Posted on Tuesday 31 August 2010
I just received the brand-new Amazon Kindle 3G last weekend and I love it! I’ve been thinking about getting an e-reader for a while but up to now I didn’t like the form factor. But this newest edition of the Kindle is smaller, lighter, has even better contrast and more memory, among other things. The high-contrast “e-paper” is really amazing and honestly feels and reads just like actual paper. For a while I thought maybe I should get an iPad, but I decided against it for several reasons. First, I want a dedicated reading device that’s optimized for just one thing – reading. The iPad, while a nice toy, is neither here nor there in my opinion. I’ve seen dozens and dozens of people at airports with their iPads, and invariably they’re doing one of two things: either they’re surfing the web, or they’re reading an e-book. Now, if I want to surf the web, I prefer my tiny little laptop, because it also serves as everything else at the same time – I can use Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, Word, etc and it has USB hubs (which the iPad lacks). And if I want to read an e-book, the iPad doesn’t cut it either – the glary screen is just like a computer screen and will eventually strain your eyes, just like a computer screen (and try reading an iPad in bright sunlight – impossible with that glare…). So for reading an e-book, I prefer a dedicated e-reader like the Kindle, with its high-contrast, low-glare “screen” (I hesitate to call it that because it doesn’t feel like a screen, it feels more like an actual paper page). Of course, the Kindle wins out on battery life by a huge margin – one charge will last you up to a month, while the iPad dies after about 10 hours or so… Oh and then there’s of course the price – iPads are ridiculously overpriced, while the Kindle starts at $139 (iPads start at $499). Don’t get me wrong, I’m a gadget fan and if somebody gave me an iPad I’d keep it of course :-) But I don’t really see the point, and I’m not sure what else I would use it for – certainly not for extended reading, and I’m not much of a games person either. For serious readers (which I consider myself to be), a dedicated reading device just makes more sense.
Ok enough of the sales pitch, maybe Amazon should pay me a commission… but it’s just an honest reflection of how happy I am with this little gem. Now I don’t have to lug around several pounds of paper on my many trips anymore, just this tiny little thing which will hold up to 3,500 entire books.
Speaking of books, I’ve been reading voraciously lately – partly due to the fact that I spent several hundred hours in airport lounges and on planes over the last couple of months, with plenty of time to kill. Some of the better books I read recently include the following:
Klaus Mann’s classic “Mephisto” (the original German version), a novel he wrote while he was in exile in the Netherlands to avoid persecution by Hitler’s regime. Mann wrote the book “…to analyze the abject type of treacherous intellectual who prostitutes his talent for the sake of some tawdry fame and transitory wealth”. As Amazon puts it, it’s a “searing indictment of Hitler’s Germany”.
Why Does E=mc2?
I picked this up recently while waiting at yet another airport, and I absolutely loved it. It’s a fascinating, passionate, and authoritative account of relativity physics. The authors, both brilliant physicists, use very clear writing to describe ‘…how the search for “mathematical consistency” can guide scientists in finding the “laws that describe physical reality.”’ Providing historical context and funny anecdotes, they walk you through various critical scientific discoveries all the way up to Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity. In the process, they will boggle your mind with the weirdest, most counter-intuitive thought experiments. Highly entertaining! And so what if it’s geeky :-)
Leonardo’s Legacy: How Da Vinci Reimagined the World by Stefan Klein (I read the original German version). Great investigation of Da Vinci’s scientific and artistic achievements and thought processes: from paintings and drawings to the study of flowing water, anatomy, weaponry, flying machines, mechanical devices and other technologies, this book is a fascinating account of one of history’s most amazing geniuses.
On the lighter end of the spectrum, I also finished the three books in the incredibly popular “Millennium” trilogy by Stieg Larsson. These novels are a fun, quick read, real page-turners. The thrillers evolve around the unusual heroine, Lisbeth Salander (a sociopathic, anorexic-looking young hacker with a dark past) and Mikael Blomqvist, an investigative journalist. Addictive, fun stuff. It’s amazing to see how many people are reading these books – get on any plane and you’re bound to see 10 people reading about the girl with the dragon tattoo.
Right now I’m reading two books in parallel, Jack Holland’s “Misogyny: The World’s Oldest Prejudice” and Jo Nesbo’s “The Redbreast” (the latter one being pretty light fare). I might post some thoughts on those in the near future.
Pick up any of the above books and I guarantee you won’t regret it.
