I bought an iPad.

That’s right. I’m not reading Kindle on my Kindle. I’m reading Kindle on my Apple iPad. This probably causes some of you to panic, yell, or scream. “How can you possibly be enjoying your Kindle more on the iPad”, you’re thinking. “Surely the iPad doesn’t have the eInk screen, or the integration of buying anything from the Kindle store without going into a web browser. So why do you like it?”

The truth is, I didn’t think I was going to like it either. I mean, I was going to buy an iPad anyway. I’m an iPhone addict, and I knew the experience would probably translate well over to the iPad. Besides, I also develop iPhone and iPad applications for the startup I’ve created. But I didn’t buy the iPad thinking I was going to replace my Kindle entirely. I had a place reserved in my heart for the eInk bearing white Kindle 2.

As I started to play with the iPad over the last month as an eBook reader, I started to quickly realize that this was a much nicer experience than what Amazon was giving me before with the Kindle 2. Gone were the agonies of slow page turns. Gone was the inability to read in the dark without a flimsy plastic book light. It was a truly new way to read my books.

Bad Kindle, Sad Kindle, Goodbye Kindle

Don’t get me wrong. There was plenty to love about the Kindle family of devices. The eInk screen and the always-on anywhere-you-are Amazon Kindle Store were the primary reasons I loved the Kindle, and still do to this day.

But here’s what I didn’t like about my Kindle 2 experience:

• Each page was too small. I was constantly clicking the page turn button, because I’d run out of content on the page to read. I could turn the font way down, and it would fit a considerable more amount of text, but then I was squinting. Wait, didn’t I get the Kindle because it had eInk and reduced my eye strain? Now why am I straining to read tiny text?
• Page turns were too slow. Owners of the original Kindle are probably rolling their eyes at me right now, since the Kindle 2 turned pages significantly faster than the Kindle 1. Yeah, you’re right. But it was also way too slow for me. The pause in my ability to read from turning the page was too long for me to always keep my focus on the book’s plot line, but too short to be able to ponder or expand upon what I had been reading. It was simply a distraction. Not always, but often enough.
• Browsing the Amazon Kindle Store was too slow. When I first got the Kindle 2, I was so excited that it had free cellular-based wireless Internet access to purchase books that I overlooked the fact that the UX (user experience) for the Amazon Kindle Store wasn’t quite up to par on the device. I mean, since it was basically showing you simple web pages, you had to wait for each page to load, and then you had to wait for the Kindle to render the page. Once you clicked into a category, you the had to click into a book, or click on the next page. Then you either clicked the link that said “Return to the Store” (paraphrased), but that took you back to the very front of the store, not to where you were at in your search results. Or, you pressed the back button. In either case, again you had to wait, wait, wait, wait… Every time you did anything, you had to wait. Perhaps I’m too impatient, but I finally got tired of waiting. Note that I thought that the downloading of the actual books was quite fast, it was just navigating the Amazon Kindle Store that I thought was unfortunately a bit aggravating. Why didn’t they just download the whole catalog (or sections of it) to the device, and then render it locally? I’m certain it would have been a better user experience.
• Amazon doesn’t care about the Kindle devices. Blasphemy that I say this, right? But it’s mostly true. When Amazon released the first Kindle people were mostly happy. It was new, and it offered some nice things for the time that no other eBook reader ever dared to do. Then Amazon released Kindle 2, which was really mostly about updating the cosmetics of the casing and the user interface. But then Amazon stopped innovating. They decided to not release any significant software updates and improve upon how people use the Kindle. Not a single meaningful software update came out that added a way to manage all your book purchases (if you have more than 30, you’re tearing your hair out trying to navigate through it all), nor did it offer any performance improvements. Over a year went by, and Amazon made the message clear: they’re not going to improve your Kindle 1, Kindle 2, or Kindle DX experience. Sure, they may come out with a Kindle 3, or Kindle HD, or whatever you want to call it, packed with color eInk, a larger screen, and a fancy new UI. But that’s too little, and way too late. They’ve had 2-3 years to show us that they care about the platform enough to release some updates, and they didn’t. So when the Kindle 3 comes out, it won’t be updated for another year or two, as far as I’m concerned.

Hello, iPad!

The Apple iPad has a gorgeous high resolution (1024×768) color screen, and touts a hefty 10 hour use time. Let me be really clear when I say this: my iPad’s battery lasts for 11 or 12 hours of active use! If you put the thing into standby frequently (as most people do), it can last many days (although, I’m not sure how many, since I can’t stop playing with this thing so it is always on). The majority of the device’s weight and internal space is dedicated to the batteries. Quite an amazing feat really. So you could technically sit there for 10-12 hours straight and finish a book or two and not even need a recharge.

The iPad has several applications for reading eBooks, each with their own sources of content.

Here’s what I love about the iPad:

• Long lasting battery between charges. Let me be really clear when I say this: my iPad’s battery lasts for 11 or 12 hours of active use! If you put the thing into standby frequently (as most people do), it can last many days (although, I’m not sure how many, since I can’t stop playing with this thing so it is always on). The majority of the device’s weight and internal space is dedicated to the batteries. Quite an amazing feat really. So you could technically sit there for 10-12 hours straight and finish a book or two and not even need a recharge. Sure, it’s not quite as long as the Kindle, but it does a boatload more than the Kindle does too, and it’s much longer than anyone every expected a device like this to pull off.
• Bookstore agnostic. Sure, Apple wants to push their iBookstore and their iBooks application. But they’re not preventing any healthy competition from running on their App Store. That means I can read my Apple books, my Amazon books, my Kobo books, my Zinio magazines, or my Marvel comics. In fact, there are so many applications and stores available on the iPad now, that it makes a Kindle device seem so useless in comparison. If you really know you only like Amazon Kindle books, and don’t feel constrained, then the Kindle does its job for you. But, if you’re like me, you want choices. And boy do we have choices.
• Sex appeal. Holy cow, this thing is gorgeous. It feels nice in the hands. People stop and ask about it more than they did when I had a brand new Kindle or Kindle 2 when they first came out; not that it matters if people stop by curiously though. The interface has a similar feel to the well appreciated iPhone, and the applications are simply well thought out. It’s an incredible user experience. You feel like you’re a kid in a candy store all over again. Even at the peak of my Kindle experience, I never ever felt that way.
• Full device backup. Maybe the Kindle doesn’t really need this, but I love that I can quickly restore all of my applications, books, and saved files onto my device whenever I want. Perhaps even a brand new replacement. In fact, I had purchased an iPad Wifi, only to want the iPad 3G model a few weeks later. Transferring everything over was so simple.
• New ways of reading. I think it’s really fantastic that some of the news companies actually took the time to reinvent how their electronic newspaper or magazine would function. Newspapers and magazines were bastardized on the Kindle; Amazon really screwed that up. Amazon had a custom Kindle file format that allowed the use of special graphics and fonts, but they didn’t encourage their content providers to use it very much. Thus, the book, magazine, and newspaper presentation really suffered. It didn’t live up to the hype. But, there’s hope here with the iPad, because lots of companies are innovating truly remarkable interfaces on it with ways to interact with books, magazines, and newspapers. Apple’s iBooks isn’t in itself a tremendously different experience from the Kindle’s, but there is a lot of opportunity here for it to be, or some thirsty developer to come up with it.
• Updates, updates, updates! Apple has a proven track record of releasing consistent and often minor software updates that add small features and improve the performance of most of their products. This alone is a nice way to justify paying a couple hundred dollars more on the Apple iPad because you know that you’ll get some lasting value out of it, perhaps as long as 3 or 4 years. A hefty update comes around at least once a year, and most of the time it’s a free one.
• My Kindle books are alive and well. Lastly, and possibly one of the most important to me, is that all of my previous and future Kindle purchases are accessible in the Kindle app for the iPhone and iPad. The reading experience is even nicer than it was on the Kindle devices (in terms of attractiveness and functionality, but not eInk). And all of my book purchases are safe and available for me anywhere. Amazon got this right. After all, it’s clear to me: Amazon is out to make a profit by selling content, not hardware devices. And this is one of the big distinctions between Apple and Amazon, because don’t forget, Apple is really a hardware company.

But if you’re still uninterested in the iPad, even after my superb dissing of the Kindle device family, please buy a Kindle today. Otherwise, how about one of these iPads?

The Pragmatic Programmers offer books about Ruby, Ruby on Rails, iPhone development, high level programming concepts and techniques, and several other topics. They’re worth a gander if the topics interest you. Their eBook FAQ points out that they are continually converting their eBooks to the new formats and hope to have all of their offerings available in .MOBI soon.

With technical books starting to get visually formatted for eBook readers now, the Kindle is starting to make an excellent reference library. When Amazon releases the “Kindle Student” (presuming that’s what they would call it for an educational version), you can expect that more technical references will quickly become available.

Do you know of other technical book publishers who have recently made a Kindle or .MOBI format of their content? Share it with my readers by leaving a comment.

A couple of weeks ago, I saw a promo for this illustrated cookbook for Kindle owners. To celebrate the Kindle, this book was selling for a mere $0.00, available on pre-order. Even though the Amazon Kindle Store page for this item shows that it’s not available until March 26th, my Kindle 2 somehow managed to get it delivered this morning. I ordered the book on February 13th, long before the Kindle 2 was released.

Based on seeing existing books that have no exciting Kindle formatting, I expected this book to be unattractive. In fact, I expected that the illustrated cookbook would come without illustrations, and just not be formatted with the Kindle in mind. Newspapers and magazines seem to be poorly formatted on the Kindle, with their authors often leaving out pictures and illustrations, and only doing a text export. But for this cookbook, boy, was I wrong! It looks great!

The book has a table of contents, with clickable links to take you into the chapters you’re interested in. The illustrations seem to fit perfectly on the page, and you can tell that they intentionally put page breaks in place so that its layout is maintained, even if you increase the font size.

This is an example of a Kindle book formatted to maximize the Kindle experience. Thankfully, the book is still available for free pre-order, and if you’re lucky, you’ll receive it early like I did.

What do you think about publishers taking more efforts to setup their content for the Kindle’s particular format?

Free eBooks in Kindle Format on the Internet

1. Amazon’s Free Kindle Books
2. Free Kindle Books
3. FreeKindleBooks.org
4. ManyBooks
5. Feedbooks: Food for the mind
6. MobileRead Forums
7. Baen

Free eBooks in Unsecured MobiPocket format (compatible with the Kindle)

1. Feedbooks: Food for the mind
2. Free Books at the MobiPocket Store
3. MobileRead Forums
4. Fictionwise
5. The Online Books Page
6. Baen

Free eBooks in other formats on the Internet (must be converted)

1. Munsey’s (PRC)
2. Planet eBook (PDF)
3. Bookyards (PDF, minimal formatting)
4. MobileRead Forums (All formats)
5. Fictionwise (All formats)
6. The Online Books Page (All formats)
7. Baen (All formats)
8. Free Tech Books (Several formats)
9. Free Computer Books (Several formats)
10. eBook Searchr (All formats, eBook Search)
11. LibriVox (Audiobooks)
12. Wired for Books (Audiobooks, conversion necessary)

I found many of these book sites from a posting on iReaderReview. If you’ve discovered a source that I’ve overlooked, please do share it with the rest of my readers by leaving it in a comment! If you’re the source owner, please do introduce yourself to us in the comment.

Lastly, if you decide to buy a Kindle 2, please consider clicking this link to buy it through Amazon, and I’ll get a small commission.