Why you should (or shouldn’t) buy a Kindle?

How does it feel like to read books on a specially designed proprietary device

5 min readMay 8, 2020

Since November 2019, I’ve been using my Kindle. Here are a few things I love/hate about my Kindle.

(Also note, you do not really need to have a proprietary Kindle device to experience most of the following benefits, you can simply install Kindle app on your smartphone or PC.)

Following are a set of things I really enjoy about my Kindle

1. You get the books you love, only within a distance of your thought.

One of the main problems I had was when I get to know about a book probably recommended in some YouTube video, or someone you adore or written by someone who is an inspiration to you, and when I go book-shopping in Sri Lanka, I rarely find them. Most likely the shop owner might not have even heard about the book. Most of the time, they have a fancy set of famous books mostly written by famous authors, but hey if you want to read about Salman Khan’s (not famous biceps actor: Sal Khan, the founder of ‘Khan Academy’) ‘One World Schoolhouse: Education Reimagined’, your book shop manager might end up bringing you some Vogue India magazine with Salman Khan on the cover page!

Want to read this story later? Save it in Journal.

Salman Khan you want v Salman Khan you get

Now with the Kindle, I am just moments away from purchasing the book.

2. Kindle Books are cheaper (and greener!)

Kindle books are cheaper than the usual hardcovers & paperbacks. I mean, some books are way cheaper!

There are Kindle credit system and time to time, they give you Kindle offers: like books around $0.5–$1.99. This is very often. You don’t want to miss this.

And hey you do not contribute to cut off trees!

3. A purpose-built device: means fewer distractions!

Well, your Kindle (depending on the version that you purchase) is very poor at web browsing. I have a Kindle 10 basic version, in this device, unless otherwise you absolutely want to, you will not browser typical internet. Because, hey who wants to load a Facebook page on black and white, slow, 167 ppi resolution screen?

Well, this serves a great purpose! Fewer distractions, with prolonged concentration. Because when you get the Kindle on your hand, your brain knows the sh*t is about to get real with your reading!.

Because when you get the Kindle on your hand, your brain knows the sh*t is about to get real

4. Highlight and place notes when you want, and refer later!

When I see something that I think important, or I want to refer later for something I am working on (i.e Presentation/ a medium article) I simply mark that and move forward.

When I want to refer that, I can come back and view on my Kindle device or in any of my Kindle Apps.

Think about all the reference books that you want to read!

5. Read in any device

If you have installed Kindle apps in your PC and your smartphone, you can switch between them, whenever you want. If you read them while you are connected to the internet, you can simply resume where you were reading, without switching to the page, manually.

I have a Kindle, also Kindle app on my mobile & in my PC

6. Battery Life in Kindle Device

For the entire six months I’ve been using my Kindle device, I haven’t charged it for more than six times. To be honest, I can’t recall the last day I charged. And I use the Kindle device pretty often, at least around 40 minutes a day.

Battery drains little faster if you are connected to WiFi, but hey it is not Tesla Insane mode fast. And you can simply turn that off while you are reading. You only need WiFi to download a book to the device, to purchase (less likely to do via Kindle Device itself, though) or to resume reading from a different device.

Bert thinks Kindle has a pretty good battery life. Image:https://i.pcmag.com/imagery/reviews/069CA7wrKpwBWs23Lko2zDP-2.fit_lim.size_1280x720.v_1572484926.jpg

Well, there are a few things that I do NOT enjoy, in my Kindle Device.

1. Black and White can sometimes be bad

Do not get me wrong. I like the Kindle display. But recently I had a hard time understanding few graphs on this book I was reading ( Book: Introduction to Machine Learning with Python: A Guide for Data Scientists )

Then guess what, the graphs were in color. And I had no clue until I checked my mobile Kindle App.

To Understand this book, graphs are pretty important.

2. Sometimes home screen is a little confusing

When I first started using my Kindle device, I had a hard time understanding where the downloaded books go, how to delete a sample etc. Well, the Web-page looking Home Screen is not something I had in my mind for the Kindle Device.

Still, I have a hard time accessing certain features.

Credits: https://blog.the-ebook-reader.com/2016/02/13/the-new-kindle-homescreen-sucks-its-just-one-big-ad/

3.Kindle Power Button

This problem can be quite specific to the way that you read, but the position of power button sometimes irritates me. While I am on a peaceful read, suddenly I accidentally keep my little finger, and Bam! screen locks.

Conclusion

Well, for me, Kindle serves a pretty good purpose. Now that I am used to it, it is part and partial of my life. Despite few trade offs, Kindle is very helpful, especially for someone like me who is living in a Country like Sri Lanka. And hey, with this, I had fewer problems with Social Distancing ;)