It's interesting and a bit strange that apart from a few video blogs and such, reading is virtually everything I do on my iPad. I have a multitude of apps which I have tried once or twice, and then abandoned. For me it's an ereader, and the best one, apart from weight.
I've solved the weight with a book holder. (Clearly few people want such a thing, so we need a lighter device, probably the Kindle Fire is the closest thing yet.) On the book holder, the iPad is heaven for a attention-span-challenged reading addict. I zip around between several reading apps: Instapaper for saved/formatted web articles, Zinio for e-converted magazines, a web browser, the Kindle app for books, GoodReader for PDF files, NetNewsWire for RSS feeds, Zite for light news/articles reading, Comix for comics occasionally, "Articles" for better wikipedia formatting...Wow, that's many apps just to cover my reading needs! Not sure what we can learn from this... perhaps that humankind's typical split-mindedness is show here in abundance in the multitude of formats used simply for reading. And certainly that for somebody like me who likes short formats as much as books, the traditional Kindle device does not cover it, a better screen, a better processor, and many more apps are needed.
For magazines, comics, text books and art books, a 7-inch screen like on the Kindle Fire is not quite enough. So I hope the future will bring a device with the size and capabilities of an iPad, but much lighter. I suppose it's just a matter when, not if.
Update: I've just seen in my iTunes app that I have three hundred and ten iPad apps!! And I am decidedly not amongst the people who get new apps all the time.
Actually I rarely use over 90% of them, so I guess it's time to delete a lot! (Most of them I don't have on the iPads themselves anymore, I just never took the time to weed them out in iTunes on my Mac.)
Update again: it turns out that there are actually surprisingly few app that I am sure I wouldn't want to use again. I guess it speaks to how many interesting uses an iPad can be put, despite my own one track mind, or as Snoopy said: "I prefer to think of it as singleness of purpose". (This was after Charlie Brown had accused dogs of thinking only of eating.)
8 comments:
Eolake, I bet Amazon will have a bigger Fire early next year. I like the idea of your stand for the iPad. I still have difficulty reading on the iPad because of the brightness, even when turning it down as low as I can go. I miss reading the New Yorker on Kindle, since I bought a one-year iPad subscription to it. I wish the had a combined Kindle-iPad subscription, because it's nice to hear the poets' reading of their work and other extras not available on Kindle.
Mr. Edgerly: I wonder if one of the screen protectors might help you w/the brightness issue.
Really liked your window picture @ your beach cabin (must be tough to have to leave! Loved the background sounds on the audio interview that you did with Eolake, recently. :-) and have read your blog a couple of times, recently. Nice blog. :-)
BTW, Eo: Was reading some of Rick LePage's (see what happens, when you're down for the count w/a spasming back for an entire week?! Too much time to lay and read!) tweets, earlier, and checking out his cool pics. He's funny: he doesn't seem to think that the Pad is anything more than an over-sized iPod touch! lol! He's indifferent to it, it seems. :-) And...he "abhors" GoodReader! lol! "Different strokes..." :-) (Funny...seems there's some "slit-mindedness" w/him, as well: he tweets, the following day, that he LOVES Good Reader 'cuz it has password protection! Go figure!)
Based just on that, he sounds like an eedjit.
Eolake said...
"Based just on that, he sounds like an eedjit."
But one that you quoted! ;0)
Well, as my old friend Tox said: "even a blind hen can step on a turd."
I just got one of the Levo floor-standing tablet holders, having seen your link. I've got rotator cuff issues, and I'm supposed to keep my head erect rather than looking down at a book; the Levo stand solves that quite nicely. Thanks for mentioning it!
Congrats, Will!
Thanks for telling me.
They did tell me this week that they adapter I have is not sold anymore. And the new one, a whole plate, does seem very advanced.
Tell us in a few weeks how it works for you overall.
(For example is the floor plate stable enough to hold an iPad 1?)
The Hold-It I have is much heavier and sturdier, but I don't know if that's necessary. I also don't know if it's still made, Back2 doesn't sell it anymore, and googling only shows UK dealing.
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