Technology Wins Again: Amazon's Kindle Surpasses Expectations and Paperbacks
It has multiple personalities. Keeps matters light. It's easy on the eyes. And creates room for all of your other oddball collectibles.
It's Netflix over Blockbuster, texts over calls, skinny over flared.
It's Amazon's very own love child, first name Kindle, and last name Success.
All bibliophiles alike will at first deny the claims that this little device could ever replace an actual book – the novelty of turning those gritty pages, the smell of fresh or vintage ink, whatever your preference. There's no way, no how.
Earlier in July, Amazon announced that the Kindle content was outselling hardcover books, according to CNN. However, "industry analysts quickly dismissed that milestone, pointing out that paperback books sell far more copies than pricier hardcovers."
But alas, the world falls prey once more to the powers of convenience and accessibility. E-books now outnumber the number of paperbacks.
The figures testify to all the traitors out there – for every 100 paperback books sold, 115 kindle books are instantly delivered.
It is a day that will live in paperback infamy.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos said in a statement, "This milestone has come even sooner than we expected – and it's on top of continued growth in paperback sales."
In a recent report by CNN, Amazon recorded quarterly sales of $13 billion for the three months that ended December 31, up 36 percent compared to last year. With a net income of $416 million, earnings have surpassed Wall Street's estimates – and English majors alike.
A 50 percent jump in sales was reported in Canada and the United States, while international sales climbed 26 percent.
This little baby boomer, tried and true, is already onto its' third generation. It features Wi-Fi, or 3G connectivity for the more flush Benedict Arnold's, E-ink Pearl display, 4 GB of internal memory, text-to-speech menu navigation, and Samsung DRAM and Flash.
Half an inch shorter and skinnier than the Kindle 2, it supports additional fonts and international Unicode characters.
With the wireless turned off, the battery life is advertised to last up to one month of reading on a single charge – although a paperback, to be fair, has an endless "battery life." Endless.
Yes, the instant delivery, if you're a speed reader, is tempting. And the thousands of scrumptious titles at literally the palm of your hand, whenever you want, wherever you want – that could be of use.
But the romanticism of reading – of turning the page, sifting through endless titles at used or new bookstores, underlining those heart-tugging moments with a ballpoint pen – all gone for the sake of accommodation.
In today's society, where fast, quick, and easy are heralded as the everyday mantra, let's hope some things will remain inexplicably inconvenient.
And if books have already taken the bite – then let friendships and love remain so.
