Video

Portfolio contributing editor Kevin Maney interviewed Jeff Bezos in a packed auditorium at New York University’s Stern School of Business. Bazos and Maney discussed many topics during the lengthy 1 hour 30 minute interview - everything from Bazos personal life, how he makes business/personal decisions, the founding and growth of Amazon, Amazons Infrastructure Services, Amazon Prime, Amazon A9 and of course the Kindle. It is a very in depth interview, Bazos goes into great detail about what the vision is for Kindle and how Kindle came to be - it is a fascinating interview and if you have the spare time its well worth watching.

We don’t all have a couple of spare hours every day, so if your just interested in what Bazos has says about the Kindle then you can skip most of the interview - Bazos starts talking about the Kindle in part 3 at 3min 25sec into the interview.

Partial Transcript by Wired.com:

Portfolio: Let’s talk about the Kindle. What do you want it to be?

Bezos: Any book, in any language, ever in print should be available in less than 60 seconds. We worked on it for three years. It’s been selling out since being released.

Portfolio: You sold how many?

Bezos: You asked that so innocently, but you know I’m not going to answer. We have a long-standing practice of being very shy about disclosure, and I’ll stick to that practice. The Kindle has substantially exceeded our expectations.

Portfolio: Every effort at e-books has failed. Why should this one work?

Bezos: We decided we were going to improve upon the book. And the first thing we did was try to determine the essential features of a physical book that we needed to replicate. The No. 1 feature is that it disappears. When you’re in the middle of reading, you don’t notice the ink or the glue or the stitching or the paper — all of that disappears, and you’re in the author’s world. Most electronic devices today do not disappear. Some of them are extraordinarily rude. Books get out of the way, and they leave you in that state of mental flow.

Portfolio: How do you improve on that?

You can watch the full interview 6 part interview here.

Source: Wired

Our old friend Walt Mossberg sat down with Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos this morning at the “D: All Things Digital Conference”.

Walt Mossberg gave the Kindle a luke-warm reception back in November calling it “mediocre” and “marred by annoying flaws”. He liked the idea and the shopping experience behind the Kindle, but thought that the device itself was where Kindle’s flaw lied.

Jeff Bezos does his normal sales pitch about the Kindle, but this time he throws in a bit of new information about Kindle sales. Walt asks point blank “How many Kindles have you sold?” Jeff politely refused to answer the question instead he gave us a new stat: “Title-by-title basis…Kindle unit sales more than 6% of total book sales”. So of the 125,000 titles available for Kindle, of all those 125,000 titles that were sold — digital and print — Kindle accounted for 6% of sales. Jeff also said he envisioned a time when e-book sales formed a substantial portion of book sales at Amazon.

Jeff Bezos also commented on a Kindle v2:

“There will be a second version, a third version, a tenth version. … but a second version is not that near.”

It may take a decade to get the product to where Amazon wants it, he said. So this has confirmed what many thought, that Amazon is committed to the Kindle and there will be a Kindle v2 release sometime in the future.

The interview wasn’t just limited to talk about the Kindle, Bezos also talks about the streaming video-on-demand service for Amazon, which will be released in the next couple of weeks amongst other things.

You can see the interview below in 2 parts.

Source: All Things D

Every Sunday night we will bring you our selection of Kindle and Amazon related links from around the web. Compiled from blogs, magazines, main stream media and other sources, we hope these links will give you a definitive overview of what’s happening regarding the Kindle and what the Kindle community is talking about.

Amazon Gains, Despite an Economic Slowdown - NYTimes

Amazon doing an Ugly American act in Great Britain? Bullying U.K. publishers to jack up Jeff’s profits - TeleRead

Apple-Amazon e-book slugout ahead? Some possibilities - TeleRead

The Future of Reading - Columbia Journalism Review

The PR Revolution Amazon’s Kindle May Be Bringing - 360 Digital Influence

Kindle - The Reading Experience - Adobe Blogs - Bill McCoy

The “Quirky” Kindle is “Headed for Nichedom” - Kindleville

Not on Fire for Kindle - Econlog

Kindle Still Unknown to the Tech Savvy - K.indled

Why the Amazon Kindle is a tourist’s best friend - Computerworld

Does the Kindle have iPod-ish potential? - ZDNet blogs

Rethinking the Kindle - Auxiliary Memory

Reading Rekindled - randomdialogue

Amazon’s Jeff Bezos on Martha Stewart Video

Why I love my Kindle - Collected Miscellany

Early Adopters Are Useless - Technosailor

Every Sunday night we will bring you Kindle links from around the web. Compiled form blogs, magazines, main stream media and other sources, we hope this link list will give you a definitive overview of what’s new regarding Kindle and what the ever growing Kindle community is talking about.

Kindle Summary 2007: Pros and Cons - Educational Paradigms

Amazon Kindle vs. Sony Reader SMACKDOWN - Gadgets Page

Amazon Kindle Does It All — Almost - The Street

Should You Use Kindle to Beta-Test Your Next Novel? - Gawker

Amazon Kindle, Magazines Could be the Killer App - theyshoulddothat.com

Kindle: gadget of mystery - Computer World

Kindle Kicks Newsprint’s Butt - Enterprise IT Planet Blog

Going Green with Kindle Reader! - justanothermobilemonday.com

Amazon Kindle has JVM - Java Swamy

Why Amazon’s Kindle Is A Big Deal - Bear on Business

Kindle, dissed on Gawker, still sells for $800 on Ebay - Munseys

Not on the Same Page as Print is Dead - Structured Publishing

Would you buy a Kindle? - Chas’ Compilation

Feedbook delivers one-click Kindle downloads - Mobile Read Forums

Kindle isn’t the Most Desired E-book Reader - Kindle News

Jeff Bezos and Bestselling Authors Discuss Amazon Kindle

In a scathing (yet hilarious) review of the Kindle, Robert Scoble - a former technical evangelist at Microsoft - states the following:

1. I want to meet the guy who designed the thing, and I want to beat the crap out of him.
2. It’s obvious they did not think about how the device was going to be used.
3. Amazon is a “cheap-ass company”.
4. In conclusion, “It really sucks.”

I take it he doesn’t like the Kindle device, fundamentally I think he is wrong, Kindle can be a success and whilst the Kindle does have its flaws, it certainly is not going to be a failure. Here are the 6 major criticisms of the Kindle Scoble cites;

1. No ability to buy paper goods from Amazon through Kindle.
2. Usability sucks. They didn’t think about how people would hold this device.
3. UI sucks. Menus? Did they hire some out-of-work Microsoft employees?
4. No ability to send electronic goods to anyone else. I know Mike Arrington has one. I wanted to send him a gift through this of Alan Greenspan’s new book. I couldn’t. That’s lame.
5. No social network. Why don’t I have a list of all my friends who also have Kindles and let them see what I’m reading?
6. No touch screen. The iPhone has taught everyone that I’ve shown this to that screens are meant to be touched. Yet we’re stuck with a silly navigation system because the screen isn’t touchable.

Now as far as I can tell, Scoble has 3 problems with the Kindle - Social Networking, eCommerce, and Usability. The usability seems fine to me on the Kindle, it takes about 30 seconds to figure out how to use the device and then it becomes second nature and most reviews have had a similar experience. In my opinion social networking has no place in a eBook device so that’s a moot point, however the ability to share your profile for thing like a book club might be something worth looking into. And finally eCommerce, the Kindle is a eBooks reader, not a supermarket! who wants to buy a toaster or mountain bike through a Kindle? I certainly don’t want to, I want to buy books and read on my Kindle. If I want to buy anything else, I will log into Amazon.com and purchase my goods that way. However, Scoble does have some valid points so the review is watching even if it it just to watch Scoble lose it.

You can check out the Videos here:

Amazon Kindle video #1. Unboxing.
Amazon Kindle video #2. Kindle first use.
Amazon Kindle video #3. Walking around with Kindle.
Amazon Kindle video #4. Mike Arrington on Kindle.
Amazon Kindle video #5. Books vs. Kindle
Amazon Kindle video #6. Me being a total jerk to Amazon.
Amazon Kindle video #7 (Interview at SF State University).

Source: Scobleizer

Ok so its Christmas day and we should all be spending time with our loved ones, but your not! seeing as your here reading this blog on Christmas day!

So Merry Christmas to you and here is something fun for you to watch!

Source: Cracked.com

Whilst browsing around the net looking for Kindle related news to bring to you guys I stumbled upon Pocketnow.com. The guys over there have uploaded a very good, in-depth video review of the Kindle, I thought I would share it with you guys on this blog. Now the videos are quite in-depth, and they are spread out over 4 video each one covering a different aspect of the Kindle device. The videos go into a lot of detail on how the device works and what it is like to use every day. So if you are interested in buying a Kindle in the near future I would highly recommend these videos as they will give you a flavour of what you can expect when you own a Kindle device.

Part 1

Talks about the carrying case of the Kindle, then give a tour of the hardware features of the device.

Part 2

Talks about the reading experience of the Kindle, and show off the electrophoretic display (aka E-Ink).

Part 3

Go over using the Kindle store and viewing Wikipedia.

Part 4

Covers viewing a newspaper with the Kindle, and go over a few experimental features that you can use on the device.

Source : Pocketnow.com Amazon Kindle Video Review

Welcome to the first instalment of Sunday Night Links! As the week draws to a close, every Sunday night we will bring you Kindle links from around the web. Compiled form blogs, magazines, main stream media and other sources, we hope this link list will give you a definitive overview of what’s new regarding Kindle and what the community is talking about.

15 Things I Just Learned About the Amazon Kindle - BoingBoing

The PR Revolution Amazon’s Kindle May Be Bringing - Influential Marketing Blog

Kindle Gaming? The Hidden Game - Kindle Reader

Amazon Kindle Real-Life Review (Verdict: Lightweight, Long Lasting and Easy to Grip… In Bed) - Gizmodo

Which eBook Reader is the Best? - Slashdot

10 Lessons in Innovation from Amazon’s Kindle - onmoneymaking.com

Kindle can light up your life - Chicago Sun Times

And finally on a more festive note, Merry Christmas to all our readers! So here is an amusing video for you to watch…