L-O-V-E It!!!!
I got the Kindle for my Birthday and I love it. So nice to be able to get a book right away and also have it available in a typeface that is easy to read. Each birthday, the eyes get worse.

Would recommend that anyone who loves to read, will love this.

Good, but could be better
well I bought this for my mom for her birthday but she has found a few things she didn't quite like.
When your shopping and looking at a certain item it doesn't take you back to the place you were previously looking at.
One time it forgot where I was at and was a pain to get back to where I was.
Overall it is a very nice convenience then lugging around a bunch of books, but can be too convenient for me at times.

Love to read then you NEED a Kindle
I have had my Kindle since before Christmas and I love it. Before getting my Kindle I would read 1 to 2 books per week. With the Kindle I am able to read more quickly because I am unburdened with the weight of a physical book. I now read 2 to 3 books a week, at least. During the recent blizzard in the Northeast I read 6 books in a week and didn't need to worry about ever running out of material since I can instantly search and receive almost any book I want. Recently I downloaded a few of the books that Amazon was offering free for the Knidle and they were very good. I highly recommend Operation Sheba by Misty Evans. It was excellent and it was FREE.

Features I Love:
1. All my books are with me all the time- so if I want to re-read a particular chapter or reference something I can.
2. Share library with my family- my husband and children all have the i-touch. Since we like to read a lot of the same things, with the Kindle app they can access our Amazon library and read any of those books from their i-touch. My son was even able to download some of the books he needed for school to the i-touch which lighten his backpack. Some of those were free as well i.e. Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Select works of Edgar Allen Poe.
3. Bookmarks, highlights and word lookup- Kindle can add as many bookmarks as you want in a book for future reference or to easily locate your favorite part or poem. Highlight and add notes is great for school projects. Instantly get the meaning of any word you don't know, excellent feature for kids.

Things to improve:
1. Kindle needs some kind of file organization tool. I would really like to be able to put books from a Series in a folder or all the classics together in a folder. Just some way to organize them rather than one long list that can be sorted by author or title. With all the books I read that list can get pretty out of control and I have only had it 3 months. Can't imagine what it is going to look like in 1 year.
2. Purchasing books from Kindle device not a great shopping experience. I still prefer to browse the Amazon sight purchase from there then turn the wireless on and watch the books appear on my device. Maybe it's all the pretty colors of the website or it just seems easier to navigate. If I know what I want then purchasing from the Kindle is fine. If your just looking for ideas and suggestions the website is a better experience to me.

If your thinking of an e-reader this is the one to get; easy on your eyes, holds a charge with wireless off for 2 weeks (and I use mine for at least 6 hours or more per day), lightweight and easily fits in your purse or bri

Good size, not within whispernet access
I am just adressing the size and whispernet connection issues.
I was afraid that the smaller kindle would not handle newspapers and magazines well, but due to how these periodicals are formatted, that is no problem. Graphs are a problem. They often appear embedded within the text, too small to read, but the solution isn't the larger kindle, it is either publishing them in larger format or allowing them to be expanded to full size screen, and rotated when appropriate. For school work and professional publications, the larger kindle would be well worth the cost, but only if the charts and graphs can be expanded. The moderate expansion due only to a larger screen probably won't meet strigent analysis of graphics.
I do not receive whispernet at my home, which is a frequent problem in mountainous states. ((P.S., their coverage maps lie. If you live in hilly terrain, you know what I mean. Supposedly I have top coverage around my home. Actual service is much less than mapped. I need to be nearly 7 miles from home before I receive spotty connection.) This is not a problem when I travel into town, but I don't do that frequently, so I have to download through the computer. I can't emphasize how convenient whispernet is, if it works, or how cumbersome it is to update the kindle without. Currently you have to manually synch and update each item separately, which is terribly cumbersome compared to whispernet. The auto archive and disposal features of outdated periodicals also doesn't work through the internet connection. Amazon needs a one-click button on the internet to synch and update. It would really be great if I didn't have to formally log onto "my kindle", just select "update and synch" on the kindle menu once the kindle is plugged into the computer. You might want to reconsider subscriptions unless you have access to whispernet. My newspaper subscription is semi-useless. I find I just don't bother going through the download process on a daily basis. Actually, come to think about it, I have a home network. I would dearly love a wireless device to plug into my kindle that would update automatically. I could just plug the wireless device in and have my kindle automatically updated. That would be very cool. Are you listening Amazon? Wifi would be a great alternative when whispernet is not available.

Kindle is Kwick and Kool
I have been and e-reader holdout because I couldn't imagine holding a small device instead of a book. Recently I decided it would be worthwhile to purchase one. After a great deal of research on available e-readers, I chose Kindle 2. I found the reviews, good, bad and indifferent very helpful. I've had my K2 for a week now. I'm very pleased with it! The speed at which it downloads books is not exaggerated. I purchased 2 books and also downloaded 19 free books as soon as it came out of the box. I have no problem reading the K2; the e-ink does have the appearance of a book, and the pages change quickly. I also have Kindle on my I-phone, very convenient! I love the size of the K2!

My only concerns with K2 are that the back is slippery, and due to it's size, it seems fragile, even though it may not be. No problem, as I had already ordered a JavoEdge, flip case for it. In the case, my K2 is no longer slippery and feels just right, and the case is a beauty!

All in all, I would recommend the K2. It's a great gadget!

Travelling with a Kindle in Asia
An Australian based Kindle travelling through the North Eastern parts of India can be a frustrating exercise. I was on a three week vacation in West Bengal covering the major city of Kolkata, a seething mass of 15 million people, in a climate that was becoming hotter and more humid on a daily basis. From there it was onto Darjeeling, a place famous for its tea, tourism and remnants of its former colonial heritage. Currently this area is in 'dispute' with the West Bengal government and is seeking self status - Gurkaland - so the difficulties of travel in this area are compounded by poorly maintained roads so bad that trips of 50 -60km can take up to 3-4 hours and rolling 'strikes' from the separatist movement.

Now the picture is painted how does my Kindle work within this environment - all of the hotels at the 4/5 star level only have an internet connection and no PC - this is generally the case wherever you travel these days. In this part of the world you do find a 'business centre' in each of these hotels - however it is generally a single PC and an aged one at that. As an Australian Kindle this is your only power source and you are hardly going to leave it to charge for an hour or two whilst you mooch around the local haunts -chances are it won't be there when you return!

So once the battery drained after the initial flight to Singapore it was game over for reading and a reversion to the hardback I was forced to buy on my travels.

The Kindle for us Aussies is fine - at home and in your own residence. Outside that environment its a paperweight and I certainly won't bother taking it on my travels again. Until we can charge the Kindle up through a power source it will never become the international bedside companion. I have though of using the Power Monkey - a portable charger that pumps out a very low voltage for mobile phones and the like but I am reluctant to test this theory as it may cook the unit. Any ideas out there for my new paperweight?

Lost without it
Love the Kindle - wish it had a dictionary lookup feature independant of the books it holds. I'd be lost without my Kindle.

I Love My Kindle
What was life like before a Kindle - truly all kidding aside it consisted of reading books from Amazon and listening to books on my Apple Ipod.

Then last Xmas along came my Kindle and my life changed again - now I exist in three realms - I consider myself lucky and privileged to be at the crossroads of the three media - paper books, Ipod and Kindle books. I have all three and life is perfect.

But (I am ashamed to admit) I read a lot of classical and obscure books. And over and over again I am finding that my taste in books (example: Lytton Strachey, Lawrence and Gerald Durrell, Yeats, Maugham, Walter Scottand et cetera) is not only readily available for my kindle - it is rewarded by being so inexpensive that it is almost free!!!

I DO LOVE MY KINDLE and all the paradisical privileges it brings with it!

I love my Kindle!
I received a Kindle for Christmas and I wasn't thrilled about getting the product. After sitting on my shelf for 3 weeks and my husband making me feel guilty about not using it, I finally took it out of the packaging. I hate to read manuals and I'm not good at electronics so I figured I would quickly be putting the Kindle back into its box. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the setup was amazingly easy. Within minutes I was set to go and quickly downloaded my first book. Reading the books on the Kindle have been great on my eyes because since I turned 40 it has become more and more difficult to see up close. The Kindle has solved this problem for me. I've even downloaded a magazine subscription for B000FI73MA.25 a month. The only downside I can even think of is that since I'm reading the book at a larger font and I'm a fast reader, I spend alot of time hitting the "NEXT PAGE" button.

most expensive non-book. ever.
After a little over a year, my Kindle went ka-put. I've charged it and tried turning it on and get nothing. Not even a light or error message of some sort. I (literally) bought into the whole Oprah rave and fell for the off special at the time. I bought one online book to start, which I never even finished before I found out that it just stopped working. The only things I did find convenient with it was the fact that I could lay sideways and read without having to fold or awkwardly manage a book. But let's face it, if I'm already in that position, I'm falling asleep in 5 mins, which is normally what happened. The other thing I liked was the look-up on any word I wanted, but I could have just kept a dictionary nearby.

So having said all that, I realized in this (very expensive) exercise, that I'm a traditionalist. I love going thru actual books and flipping pages. If I liked them, they're mine forever and I can get to them anytime I want. If not, I can still get a bit of money back from them at the local Half-Priced Books. The Kindle always felt fragile to me. One small move and I'm bounding pages forward or back. The book cover for it was awful, and it would never stay in place.

I've contacted customer support to see if there's any kind of warranty or replacement part or even sympathy that could be offered to my dead Kindle...but to no avail.