The Kindle product page is up -- from the product overview therein:
Revolutionary electronic-paper display provides a sharp, high-resolution screen that looks and reads like real paper. Simple to use: no computer, no cables, no syncing. Wireless connectivity enables you to shop the Kindle Store directly from your Kindle—whether you’re in the back of a taxi, at the airport, or in bed. Buy a book and it is auto-delivered wirelessly in less than one minute. More than 88,000 books available, including 100 of 112 current New York Times® Best Sellers. New York Times® Best Sellers and all New Releases $9.99, unless marked otherwise. Free book samples. Download and read first chapters for free before you decide to buy. Top U.S. newspapers including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post; top magazines including TIME, Atlantic Monthly, and Forbes—all auto-delivered wirelessly. Top international newspapers from France, Germany, and Ireland; Le Monde, Frankfurter Allgemeine, and The Irish Times. More than 250 top blogs from the worlds of business, technology, sports, entertainment, and politics, including BoingBoing, Slashdot, TechCrunch, ESPN's Bill Simmons, The Onion, Michelle Malkin, and The Huffington Post. Lighter and thinner than a typical paperback; weighs only 10.3 ounces. Holds over 200 titles. Long battery life. Leave wireless on and recharge approximately every other day. Turn wireless off and read for a week or more before recharging. Fully recharges in 2 hours. Unlike WiFi, Kindle utilizes the same high-speed data network (EVDO) as advanced cell phones—so you never have to locate a hotspot. No monthly wireless bills, service plans, or commitments—we take care of the wireless delivery so you can simply click, buy, and read. Includes free wireless access to the planet's most exhaustive and up-to-date encyclopedia—Wikipedia.org. Email your Word documents and pictures (.JPG, .GIF, .BMP, .PNG) to Kindle for easy on-the-go viewing.
See the product page for more details and some intriguing videos.
A few quick impressions:
- $9.99 for NYT best-sellers and many new releases -- compelling
- No monthly wireless fee (I look forward to seeing details on how Amazon.com pulled that off...)
- Everything backed-up on-line
- Free Wikipedia access -- very cool
- Nice in-context features, such as dictionary look-ups
- Magazines and blogs/feeds can be downloaded, but they're fee-based
- Another fee-based service ($.10): you can email Office files to your Kindle account; Amazon transforms and makes the content available (for reading only, I assume)
I suspect Kindle will be a very successful product, if the service is robust and reliable. I also hope Amazon.com will be aggressive with school systems; a Kindle-like model would be much more effective than having kids lug around 30 pounds of books every day...
Amazon.com: Kindle: Amazon's New Wireless Reading Device: Kindle Store
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