Amazon’s Kindle Draws the Reader In

The popular e-book device isn't perfect, but it's pretty darn good. Moreover, it points to a very exciting future for the world of publishing.

May 17, 2008 - by Charlie Martin

This morning, I decided to drop down to my local coffee establishment for a breakfast of coffee, eggs, and some morning reading. I had a lot of new things, and pre-coffee I’m not up to making decisions, so I just brought several things to read: Peter Kramer’s Against Depression; Marianne Williamson’s The Age of Miracles; Wayne Dyer’s Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life: Living the Wisdom of the Tao; and for a little more rigorous reading of Buddhism I brought The Dhammapada, D.T. Suzuki’s Manual on Zen Buddhism, Steve Hagen’s Meditation Now or Never, and Buddhism Is Not What You Think — great title, that — the complete works of Edgar Allen Poe and Mark Twain; Sun Tzu’s Art of War and Musashi’s Book of Five Rings; a couple of novels; some books on Ruby and Python programming; the most recent issue of Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine; Locke’s Essay Concerning Human Understanding and Second Treatise of Government; John Stuart Mills’ On Liberty; Paradise Lost, Shakespeare’s Sonnets; and some Larry Niven.

“What, in a wheelbarrow?” you’re thinking? No, in my Kindle. Of course, it’s only about 30 percent full.

(Could someone direct me to nominations for the Eclectic Reader World Series, by the way?)

Actually, that’s not a complete catalog of everything I currently have on my Kindle — there’s only so far I’ll carry that joke with a straight face — and even that isn’t all the books I have for it. I also have a number of books — like Jonah Goldberg’s Liberal Fascism, which I wrote on some weeks ago — that are waiting for me on my stored books at Amazon. But that I deleted from memory on my Kindle, mostly just to see how I could do it.

It would be fair to say I’ve become a fan.

The Kindle is Amazon’s entry into the “e-book” market. It’s neither the first, nor in some ways the best, but it has one dramatic advantage in that it’s tied to Amazon’s amazing technical infrastructure and Jeff Bezos’s deep pockets and passion for the printed word. Physically it’s a little bit bigger than a common pocket book, a little smaller that the usual “trade paperback” — call it 5 1/2 by 8 1/2 in the custom leather cover that comes with it. Weight, a little less than a pound. (Look, if you want to have exact details, go look at the website.) The actual reading surface is about 6 inches diagonally (according to Amazon; clearly someone from the TV department was writing the copy) which makes the reading surface as tall as a 3 by 5 card held vertically, and maybe a half inch wider. Again, not far off from an old-fashioned pocket book paperback, a little smaller. The actual reading surface is “e-Ink(tm)”, which looks very much like conventional paper and is about as clear as relatively inexpensive paper printing.

I have to admit, when I first got it, I was a little put off. The text area seemed a bit small, and the physical object is a little odd. There are “next page” buttons on both the left and right edges, a “previous page” button on the left edge only, and a “back” button on the right edge that frankly isn’t all that intuitive at first — it seems to always be set to do something but it’s not clear what. There is a keyboard of tiny “chicklet” keys that are arranged to be easy to use with two thumbs if you’re adept with two-thumb typing — which I’m not — and a peculiar little scroll wheel on one side that’s used for picking from a menu. The Kindle page has a nice video demonstration by a guy with a pleasant voice and a calm manner.

For the first day, you’re going to need the calm voice, at least if you’re like me. I kept playing about with it, all the time thinking “how long can I use this before I can’t send it back?” The buttons didn’t do what I wanted, and I kept paging forward when I didn’t mean to. I suppose I needed to learn how to use a book comfortably too, but then when I learned to read, Gutenberg was just working out the whole movable type thing anyway.

After a short while, though, I caught on. Then I discovered something about it, and I began to really like the thing. In my day job, I read a lot of technical material, and a lot of that is available only as a PDF file. Call me old-fashioned (oh, go ahead, you know you want to) but I don’t like reading long documents like that on my computer screen. It makes my eyes tired. If I really need to read something like that, I’ve often sent it off to the printing shop, to be printed and bound in one of those nasty plastic comb things.

Then I have to store them, or shelve them, or throw them away.

With a Kindle, you can email the document to a special email address, and for a few cents Amazon converts it to a Kindle file, and sends it via “Whispernet(tm)” to the Kindle. (You have to be able to get cell phone reception, so that feature won’t help you much in Siberia or an elevator.) Boom, my PDF manual was there on my Kindle. I sent a couple more: boom, boom. (It doesn’t really go boom, but that’s the way it struck me). If I’d have printed those manuals, I would have about a shopping bag full of unpleasant comb-bound laser-printed books to lug around.

I was starting to like the thing.

Then, while I was writing the music industry piece for PJM, I wanted to re-read The Long Tail. I’d long ago lent my copy to someone, I didn’t know who. I could have ordered another copy, for about $18, and gotten it in one day (for another $4 shipping) … or I could push the one-click button and have it delivered to my Kindle for $10. Right now. Less than a minute later, I had it.

Oh, my. Suddenly, the whole thing began to make sense. It struck me, for probably the one hundredth time, that I really should finish reading Moby Dick. (It’s the chapter on “whiteness” that kills me. Okay. It’s white. It’s a white whale. Whiteness is, like, symbolic. I got it. Cripes.) Click, and I had it, for a couple bucks. I wanted to re-read some Poe. I could find it easily enough; the Raven is all about — but for about $3 I could have Poe’s complete works. Click. Same with Twain, and I nearly bought a complete Shakespeare — I’ve got three of them on paper already — but settled for the Sonnets for 99 cents. Delivered instantly. I could get today’s issue of the Frankfurter Allegemeine, today, for 75 cents.

I’m convinced. Send me the Kool-Aid Jeff, you’ve got a convert.

Okay, so it’s not perfect. The keyboard is nearly useless, at least to me, although I’m sure my text-message-happy niece would find it completely natural. It seems to have some issues with non-standard text. One of its handy features is that you can use it to read Wikipedia and other web sites, as well as look things up in its built-in dictionary. Nice feature, but I looked up Śūnyatā and the letters with diacriticals just flat-out thwarted it: “Śūnyatā” comes out “nyat”. A cedilla, “ç”, comes out as a regular “c”, at least in text supposed to be English. (To be fair, I’m sure that’s just a firmware issue, and Amazon will correct it eventually. But I want it now, dammit.)

The accumulation of little charges — 75 cents, 99 cents, and so on — freaked out the credit card company for a while, until they confirmed I really was making 75 cent web purchases. Worst, at least for now, is that while there’s a lot of content available for Kindle, there’s also a lot of things that still aren’t. When I began to really get into it, I thought, “Oh joy, I will have more room!” Well, yeah, but not as much as I’d thought: I still buy five or ten physical books a month, and most of the magazines I like aren’t available on it yet.

The Kindle, though, is really a first-generation device: there are already new devices coming out, with bigger “paper” and more features. The iRex iLiad is bigger, and lets you take handwritten notes — and it’s about twice as expensive. Other vendors have them as well, but none of them have the combination of the e-book reader, the wireless delivery, and the content back end that Kindle has.

The future of these things is bright, though. First of all, the price is sure to drop; electronics always does. Soon, a lot of schools will be ordering texts that can be delivered as e-books — Metro State in Denver already does. And, as publishing is more and more divorced from the costs of physically producing the physical books, it’s sure to change the publishing industry — no more advances, but no more big barriers to publication, either.

So it’s not perfect. On the other hand, as I looked at my Frankfurter Allegemeine today over coffee, before re-reading Larry Niven’s Flatlander, and looking up the 29th sonnet (“When in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes/I all alone beweep my outcast state”) for the college girl — far too young for me, but interested in the Kindle in my hand — I have to say, it sure is pretty good.

Charlie Martin is a Colorado computer scientist and nearly-successful screenwriter who contributes to the Flares Into Darkness political blog as ‘Seneca the Younger,’ and blogs under his own name at the aggressively non-political Explorations blog.

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45 Comments

1. Patrick Carroll:

All this, and it’s http://igorsk.blogspot.com/2007/12/hacking-kindle-part-1-getting-console.html as well.

Saving my pennies as we speak.

May 17, 2008 - 6:33 am 2. b:

“(Could someone direct me to nominations for the Eclectic Reader World Series, by the way?)”

Oooh… I think actually you need a Mac and a Starbucks coffee.

May 17, 2008 - 6:35 am 3. Wildmonk:

I will second the review overall but note that I had no trouble with the layout of the keyboard. The only area I’d like to see improved is the resolution of scanned graphics. When reading a work on popular biology, I found some of the graphics difficult to read. Other than that, this thing is really a wonder.

Oh, and Charlie is right to point out that what really makes the Kindle a must-have is the integration with Amazon.com.

May 17, 2008 - 7:16 am 4. Charlie (Colorado):

B: Dude I’ve got four Macs. And a Starbucks card account. But I can’t get by on a scone in the morning, I need protein.

May 17, 2008 - 7:22 am 5. Charlie (Colorado):

Thanks, Patrick. Here’s a link that works Gods willing — we need a working “preview” — and that is a pretty fascinating looking series of articles.

May 17, 2008 - 7:32 am 6. David Thomson:

I am not going to purchase the Kindle at this point in time. A reactionary luddite like myself will probably wait until 2010. I want more of the bugs to be removed. Nevertheless, I completely concede that the Kindle is here to stay.

May 17, 2008 - 8:14 am 7. Daily Pundit » Kindling the Flame:

[...] Not All Bush  Kindling the Flame May 17th 2008 @ 6:15 am Culture, Technology Pajamas Media » Amazon’s Kindle Draws the Reader In Then, while I was writing the music industry piece for PJM, I wanted to re-read The Long Tail. [...]

May 17, 2008 - 8:20 am 8. TGWShark:

Good review. I didn’t think Amazon did PDF conversions, though? Am I wrong?

I had some extra money and violated my rule of “never buy vs. 1.0″. Like you, I’m enjoying it, flaws and all. Now, I think I’ll look for some Niven to add to my list.

May 17, 2008 - 8:37 am 9. Kindle review up at Pajamas Media | Explorations:

[...] Here’s a link. I even got Instalinked for this one. [...]

May 17, 2008 - 8:45 am 10. Jeb:

The screen technology is great, if only the rest of the device matched it. Hopefully in the near future there will be higher screen to device ratio, direct pdf support, and water resistant casings.

May 17, 2008 - 8:53 am 11. tbrosz:

I’m impressed by the technology, but let me know when they make one that’s waterproof and shockproof that I can take to the beach or drop on the sidewalk without having a heart attack.

To be fair, none of my books are waterproof either.

May 17, 2008 - 9:07 am 12. Charlie (Colorado):

TG, they definitely do the PDF conversions. You just mail it to a special email address. The conversion isn’t wonderful — it mangles hyperlinked tables of contents, for example — but as I said, I’ve got, or, 20 Solaris references in mine.

May 17, 2008 - 9:43 am 13. cds:

I bought my wife one for Christmas and she loves it. It’s hard to read, because people are constantly asking you what it is, how it works, and where to get one.

The “nest page” and “previous page” buttons do need to be made smaller, but you do get used to them.

May 17, 2008 - 9:44 am 14. kitten:

We were in Borders the other night and I thought the Sony reader was really cool…I want one. I want to have PDFs and to be able to put magazine articles on so I can read them at my leisure. I want to be able to read in bed. I want to be able to read things from Book Glutton and other free book sites…maybe even Gutenberg but I hate reading ASCII text.

Thanks for your review of the kindle.

May 17, 2008 - 1:25 pm 15. Annie:

From the reader point of view, I’m convinced. What about from the writer point of view? So far, other than the .pdf docs for work, most of the books you mentioned are well-known. (Forgive the extreme understatement. Shakespeare = “well-known”?)
What about for emerging writers? Is it worth their time to “publish” on Kindle? Will it create a small author revolution?
Not that I have any vested interest, understand… just because I happen to be a small author…

May 17, 2008 - 2:03 pm 16. Misanthropicus:

Re b: “ooh… I think actually you need a Mac and a Starbucks coffee.“ RE “could someone direct me to nominations for the Eclectic Reader World Series, by the way?)”

Yo, b – Mister Cartesius, I assume…
You locked a high IQ demographic in your post: operating a Mac at Starbucks, MoveOnOrg, Tibet and “Our Marriage Doesn’t Hurt Your Marriage” badges on your WholeFoods gown, Obama and Free Mumia Jabal-slogganed Prius outside – towering, indeed!

RE cds: “It’s hard to read, because people are constantly asking you what it is, how it works, and where to get one.”
cds, bab’: when you buy a book or whatever contraption like the “kindle”
you don’t do that to rush and sit grinningly in a coffee shop and answer questions regarding it. Unless you’re powered by b’s grasping intelligence.

May 17, 2008 - 2:51 pm 17. Gozer the Carpathian:

I decided to go the Internet Tablet route instead of the Kindle for one very important reason: Darkness. I know, I know. It’s bad to read in the dark, but I find myself doing most of my reading in the dark or low light conditions and the Kindle, while being a nifty device, still requires a book light to use in the dark. So I would be paying how much for something I can use when I normally use it without an accessory? Sorry.

The Nokia N800 (which is actually an older model internet tablet) does all the fun things the Kindle does and more. Plus it only cost me $200. (Just dropped to $150)

Now does it require a bit more work to get your books into it? A little. As you say no eReader is perfect, but I would submit that for my usage my tablet performs better than the Kindle or Sony’s eReader does.

Though for me the biggest point the article aludes to is the future of books. Digital books are such a great idea and the future of publishing in a lot of ways. The biggest advantage is that more authors can now be published, and it’s doen wonders for the gaming (Pen and paper stuff) industry.

May 17, 2008 - 4:09 pm 18. Charlie (Colorado):

Annie, I really didn’t research that in detail, because this was already running long for a PJ piece. Looking at the Distribution Agreement, it doesn’t look awful — if you are self-publishing via Kindle, you get a 35 percent royalty, they pay 60 days after the sale, both sides can revoke the agreement but Amazon gets to keep an archived copy so they can re-supply a book that someone has purchased. Publishing looks to be simple — upload the book in HTML, with a few custom tags for Kindle specifics, or convert it for Mobibooks, or upload Word or PDF. (Some of the things I might publish would have heavy equations, and I don’t see yet how they handle that.)

Now, I Am Not A Lawyer, this Should Not Be Taken as Legal Advice, etc., and I can see an argument that charging 65 cents on the dollar for formatting and sending it out might seem kind of high — on the other hand, it’s essentially no cost to do it, and you get a potential audience and a better cover-price royalty than you’d get from a printed-brick publisher.

May 17, 2008 - 4:15 pm 19. Dale:

If you want to waterproof a Kindle, just stick it into a baggie. It’s still fully functional and you can read in the tub, if you are so inclined. I used to say that I liked to take baths because you couldn’t read in a shower. Well, that is no longer the case.

During intermission at a BSO concert the other night I took out my Kindle to check my g-mail, soon people were gathering around to watch. It was a high-end audience — they all had heard of the kindle and just wanted to see it in action. Their biggest concern was text size and they were glad to see that it was adjustable. From the comments I heard at least a couple of them planned to buy one.

May 17, 2008 - 7:45 pm 20. John:

I’m interested, but wonder whether it can handle larger PDFs, say like 250+MB files. I’m concerned the gadget will freeze up or slow to the point of being unusable.

May 17, 2008 - 9:20 pm 21. joe:

I have lately been reading a few books from http://www.booksinmyphone.com The screen on my old cell phone is pretty small, but within a few pages the authors voice was dominating the experience. The killer advantages for me are the optional ‘night mode’ red on black color scheme and the fact that I don’t have to think about carry or charging another device – the books are just ‘there’ in the phone.

I have internet connectivity and with a few clicks from the mobile version of the site (mobile.booksinmyphone.com) I can find and install books ranging from _Moby Dick_ to contemporary SicFi (thanks to Creative Commons licences).

It seems like Kindle and other special purpose readers will get squeezed out between improving cell phones and ultra small laptops.

May 17, 2008 - 11:46 pm 22. Charlie (Colorado):

Joe, I suspect you’re right to some extent. Historically, general purpose computers drive out special-purpose ones because it’s too easy to add general-purpose features to a special-purpose device.

If you look over at my “computers in ten years” piece, you’ll notice I was talking about a “$20 Mac Air”. My day job research has a lot to do with how we’ll make a small cheap device look like a much bigger device by exploiting the Internet and the “compute cloud”; if that, or something similar, works out, then I can imagine a “Kindle” application for the general purpose netbook.

John, my Kindle only has about 200 MB of storage, so I’m confident it would be trouble, although you can add an SD card for more space if you want. But what I want to know is where in God’s name are you finding 250MB PDF files?

May 18, 2008 - 8:32 am 23. Lily Bart:

I love to read. I always have. I love the feel of the paper in my hands. I love to scan my bookshelves, brimming with books. As my eyes scan the titles I remember my enjoyment of these works. I cannot ever see myself buying an electronic gaget to ‘hold’ my books. But then, I am still using my filofax. Keep your blackberry! (I do like my Ipod though).

May 18, 2008 - 10:50 am 24. in_awe:

Like Lily Bart, I love the feel of a book, and I can’t find a book on my bookshelves that doesn’t have some sign of my perusal – notes in the margin or multi-colored highlights. Once I can make a book “my own” with electronic annotations I’ll consider a Kindle. Until then, I continue to enjoy my books the old fashioned way.

May 18, 2008 - 12:09 pm 25. Charlie (Colorado):

in_awe, then you’d better fill out an order. Again, I didn’t hit everything you can do, and I rarely mark up a book so it’s not that important to me, but that’s part of why it has a keyboard: you can make notes, you can capture bookmarks, all from in the Kindle.

And Lily, believe me, anyone who could see into my apartment would know that I like physical books as much as anyone; my apartment has been described as a two-bedroom library. I’m as surprised as anyone how much I like the Kindle.

May 18, 2008 - 1:38 pm 26. John Moreschi:

Can you underline? or highlight in color? These are mandatory for me. I don’t read books that I can’t underline.

May 19, 2008 - 9:35 am 27. Bill Quick:

Charlie, I’ve been beating the drum for e-readers for a couple of decades now – the reality has finally (mostly) caught up to my hopes.

You shouldn’t be surprised that you like the thing. Almost anybody who reads a lot and gives it a fair tryout will end up liking it.

I’ve got a Sony right now, but I’m all agog over what’s coming for the next generation of e-readers.

Right now, my biggest gripe is that every single new release doesn’t come in a e-book format along with everything else.

May 19, 2008 - 10:14 am 28. Charlie (Colorado):

John, color is right out: the eInk doesn’t do color. Underlining yes. Also searching your markups, bookmarks, etc. (Let’s see a paper book do that!).

May 19, 2008 - 11:06 am 29. TakeFive:

While you might make a case for business use – reading PDFs and cross referencing for an article, this seems like a waste of money for recreational reading. If book downloads were 99 cents, I’d be onboard.

A better version of this device would allow the book to be either read or listened to.

May 19, 2008 - 11:14 am 30. Charlie (Colorado):

TakeFive, the books are still cheaper than paper ones. I actually find it better for recreational reading in some ways — the text and button issues are less annoying with plain text, so anything that’s just running prose. Second, I’d say, it mathematics, where you’re going back and forth over a few pages; mosy annoying is PDF books, like manuals, that don’t translate their tables of contents successfully. (The benefit of being able to carry thousands and thousands of pages of manuals on a Kindle is still substantial.)

May 19, 2008 - 2:30 pm 31. Craig (Seattle):

You most definitely should pull the S/F Kindle Novel “Recon of Worlds” (by guess who…)for you’er next coffee breakfast. It is a great system for new writers.

May 19, 2008 - 3:01 pm 32. John Moreschi:

Charlie (Colorado) — Thanx! The underlining question was my only hangup. I’m on board. I think I will suggest for myself as a Christmas present.

May 19, 2008 - 3:20 pm 33. Joel:

I suppose – if you have the disposable income, and want to help enrich and encourage Amazon’s fee for use DRM encumbered distribution system. Sure. It isn’t like there are any alternatives – right?

Well – let’s see. For ~$50 and a used Palm off of eBay I can load books galore. I don’t have to pay usurious Amazon fees to translate the works either. I can use Gutenberg and “plucker” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plucker) to grab – for free – tons of content. If I *have* to have DRM’d books – most anything available for the Kindle can be loaded as well. Fits in a pocket much more easily than the Kindle – and is much less expensive to replace. I also put text on my iPod using iPodlibrary – not for everyone, but works for me. If I have to read my gmail -I can do *that* with my phone.

[Oh and "Eclectic Reader World Series" reading? Give me a break. I've got Ancient literature, medieval, and modern. SF from Baen books, Burroughs and Verne. Essays from Chesterton and more. I'm sure the Kindle is nice, but ... besides having a library in my pocket - my old Palm PDA left something else - money.]

May 19, 2008 - 4:11 pm 34. Charlie (Colorado):

Looks interesting, Craig, I’ll put it in the queue right now.

May 19, 2008 - 5:05 pm 35. juvat:

Charlie,
I’ve got two questions. First, I’m looking to potentially buy this for my Dad. He can read large print books and newspaper headlines, but that’s about the extent of his vision. Does the kindle’s font get to about that size? Second, what happens to books that you need to delete from the kindle to make room? Can you reload them later or are they gone for good?
Thanks
Rick

May 20, 2008 - 7:07 am 36. TakeFive:

Charlie (Colorado) wrote:

“TakeFive, the books are still cheaper than paper ones.”

I guess if you need to read the lastest release of Harry Potter right away, that’s probably true. But if you wait a few months, you can pick it up pretty cheaply on Amazon used book. Even cheaper – the local library. Mine buys about 6 or 8 copies each time one is released. And they have about 500 years worth of other literature to read while you’re waiting.

In fairness, I haven’t tried the Kindle and might love it. But this seems like a very expensive way to buy books.

“I wanted to re-read The Long Tail. I’d long ago lent my copy to someone…”

Could you loan this Kindle e-book to someone? Could you borrow one? Donate it to the library? Once that hardback gets passed around, its cost pretty well gets amortized down to nothing.

I’m sure this device has it’s place, but if a simpler tool will do the job without creating future electronic waste, should that maybe figure into the overall benefit. Apologies in advance for coming off like scold.

May 20, 2008 - 9:48 am 37. Joel:

Ah – and another neat choice I just found: Manybooks.net – lots of formats of many, many free books. They even have a neat way to download books to your cellphone: mnybks.net has jar files (Java apps) that give you whole books to read on your cell. Again – no DRM, no charge (beyond your connectivity to the net with your cell).

May 21, 2008 - 6:22 pm 38. Charlie (Colorado):

Juvat, sorry to be slow. The print gets bigger that most large-print books. My mother’s having macular degeneration problems, and it’s big enough that she can read it.

May 22, 2008 - 2:12 pm 39. Pajamas Media » Ask Dr. Helen: When Being Professional Means Being PC:

[...] and buy the Kindle that I’ve had my eye on (especially after reading Charlie Martin’s review on it) and never look [...]

Jun 5, 2008 - 12:46 am 40. Jamie Irons:

Charlie,

Great review. Like you, I’m an eclectic reader, and scattered around me as I write this are the books I’m currently reading (Norton Critical Edition of “The Waste Land,” Broch’s “Tod des Vergil,” Otto Toeplitz’s “Calculus: A Genetic Approach” (I recommend that one to you!), Gilbert Strang’s “Introduction to Applied Mathematics” (an autographed copy!), Victor Bryant’s “Metric Spaces,” and “UNIX for Mac OS X,” among others…

I think I’m going to await the second-generation Kindle, but I’m tempted to not wait after reading your piece.

Best,

Jamie

Jun 5, 2008 - 8:26 am 41. Lawst:

Personally I’m loving my Kindle. Because of my experience working in the software and computer industry I tend to hold off on new technologies. I won’t say this was forced on me, but my Kindle was a gift. I wouldn’t have spent the money on such a new piece of technology. It’s worth the price.

Working in an engineering firm means trips to the field and sometimes having to lug around back-breaking ammounts of referance books. If I forget a book, oh well. Many of the books we have at the office are in PDF format. So I can call the office, tell them what I need and have it sent to my Kindle so long as I have signal. I can do mark-ups, books marks…AND I can read it in full sunlight. Cell phone and palm screens are too small and some tablets are too large and heavy. The battery life is also far longer than that of most other devices I’ve used.

It’s true that the Kindle isn’t for everyone. It’s true that it takes some getting used to, just like any other device. There’s good an bad to every device. So far I’ve had a better experience with my Kindle than any other device in spite of it being larger than the average PDA and only in black and white. I’m still a book collector…I won’t ever get away from that. The Kindle is simply another method for me to read.

Jun 9, 2008 - 8:47 am 42. Pajamas Media » Manufacturing on Demand: The Future Is Now:

[...] to daily life: music distribution without the need for big physical production plants, electronic book publishing, and even what the continuing advances in computer technology will mean to computers [...]

Sep 18, 2008 - 3:09 am 43. Jacob Anders:

Can I have more details on this?

Jan 9, 2009 - 5:27 pm 44. Jane Hobbos:

Can you please give more details on this.

Jan 10, 2009 - 5:53 pm 45. custom essays:

WOW, this’ll keep me busy for years. I’ve been subscribing to your RSS feed for months, but somehow I missed this great list.

Aug 11, 2009 - 10:44 pm