Kindle has to be one of the dumbest ideas ever invented (imho.)
You have to spend $300 on a device that does nothing but reads e-books. A function that could easily be done on any number of devices people already own (from pc, to pda, to ipod, to cell-phone.)
For someone who travels, an e-book that is no harder on the eyes than a printed page, that is smaller and easier to pack than any hardcover or paperback, that has the latest titles available for half what paper costs, , on which I can carry reference materials, that doesn’t make you squint like an iPod or PDA and that has battery life orders of magnitude longer than a mobile computer would be invaluable.
I’m relatively sure I’ve saved the $300 purchase price for my Sony e-Book on discounted titles already. Of course, I read a lot more now - 3-4 books a week instead of just one or less.
I love my kindle! A laptop is too big if you travel, or even if you’re just sitting in your living room, and if you have ever tried to read a book on a PDA or a cellphone, you probably wouldn’t be urging it!
The Kindle feels like a book, it “turns pages” with dedicated keys and you can adjust the font size. You can get hundreds of books on one Kindle, if you like to have a lot of reads going at once, shopping for new ones is a breeze because the book wirelessly downloads in seconds (which is not true on any of the other devices), and you can get free samples sent to your device if you want to browse before buying.
My only complaint is that the publishers of liberal books seem to be better on releasing their stuff on Kindle. I’ve only been able to buy a couple of conservative books this way, and I hope publishers will wake up to the conservative market.