It’s a good thing if you happen to be amazon.com.

Yes, there will be a new next thing and, eventually the market will shake itself out. Did you advocate waiting on the sidelines when the VHS Beta wars were going on…how about now, are you waiting for the next TV new thing to pop, before you buy it..What you claim to be a technological phenomena is not exclusive to e-books.

I also enjoy sitting down in the morning with the traditional newspaper format so I am not exclusive in my reading devices.

Yes, you are correct that sometimes you may not get connection, but the integration of reader, whispernet, and shopping cart makes for a powerful combination when, say you are on a train and say…boy I would like to see the New Yorker…literally, in 30 seconds, you are reading the current edition…

That is what I like about the Kindle.

…but you’re right, of course: Amazon isn’t the only entity that is pointedly not taking advantage of a truly global market potential. Most American companies could be doing much, much better.

(By the way: I had that “411″ thing fixed within 20 minutes of hearing about it! Let’s hear it for the speed of the web!)

I personally don’t think Apple will give us THE dedicated e-book reader in a touch-screen tablet, but I wouldn’t mind seeing them try!

Personally, I think the ‘winner’—if there is to be one—will be Apple, should they wise up to the trends and release an ebook-sized tablet with decent battery life and integration with the iTunes app store. They won’t call it an ebook reader, but I bet it will effectively be just that—especially if they use the iPod Touch OS and it can run eReader and Stanza.

This is yet another reason to keep in mind that Amazon is not the only player in this game, so it is ultimately counter-productive to tailor all of our products to the Kindle. Indies and even major publishers should be setting an example by tailoring our products to open-source markets, pressuring Amazon to follow suit, and encouraging customers to vote with their wallets.

If customers duly respond to open-source products and curtail their buying of proprietary material and/or DRM’d material, Amazon can roar and thump its chest all it wants, but will have to follow to stay in the game… or make itself even better for customers, to keep market share.

Rob: Thanks. I’ve addressed that issue in the past. One of my biggest reasons for open standards is to avoid the kind of situation you describe. Here’s to a bigger e-book pie for everyone, not just Amazon! A monopoly situation would be good for Amazon’s market share, but still would mean lower earnings in the long run because of the interference with the industry’s growth. People don’t want to entrust their libraries to a giant monopoly that, as we’ve seen in Ian’s case, can yank books away from them at any time–even if the alleged abuses don’t involve returned books. David

I’m a big believer in competition–at all levels. I wish Amazon great luck–as long as other people continue having luck as well.

Rob Preece

That said, the Kindle is on people’s minds now, and as commentators, we can’t ignore this. Rather we should point out the risks of readers, writers and publishers relying so heavily on one company and one format. We should nudge Amazon toward adoption of the nonproprietary e-Pub format and the replacement of proprietary DRM with either no-DRM or social DRM. I’d also like to see Kindle capabilities such as WhisperSync replicated in other brands in a compatible way. In fact, see the latest installment in my little campaign for open syncing.

Thanks,
David