Why I Hate My Kindle
I love my Kindle 3G. I have no problems saying it. If there was ever a piece of electronics I could willingly spend my life with it's my Kindle 3G.
Which makes my IPhone exceptionally jealous. It tries to keep up. It has my IPod, more games than I'll ever really play, a wonderfully synced calendar that runs my life, and every phone number of every person that's ever called me. The phone number thing should be enough to make the IPhone my favorite toy. It even has a Kindle app on it. But the screen's not quite big enough to really read on. It does all right in a pinch but it's not quite right.
My Kindle though, it has a beautiful screen. There's no glare on it. My hubby sprung for the book cover that has its own self contained light that runs off the Kindle's battery. Best. Christmas. Present. Hubby.Ever.Bought.Me. Period. (I meanwhile gave him a child 2 weeks before Christmas so I will always win the Christmas wars. Score One for Me.)
But as much as I love it. I also hate the bloody thing. And I hate it because of my very favorite feature –Send Sample To Kindle. If you don't have a Kindle you may not know about this feature. The Send Sample feature on the amazon.com website sends you the first 1-3 chapters of a book for free so that you can start reading it to see if you like it. No more worrying about buying a book blind and finding out that you don't like it later. You can read a couple chapters, if the story doesn't suit your fancy you just delete the sample and call it a day.
Deleting samples isn't my problem. I've done it a few times when looking for books for my oldest since she's at that odd age/reading level where she's technically capable of reading YA but she's not mature enough to handle some of the older YA subject matter. I check the book out as a sample, decide if it's okay subject matter, then if it is I'll buy it for her at some point but if not the book is on the "not yet" list. Easy as pie.
My problem is what happens with "mommy's samples" that I like. See here's the problem. At the end of each sample is a little clicky link that says "Buy This Book Now" which takes you right to Amazon.com's Kindle store and buys the book with the credit card you keep on file for one click purchases. Do you know how easy it is to hit that link because you're dying to find out what happens next? My guess is Amazon was hoping for that. And as an author I love that ease of purchase. I'm hoping it will help sell my books. Won't lie, it's a beautiful thing for an author.
But for a reader? It's not a good thing. Especially if you read like I do. I usually manage between 5-10 books a month. I'm Amazon's version of a wet dream. That little clicky link is my undoing. In the month of January I spent $200 in kindle books and $180 was from the sample clicky link. Hubby grimaced. February I spent $150. Hubby got cranky and grumbled about the quality of Pittsburgh's libraries. March, I removed my credit card from my Amazon profile. I can no longer hit the clicky link to buy and it's added time to the checkout process every time I do buy something from Amazon's site but it's killed my clicky link hitting compulsion.
That means my Kindle and I can go back to our happy relationship together. Somewhere my IPhone is crying. Which is probably why it's refusing to hold a charge anymore.
Which makes my IPhone exceptionally jealous. It tries to keep up. It has my IPod, more games than I'll ever really play, a wonderfully synced calendar that runs my life, and every phone number of every person that's ever called me. The phone number thing should be enough to make the IPhone my favorite toy. It even has a Kindle app on it. But the screen's not quite big enough to really read on. It does all right in a pinch but it's not quite right.
My Kindle though, it has a beautiful screen. There's no glare on it. My hubby sprung for the book cover that has its own self contained light that runs off the Kindle's battery. Best. Christmas. Present. Hubby.Ever.Bought.Me. Period. (I meanwhile gave him a child 2 weeks before Christmas so I will always win the Christmas wars. Score One for Me.)
But as much as I love it. I also hate the bloody thing. And I hate it because of my very favorite feature –Send Sample To Kindle. If you don't have a Kindle you may not know about this feature. The Send Sample feature on the amazon.com website sends you the first 1-3 chapters of a book for free so that you can start reading it to see if you like it. No more worrying about buying a book blind and finding out that you don't like it later. You can read a couple chapters, if the story doesn't suit your fancy you just delete the sample and call it a day.
Deleting samples isn't my problem. I've done it a few times when looking for books for my oldest since she's at that odd age/reading level where she's technically capable of reading YA but she's not mature enough to handle some of the older YA subject matter. I check the book out as a sample, decide if it's okay subject matter, then if it is I'll buy it for her at some point but if not the book is on the "not yet" list. Easy as pie.
My problem is what happens with "mommy's samples" that I like. See here's the problem. At the end of each sample is a little clicky link that says "Buy This Book Now" which takes you right to Amazon.com's Kindle store and buys the book with the credit card you keep on file for one click purchases. Do you know how easy it is to hit that link because you're dying to find out what happens next? My guess is Amazon was hoping for that. And as an author I love that ease of purchase. I'm hoping it will help sell my books. Won't lie, it's a beautiful thing for an author.
But for a reader? It's not a good thing. Especially if you read like I do. I usually manage between 5-10 books a month. I'm Amazon's version of a wet dream. That little clicky link is my undoing. In the month of January I spent $200 in kindle books and $180 was from the sample clicky link. Hubby grimaced. February I spent $150. Hubby got cranky and grumbled about the quality of Pittsburgh's libraries. March, I removed my credit card from my Amazon profile. I can no longer hit the clicky link to buy and it's added time to the checkout process every time I do buy something from Amazon's site but it's killed my clicky link hitting compulsion.
That means my Kindle and I can go back to our happy relationship together. Somewhere my IPhone is crying. Which is probably why it's refusing to hold a charge anymore.
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