Is Stanza a Threat or an Ode to the Kindle?
By Joe Wikert
After hearing murmurings that the iPhone application/electronic book reader, Stanza, was going to pose a threat to the Kindle’s success, I decided to give the application a whirl and see how it stacked up. It didn’t. In fact, the only thing that I liked about the application was its name, as it’s apt. A stanza is about all I wanted to read on it. The relatively tiny iPhone/iPod screen has the glare of a computer, which is fine if you are using it like a computer, but annoying if you are using it like a book. Also, the fact that you are reading off your phone makes it difficult to read for pleasure as the medium itself is the antithesis of relaxation.
Additionally, as David Berlind pointed out in his recent post, Bezos already hinted at the fact that Amazon plans to make the Kindle books available on other ‘mobile devices’ which means that Stanza will quickly live up to its namesake (the poetic stanza) and become obsolete. If only they had named the company, EZ2READ maybe it would have fared better in a world that prefers acronyms to iambic pentameter.
Stanza’s only hope now is that it can figure out some way to team up with Amazon when Amazon decides to make Kindle books available on the iPhone. In all honestly, however, the only thing this will do is put the Kindle on a higher pedestal as it shines in comparison. Stanza, once a threat, now an ode to the Kindle.
email me at andrea@bobarra.com
www.bobarra.com
Posted by Andrea Nadosy
February 20th, 2009 at 12:02 pm
I love reading ebooks on my iPhone. Right now I’m using eReader from Fictionwise, but I have Stanza loaded on there as well.
I’ve been reading ebooks on the iPhone since July now, and I have never had a problem with a glare or the tiny screen. These reading apps let you adjust the font size so it’s comfortable for you.
Even if Amazon moves into the mobile reading arena, I’d highly doubt they’d kill off Stanza. Why? Amazon is too concerned about DRM. The beauty of Stanza is that it lets me read a wide variety of formats from different ebook websites. With the Kindle, you are pretty much stuck with Amazon (yes, you can convert stuff to their proprietary format, but that seems like a pain, if you ask me).
Furthermore, the iPhone is all I have to carry with me and I can make calls, check emails, manage my blog and read books all on one device. During a recent trip to the doctor, I spent my time in the waiting room knocking out a few chapters of the latest novel I’m reading on my iPhone. Didn’t even think about the glare or tiny screen - my only thought was getting lost in the story!
February 20th, 2009 at 1:02 pm
I use both a dedicated Reader (Sony 505) and the iPod Touch as ebook devices and enjoy both. The Touch is perfect when I’m out and about since it drops easily into a pocket, (try that with the Kindle or Sony)so it’s tops for convenience.
Stanza is a superb piece of software and doesn’t deserve cheap shots at its name. Pair it with a private web-server holding your library and it’s ease-of-use heaven.
The main iPhone/iPod drawbacks are battery life and poor performance in direct sunlight. I don’t find screen glare indoors to be a problem at all, and I’ve read from the device for several hours at a stretch.
My Sony (and I’ll make the assumption that it’s more or less the same as a Kindle in the broad strokes) provides an over all better reading experience than my Touch (or previously my Nokia) in that the battery life is good seemingly forever-and-a-day and E-Ink performs wonderfully in direct sunlight and mimics paper so well.
My conclusion is that I’m best served by having both devices, and by having a library I’ve standardized to EPub. One library that serves two different readers and I use whichever best serves my needs at the time.
February 20th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
And they talk about Mac faithful? I will agree that the iPod Touch/iPhone is not an ideal reading platform, but that kind of misses the point. The iPhone, and other mobile devices have been the nursery for ebooks and will continue to be an important device for reading ebooks because they are always with us. I love my dedicated reader, but even though I have one of the smaller ones (The Jetbook) it is not something that can easily and unobtrusively be brought with me wherever I go. A mobile phone or other small device can. Thus I can read a few pages of a book while waiting for a meeting to start, or for my lunch to heat up in the microwave at work, etc.
Now here is the thing, I am sure if Amazon handles it correctly, the kindle ebook format could be successful on mobile phones. The key of course is that books bought for either the mobile phone or the Kindle need to be downloadable and readable on either. I am all but sure Amazon will handle this correctly. That being said however, I doubt that KoP (Kindle on Phone) will dominate the mobile reader software market as Stanza and eReader are both developing ways of easily buying books and downloading them to the phone from the phone. Only that segment of the population that reads on both a Kindle and a mobile phone will be liable to switch… and I doubt they will buy a new mobile or switch cell carriers to do it either.
Of course all of this assumes Amazon is really serious about releasing fully featured Kindle software for phones. Lets be honest, they are making a lot of money on the hardware, there might be vested interests in Amazon that will slow down its development to keep from undercutting the Kindle hardware.
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Bill
February 20th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
Bill says:
“Lets be honest, they are making a lot of money on the hardware,…”
Are they?
I doubt that very many people outside of Amazon and Sprint know enough about the details of their contract to know exactly how much money Amazon is actually netting on each device.
My guess is that a huge part of the Kindle price goes to Sprint to pay for that constant data pipeline.
Personally I don’t think Jeff Bezos cares about making lots of money off the hardware itself. I think his main effort there is hoping to spark the sales of more ebooks so he won’t have to stock/warehouse/ship so many bound dead trees.
I do hope that Amazon will make Kindle books available on more platforms but I doubt that I will read any books on my Ipod Touch. The Touch is great for short bouts of reading stuff but I can’t stand it for book length material. Or trying to read outside during the day.
February 20th, 2009 at 1:45 pm
It seems clear that there are two camps of people: those who can read on the iPhone or Touch and those who can’t. And neither of them will ever understand the other.
(I’m composing this on my Touch in a hospital waiting room, so you can probably guess into which one I fall.)
Andrea, I think you’re in danger of overgeneralizing. Just because you don’t like Stanza doesn’t mean nobody else will. Judging by the success they’ve had so far, I think it’s safe to say they won’t be as much of an “ode” to the Kindle as you seem to believe.