Kindle? Maybe...

Lots of bloggers are blogging about Amazon's new Kindle. Check out the link for a commercial at Amazon on it. I've always been skeptical of electronic reading devices, but then Tyler Cowen starting having multiple posts about it, and then it caught my eye that it has basic web access. Really? I didn't know that, and interestingly I am in the market for a portable Internet device (though my wife and I disagree on that fact, currently). I'd wanted the iPhone, because it seemed like such a great device, but then I don't use cell phones ever, and isn't that the main reason you get it? I then turned to the iPod Touch, but honestly, I don't listen to music so much, so constantly, that that makes sense either. I mean, all I want is a portable electronic Internet device - not a phone, not an MP3 player.

But then I realized as I was reading this. THe other thing I do do all the time is read books and articles. Constantly. I'm an academic, after all. And apparently you can store like 120,000 electronic books in this mutha. Plus, check your web? Megan Mcardle gave several reasons she loves hers, and then I realized Amazon prices for books on Kindle is something 70% off the retail price.

I know that what Amazon is doing is trying to have the next iPod, and the similarities are overwhelming. Amazon becomes the clearinghouse for the books the same way iTunes did. And with so many people blogging and buying books, maybe this isn't a crazy dream. Still, it's got that damn monopoly price tag attached to it - $400 bucks! For that price, I really could get an iPhone, and to be perfectly honest, what person in their right mind would rather have a Kindle than an iPhone? I'm on a fixed budget here people. But this is early adoption prices, so I know it's just price discrimination at its finest, and I support price discrimination 100%. So I guess it's going to be my pretenure gift for myself, or maybe I'll get NSF to buy it for me with a grant somehow.