4th Edition, Kindle & The Future of Gaming Books

[Umbran]

And $400 is pricey, but you actually may save money in the end if you already buy enough books / subscribe to several newspapers. The prices on the media are very competitive (e.g., $9.99 for a new book then available only in hardcover for no less than $17).

Yeah, but if you are a reader of paperbacks, you don't seem to save anything yet. Kindle books run from $6 to $10 - with an apparent average around $8, matching a typical paperback.

New technologies don't tend to take off until they not only solve a problem or provide a new service, but also save people money.

The Kindle is an interesting thing that gives a glimpse of where the future might be, but it isn't ready for prime-time yet. Wait for Sony and Amazon to go a couple rounds trying to one-up each other, and bring down the production costs, and maybe functionality and price will come to someplace really useful.

This use-case conflicts with the iPod's desire to be small. Paperbacks are the size they are for a reason - it is about small as you can make a page and still make it useful. So, the iPod and iPhone form factors just don't cut it.

And gaming books have even larger pages because they are different from novels, which means neither the kindle nor the iPod will do them as well...

 

[Festivus]

No to PDFs, but you can convert PDFs to another format for reading on the Kindle as I understand it.

I would honestly love one of these things, but not for $400. $200 and if I could get all my game books, plus native PDF reading on it I would be all over it. Who knows, it could happen.

 

[TerraDave]

This is in the "intrigiung" stage. Far from must buy. And I am not convinced for reference works like game books.

But it will be interesting to see how it develops.

 

[MojoGM]

I have the Sony Reader

www.sony.com/reader

I like it, but PDF documents are a little small to read, so they would have to have a larger font.

But I use it for WORD documents all the time

Bring on the new tech!

 

[WhatGravitas]

Yeah, but if you are a reader of paperbacks, you don't seem to save anything yet. Kindle books run from $6 to $10 - with an apparent average around $8, matching a typical paperback.

<snip>

The Kindle is an interesting thing that gives a glimpse of where the future might be, but it isn't ready for prime-time yet. Wait for Sony and Amazon to go a couple rounds trying to one-up each other, and bring down the production costs, and maybe functionality and price will come to someplace really useful.

This sums up my feelings as well. The main attraction of the Kindle is probably the "paper-like screen" - because PC screens are hurting the eyes with time...

Cheers, LT.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

WotC needs to get into this with Dragon and Dungeon magazines. Then they can get back all the former subscribers who want to read them while sitting on the can.

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

I have the Sony Reader

www.sony.com/reader

I like it, but PDF documents are a little small to read, so they would have to have a larger font.

But I use it for WORD documents all the time

Bring on the new tech!

I have the SONY model as well and agree, it can read PDFs but not resize them so if the original page size of the pdf was much larger than the Reader screen text and images can end up too small to read easily.

I just take whatever file I need and convert it to either .rtf or .doc I prefer .rtf as in my experience that resizes to an eye-friendly text size faster and more smoothly than .doc Battery life is a bit short in my opinion, certainly not the length commonly claimed and I'd suspect the Kindle's battery life claim is similarly inflated. Overall I like the Reader, but I like it because it's compatible with open standard file types and what little DRM it features can be broken. It looks to me like the Kindle is more locked in and for me at least that would be a no-sale even if I didn't have the Reader.

Everything they say about digital paper is true, it's easy on the eyes, smooth with good resolution like real paper and is fairly good on power consumption.

 

[carmachu]

Oh hell no. Not paper I dont want it.

 

[Szatany]

$400 just for the device, and then you need to buy the books to read? As cool as it looks, I'm not interested at that price. I'm with Hobo. If it is still around and in wide use in 5 years and costs less than $100, I might consider it.

Of course by then Apple will probably have adapted the iPod to do the same thing, but better.

Not yet, but I imagine the price will drop considerably as this device gets more popular and widely used (just like cellphones, just not as much, remember how unwieldly and expensive were first models?). In 5 years it might cost 80 or so USD.

I can't wait till character sheets are made for this toy.

 

[Amphimir Míriel]

Ahahah... did anyone else catch that the book being read in one of the preview videos is Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age? Clever.

If that book can teach my kids math/reading&writing/martial arts/philosophy/etc. then I will gladly buy two... I just hope they don't become warrior slaves to a chinese girl.

For me? I'll take the "Don't Panic!" version, in warm and friendly yellow