I have been resisting the urge to buy a Kindle since they came out. However, this week while I was traveling to San Jose I felt really inconvenienced by carrying 5.2 pounds of books in my carry-on luggage. Currently, I am reading the SQL 2008 Internals book (3.2 pounds) as well as the Clive Cussler novel, Atlantis found (2 pounds).

While I was sitting on the plane one of my co-workers, Bryce, pulled out his Kindle 2 and I was immediately jealous. Bryce, is the guy at my office who has all the toys. He not only has a Kindle 2 but he also has an Asus Eee PC netbook with a 40GB SSD and a bunch of other toys that I have been drooling over. In any case, I am at a point in my life where my kids toys usually take precedence over mine. However, once in a while you have to splurge, so I treated myself to a Kindle 2. I weighed the advantages and disadvantages and I really felt that the Kindle 2 would be a worthwhile purchase for me:

Advantages

  • Easier to travel with a Kindle then lugging around heavy books.
  • Buying books for the Kindle are cheaper. Not to mention, that there are a lot of free books available in the Kindle format. Since, I buy a lot of books from the internet I also end up paying shipping and handling. With electronic delivery I know longer will have to incur these costs.
  • I do not have to go to the bookstore in order to purchase a new book. I can sample books right from the Kindle and have it sent to my device in less than 30 seconds.

Disadvantages

  • The Kindle costs $300 USD. Even though I will slowly recuperate the costs over time this is still a considerable amount of money to shell out for an eBook reader.
  • Some books are not available in the Kindle format.

Some people claim that they like the smell of books and that they enjoy having a physical book in their hands. Most of the people who say this, secretly want a Kindle but they are either to cheap to buy one or they do not have WAF yet. Did I mention that Amazon ships the Kindle with the wireless signal turned on. This means I can deliver books to my Kindle before it reaches my house. As soon as I open the box I can start reading!