or no lag time. It makes Windows Mobile feel like a retiree; even the iPhone feels like a middle-aged person compared to Android OS."

Which brings up the following observation going through most of the full-on reviews of the G1.  What seems to be lacking in most of them so far, was the almost total lack of direct comparison vs. other major Smartphone platform providers like Symbian, Windows Mobile, Blackberry, Palm and others.

If you look at the market share of these systems in this Wikipedia entry, the iPhone is so far a distant number five in market share, as of Q208:

1. Symbian OS from Symbian Ltd. (57.1% Market Share Sales Q2 2008 ^[13])
2. RIM BlackBerry operating system (17.4% Market Share Sales Q2 2008)
3. Windows Mobile from Microsoft (12.0% Market Share Sales Q2 2008)
4. Linux operating system (7.3% Market Share Sales Q2 2008)
5. iPhone OS from Apple Inc. (2.8% Market Share Sales Q2 2008)
6. Palm OS developed by PalmSource (now a subsidiary of ACCESS) (2.3% Market Share Sales Q2 2008)

As the old joke goes, when a few folks are running from a hungry bear, the survivor has to focus on outrunning the other runners, not necessarily the bear.  The list above shows that there are a whole host of runners besides just the iPhone*.

Google has a whole lot of opportunity for Android beyond the iPhone, both from a mind share and a market share perspective.  With  pre-orders for a few hundred thousand or more for the T-Mobile G1, they're obviously on their way to catch a few other runners besides the iPhone.

I'd particularly be interested in seeing reviews of the new G1 Android platform against the latest Windows Mobile device and Nokia's N95 or N96, which are the ultimate "do-it-all" smartphones that serious geeks around the world have gravitated towards in the last year or so. Nokia is said to have sold over half a million unlocked N95 devices in North America alone, despite the fact that no US wireless carrier "officially" supports that uber-smartphone.

These comparisons and reviews are likely forthcoming, and for now be more relevant for Google to beat with it's Android initiative than just Apple's iPhone.

Update:  Om Malik has a good post on the challenges Windows Mobile faces with the arrival of Android, with more thoughts to come on Symbian.

* Image source.

ON THE LONG-RUNNING BLACKBERRY/iPHONE RACE

THE FIGHT GOES ON

Research in Motion (RIMM) is up almost $10 today on the news of it's answer to Apple's iPhone, the Blackberry Bold (formerly known as the Blackberry 9000).  To be available later this summer on AT&T first and then all the major carriers, the new Blackberry borrows quite a few design cues from last year's iPhone, as this Ars Technica post illustrates and describes:

"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that RIM has taken a few design tips from the iPhone this time around. The Bold's all-black enclosure with a chrome border, combined with the high-contrast screen make it indeed a very, er, bold-looking new BlackBerry. Physically, the resemblance is striking.

Of course, the iPhone currently lacks many of the features that the Bold has—namely 3G capabilities, integrated GPS, Bluetooth that actually works with something besides a Bluetooth headset, video recording capabilities, and camera zoom.

However, many of these features are expected to be announced soon at WWDC for the next-gen iPhone. At the very least, a 3G iPhone is all but guaranteed, and GPS is widely-rumored to be included. And, of course, the iPhone already offers desktop-style web browsing in addition to a giant multi-touch screen that the Bold doesn't have."

The piece goes onto list Blackberry's unique advantage vs. the iPhone:

"On its own, however, the Bold is still a very attractive option for those in business who are married to things like the BlackBerry's handling of corporate e-mail and the non-touchscreen keyboard that many BlackBerry enthusiasts still love.

On the flip side, Apple said at its SDK Roadmap event in February that the iPhone 2.0 software will introduce "real" Exchange support, push e-mail, and other enterprise features that it currently lacks, possibly bringing it up to speed with the BlackBerry in that regard."

One has the killer physical keyboard and industrial-strength email capabilities.  The other the killer touch-screen with the "real internet", and a universe of software applications to come.

It looks like I'll be upgrading to BOTH the Blackberry Bold and the new 3G iPhone and continue to carry both around for a while longer. 

No clear-cut winner yet.  It's Experience vs. Hope all over again.

Looks like this race between the two devices will run at least  as long as the Clinton-Obama contest before we have a clear winner.

ON GADGET ETIQUETTE IN MEETINGS

MULTI-TASKING NO NOs

ABC News ran a story on a recent silicon valley trend with the titillating title "Going Topless to Office Meetings", wisely adding the sub-title, "Why Silicon Valley employees are going to meetings Laptop-less".

Here's the gist:

"In the headquarters of Dogster, a networking site for pets, employees are allowed to bring their dogs into meetings but they can't bring their laptops or any other electronic device...
So far, Google, Yahoo and Apple are among the companies encouraging their employees to ditch high-tech distraction and engage with their colleagues.

Topless has gone beyond high-tech companies. Laptops are not allowed in some classrooms at USC's law school. Etiquette coach Colette Swan said, "We are becoming an internalized society. We are living in our laptops, our cell phones, in our texting."

It's a logical trend going forward, although increasingly difficult to enforce, as more innovative gadgets come along all the time. 

A case in point is the LiveScribe pen that I wrote about some time ago, which is finally starting to ship to pre-orders.  It's designed specifically to improve productivity in the workplace (see demo video here). 

But I'm sure like any other technology, users will find ways to use them for distracting purposes.

Disclosure:  I'm an investor in Dogster.

ON SURPRISING APPLE RECORDS IN 2008

LEFT FIELD

This piece in Ars Technica titled "Mac OS X market share sets new record at end of 2007" highlights the 7.3% share Macs have taken at the end of November.  This by itself is not that much of a surprise. 

What was more interesting was what the piece has to say about the iPhone, introduced just six months ago:

"Finally, the iPhone has tripled its admittedly meager market share, going from .04 percent in July to .12 percent six months later. What's interesting here is not the uptake so much as how the iPhone is categorized—as an OS."

Here's a tech projection for 2008 I hadn't seen coming:

"It's quite possible that by the end of 2008, the iPhone will surpass Linux, which isn't too hard since it rates only .63 percent."

That is something to consider, given how long us computer geeks have waited for more friendly user interfaces for Linux based computers to catch on.  One of the minor tech highlights of 2007 was Dell finally introducing Linux based computers and laptops for mainstream users.

That the iPhone could be the the hare that passes the Linux turtle so quickly is something special.

Especially since Apple has committed to delivering an SDK (software developer kit) that finally makes it possible for third-party developers to bring forth a flood of applications for the iPhone, in an approved manner that won't break with the release of every update of the iPhone "OS".

It's one of the key tech developments I'm looking forward to in 2008.

ON THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF 2007

DIGITAL COLLECTIONS

This Sunday's edition of the New York Times brings it's list of the ten best books of 2007, which includes both fiction and non-fiction titles. 

Only two of the books were in my library already (The Nine and Imperial Life in the Emerald City), so there's quite a list of books to discover.

As a test, I checked to see how many of the ten were available in digital form to be read on Amazon's Kindle device, and happily, the number is sixty percent. 

Not bad at all for a new device and ebook format.  It validates the appeal of the Kindle vs. other ebook formats like the Sony Reader, given that the Amazon Kindle library has over 90,000 titles vs. something like 20,000 for the Sony product.  Plus, with Amazon's price subsidty, most of the titles are priced at $9.99 vs. $20 or more in other formats.

So, I've wirelessly ordered all the Kindle titles, and look forward to catching up on my new reading list for 2007.  The rest will have to wait until they're available on the Kindle.

ON THE THRILL OF THE READ

BREAKING THROUGH

After several days with the Amazon Kindle, I'm ready to call it a "Thriller" product.  A lot of nits have been picked by a lot of folks on how this could be so much better.

But for any lover of reading, there are three things that transcend the specific attributes of the device and service:

1.  Amazon Whispernet:  The embedding of broadband wireless has a backbone of the service makes the Kindle experiment in portable commerce really unique compared to anything we've experienced online before.  It's a model that'll likely be emulated by other portable products by a range of third-parties, much in the way the iPhone made multi-touch interfaces a whole new way to do phones and music on the go.

In fact, after browsing, researching and buying dozens of books off the Kindle, and then using the iPhone to buy a music track or two off it's Wifi iTunes store, I couldn't help thinking how a Whispernet type of data network would make a future iPhone/iPod so much more useful.

2.  The e-Ink screen: Despite the fact that the screen is not back-lit and doesn't do color, it really nails what it does try to do, which is try and duplicate the experience of reading on paper.  The text is crisp and eminently readable for hours.  And yes, it'd be nice if it didn't flicker to black at the turn of every page, as the page reset itself to the new page to follow.  But it's really amazing how attached one can get to reading off the Kindle. 

3.  The selection:  This is the part of the Kindle experience that makes me the most optimistic that my investment in a couple of Kindles (one for my wife) and dozens of books is going to be worth it in the long=run.

Given that this is an Amazon service, there are over 80,000 titles to choose from vs. 20,000 or so from competing services like the Sony Reader.  And one can imagine how the Kindle library can grow pretty quickly from here.

Most of all, one of the coolest parts of the Kindle experience is having a paperback sized gizmo, that lasts for days without a charge, with a growing collection of all the stuff you like to read.

And it's a very different online experience than laptops, PDAs, smartphones, MP3 and video players.

There a lot of ways the Kindle can be improved, and in future posts, I'll add my two-cents on them.

But for now, this is one of the coolest things from Amazon to date.

Recommended for any fan of books.

ON KINDLE BOOKS AND THE REAL THING

TIPPING POINTS

As I wait for my Amazon Kindle reader to arrive tomorrow, one thought occurred to me.  Most of the discussion on the new gizmo from Amazon (see Techmeme) is centered on how the Kindle will (or will not) finally get the long-awaited e-book market going.  Or if it'll out iPod the iPod in the book/magazine category.

But the question that occurred to me was the following.  How might the Kindle impact my book-buying habits over the next 12 months?  I'm talking about the real, old-fashioned, physical books.

By way of background, I've been a book geek ever since I could read a few decades ago.  And my wife some times thinks I buy books like Imelda Marcos collected shoes.

And I've been buying most of my books online (primarily through Amazon), since Jeff Bezos got the whole buying books online thing going over a decade ago.

Assuming any book title I want over the next 12 months is available in Kindle format (a big assumption given that the Kindle library is starting at a relatively modest 80,000 titles), I'm probably better off buying in e-book form rather than the physical book.

As an aside, the Amazon Kindle collection is already greater than alternatives out there, especially Sony's Reader ebook store.

For one thing, it'll likely be cheaper than the real thing, given that Amazon is subsidizing Kindle titles for a while (most best-sellers are $9.99).

But even if they weren't, the titles will be more convenient to own in electronic form, especially since they're sharable on multiple Kindles between my wife and myself.

And they'll always be available for re-download on Amazon if I lose or damage the Kindle (I misplace physical books sometimes).

Not to mention I'll be able to take notes in the margins on the Kindle (something I do a lot with physical books), and access/share these notes with others.

Anecdotally, I'd already started to buy ebooks over the real thing for my Sony Reader when I had a choice in my titles of interest.

So it'll be interesting to see if I end up with more e-books than real books over the next year given the broader and deeper Amazon Kindle initiative.  I'll be watching for that tipping point, if it comes.

ON A KINDLE POST-ORDER EXPERIENCE

PROMISING STARTS

Well, as expected Amazon officially announced it's Kindle e-book reader today, and there are a fair number of reactions up on Techmeme.

And as I indicated in last week's post, I ordered one.

One positive surprise before receiving it tomorrow, is this nice email from Amazon:

"Dear Michael Parekh,

Thank you for your purchase and welcome to Amazon Kindle.

We built Kindle with the goal of creating an exceptional and hassle-free reading experience. As such, we wanted to point out a few details before you get started on Kindle.

Your Kindle is automatically registered to the same Amazon.com account you used to make your purchase. This enables you shop, purchase, and download books, newspapers, and magazines wirelessly from your Kindle device right out of the box. Your Kindle purchases are made using your existing default 1-Click payment method at Amazon.com. If you wish to change the payment method associated with your Kindle, you can do so by visiting Manage Your Kindle on Amazon.com.

If you purchased your Kindle as a gift for someone else, you should deregister your Kindle device from your Amazon.com account. You can deregister your Kindle from the Settings page on the device or at Manage Your Kindle on Amazon.com.

You can start building your library before your Kindle even arrives by shopping for books, newspapers, magazines and more at the Kindle Store on Amazon.com.  Amazon's unique wireless delivery system, Amazon Whispernet will auto-deliver your purchases directly to your Kindle. Once you receive your Kindle, you can also shop the same great selection directly from your device.

Here's what you have to look forward to reading on your Kindle:

*     More than 80,000 books including New York Times Best Sellers and New Releases for $9.99, unless marked otherwise.
*     Top U.S. and International newspapers including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Le Monde, and Frankfurter Allgemeine.
*     Top magazines and journals including TIME, Forbes, and Atlantic Monthly - all wirelessly delivered to your Kindle before they hit the newsstands.
*     More than 250 top blogs from the worlds of business, technology, sports, entertainment, and politics, including Slashdot, Techdirt, Boing Boing, FOX Sports, Michelle Malkin, and The Huffington Post.

We hope you enjoy reading on Kindle and look forward to hearing about your experience.  Send us your feedback at kindle-feedback@amazon.com.

Sincerely,

The Amazon Kindle Team"

What really comes through here is Amazon's determination to keep this as simple as possible for Amazon customers.  Other than charging it when you get it, the device promises seamless integration with the Amazon experience customers are used to on the online store.

No question the $400 price tag is a steep entry point.  Silver lining is that there're no additional fees for the broadband wireless EVDO connectivity via Sprint's network.  Amazon has essentially built a custom MVNO that makes the wireless connectivity an integral feature of the device.

The other plus is that Amazon is obviously subsidizing thousands of books at a top price of $9.99, even though the publishers are charging much higher prices for the same product on other eBook services like Sony's Reader product.

One negative though is that the company is charging one to two bucks to subscribe to hundreds of pre-set blogs that otherwise can be consumed for free on the internet. 

Unlike the iPod, to which the Kindle aspires to imitate in reading material, there's very little free content that the user can load up his/her Kindle with.

And that's a bit of a shame.  It could have enhanced the out of the box utility of the device substantially.

I'll reserve further judgment on the Kindle until I get mine and have had a chance to use it a bit.  More to follow.

Update:  A couple of online reviewers have noted the ability to have more than one Kindle in a household share the books purchased off a master Amazon account.  Although I couldn't find any official confirmation of this off the Amazon site, I did speak to an Amazon Kindle rep on the phone, who did confirm this.  He wasn't sure how many Kindles per household were allowed to share the books, but he indicated it's at least four.

A big negative here though is that this sharing policy does not apply to newspapers, magazines and blogs subscribed on an individual Kindle.  That seems to be limited to one copy per Kindle only.  That's obviously like a magazine or a newspaper charging multiple subscriptions per member in a household for a physical product.

Makes no sense, but it seems to be what it is for now.

ON AMAZON JOINING THE E-BOOK QUEST

INTO THE FRAY

The long anticipated e-book reader from Amazon will likely be announced this Monday, according to this CNET report:

"On Monday, the online retail giant will unveil its Kindle e-book reader at a high-profile event in New York, an industry source told CNET News.com Thursday. Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos is expected to be present for the announcement, to be held at the chic W Hotel in Union Square.

The Kindle is equipped with a Wi-Fi connection that taps into an Amazon e-book store, which users can access to purchase new electronic books--and Amazon has reportedly signed onto a deal with Sprint for EVDO access.

Additionally, the device comes with a headphone jack for audiobooks, as well as an e-mail address."

The article correctly points out that e-books have yet to see any meaningful market success, despite respectable offerings by Sony and others.

I continue to be optimistic on the category, although I'll be the first to admit that it'll likely be a while more before e-books take off.  One of the most critical drivers is price of the books themselves.

Publishers continue to charge readers the same price for e-books as they do for the printed product.  That'll keep the product a small niche for early adopters and eternal optimists like me.. 

I'll be ordering the Amazon product next week and compare it to my experience over the last year or so with Sony's e-book reader in a future post.