Saturday, March 7, 2009

I Just Bought the Same Book Twice

OK, for the second time, I just bought the same book twice. That's a bit abstract but true.

Grace bought me a Kindle 2 for my birthday. Yeah! Being in the publishing business, I have seen more blog posts on the shape, size, function and philosophical meaning of the Kindle and Kindle 2, so I think that ground has been covered quite well. So let this be a blog post for the people not in publishing that read this blog (I believe that number ranges in the area of a half dozen readers, give or take a few).

To put it simply, I like it. And yes, it is a game changer. I have been reading books with Ereader and Stanza on my iphone, which works, but only because of the convenience. But the Kindle 2 has been enjoyable - for the three days I have owned it. I find it is closer to a 'real' book and I have been reading it in the exact same scenarios - sitting in my Dad chair by the fire in the evening with my girls on all sides, or propped up on my bed.

And here is how I can tell I am enjoying it: I paid money, twice, to buy the ebook on the Kindle 2 for a book I already owned in hand.

OK, the first time was an experiment. I was reading Scott Turow's Ordinary Heroes in an old, tattered mass market paperback which I pulled off a book swap shelf in the British Virgin Islands. When the Kindle 2 arrived I just had to buy the ebook edition to try it out. So I did, and spent 7 bucks for it. It was worth it.

The second time - at 6:00am this morning - was not an experiment but instead was a bonafide consumer purchase. After finishing Ordinary Heroes, I was moving on to my next book - from popular fiction to popular non-fiction - and picked up Bill Bryson's "A Short History of Nearly Everything". I love reading Bill Bryson as he has a quick wit that I find essential at certain times of my reading career. This book is a layman's guide to all things science, starting with the Big Bang, and I figured Bill Bryson was just the right guy to steer me through a dense set of topics.

I received this book from Grace as a gift, which she bought in Borders a few weeks ago as a trade paperback. Surprisingly, I actually found it quite cumbersome to read after reading Turow on the Kindle. It kept flopping over like it was made of paper! So, sitting in bed this morning, I proved to my wife Grace yet again that I am nuts and bought the Kindle Ebook edition for 7 bucks, searching for the product in the Kindle Store, buying it, downloading it and getting to the same page in less than a minute total.

That is a game changer. She complained for a moment that she had bought the Bryson book as a gift, but I simply countered that she had also bought my Kindle as a gift - and thank you very much.

Friday, March 6, 2009

Am I Really That Far Behind??

Man, did I blow it!

I have been trying to keep our Community News on our Firebrand Site fresh and current, but time has advanced so quickly that I fell behind. No excuses.

Well, I just updated it with announcements of many new clients who have joined Firebrand in the last few months.

We are really excited to welcome these publishers to Firebrand,most of whom are well into their integration projects already!

Here is the link to our Community News page.

And I promise I will stay current.