Reading

Oh my god, why is everyone is looking at me??!!!… are you the type of person who gets paranoid about what people are thinking when you indulge in the latest self-help book? Lets face it there are some books which are just plain embarrassing to be seen with, The Amazon Kindle official blog has a humorous post about one bloggers addiction to self-help books and how they make her feel, she lists what’s going through her mind when she’s reading on the bus;

Me (reading): He’s Just Not That Into You: The No-Excuses Truth to Understanding Guys
Bus passenger (thinking): “That chick probably gets dumped a lot.”

Me (reading): How Not to Look Old
Bus passenger (thinking): “She should have read that a couple of decades ago.”

Me (reading): The Secret
Bus passenger (thinking): “She watches too much Oprah.”

Me (reading): Ask and It Is Given: Learning to Manifest Your Desires
Bus passenger (thinking): “Geez…yesterday she was reading The Secret.”

For those of you who are conscious about what other people are thinking when you read your book the Kindle makes reading your weird little titles a little more bearable in public, no longer do you have to hide the cover or find a secluded spot to read your book, the Kindle offers protection because the title you are reading remains anonymous. However now people will now think you are cool because you own a Kindle, or are they just saying that because you own a Kindle?… hmm

Has the Kindle made you more a adventurous reader in public?

Source: Amazon Kindle Offical Blog

The images above are from a test conducted by Cartwright Reed, with the iPhone on the left and Kindle on the right showing The Stand by Stephen King.

From Cartwright Reed

The smaller, brighter iPhone screen is showing the same number of words as the Kindle. The Kindle is the premiere ebook reader, but I think that the eReader/iPhone combination is compelling. Listening to music while reading off the iPhone screen is a great experience.

The Kindle is still the winner when you’re buying ebooks, though. I bought a few titles from Fictionwise and eReader from the iPhone, but it’s not nearly as easy as Kindle’s Whispernet experience. Of course, you can only go to one bookstore on the Kindle :-).

What is interesting is that the iPhone can squeeze the same amount of words onto the screen as the Kindle, however I suspect you will be squinting quite hard as you try and read the the tiny font on the iPhone. The only solution would be to increase the font size which means less words per screen, which means more page flipping.

Source: Cartwright Reed