After reading the Amazon announcement I immediately ordered a International Kindle. This happened out of impulse, but also with some preparation.

For a while I was considering buying a US only version. But the additional steps required and the total cost to get the device to Europe was too much for me. Now the price is ok and the delivery seems to be seamless.

I suppose this won’t be the final eBook device for me. I currently envision that for each language I might buy a different device. I suppose that German publishers want to pursue a different way than working with Amazon. Also form factor (size of display), resolution and network connection will be enhanced over time. However after so many years of waiting for instant access to English books whatever solution is right for me. Now! Yes I can!  

History

My appetite for English books started in the eighties off last century. During high-school my language skills had matured far enough to enjoy the original version of a book.

But in Germany it was difficult to obtain English reading material. International press shops in large train stations had a very limited offering. University city book stores that carried sometimes carried two handful of titles, mostly as paper backs. And they could order books on request. I had to provide them with exact title, author, publisher and order number. With this information they reached out to their agent in the US or UK and tried to obtain the book. The whole process normally took 2-3 month per book and was extremely expensive. In some cases I paid factor three compared to the suggested retail price in the US. If a book was published in the UK it sometimes was delivered faster and “only” cost twice as much. But remember: This was pre-Internet and pre-Amazon.

During the nineties the situation got better and better. With CD-ROM becoming available I could obtain catalogues of books in print. This helped to better identify the exact book I was looking for.

Shortly thereafter first mail-order distributors started to collect orders in Germany with an online ordering system (still pre-Internet). So the complete process from start to end only took a month and the prices came down significantly.

With Amazon in Germany and the Internet there was no longer any difference between locally published books and other books. Often the book I wanted was on stock and got delivered within a week.

And soon the delivery process will become electronically without any significant delay.

Perfect World?

I don’t think that the current Kindle is the perfect device. The downside aspects:

Locked in Amazon DRM

I know that with the books I’m ordering from Amazon I’m locked down in their enclosed DRM world. But for the “typical” fiction I really don’t care. I normally read a book, put it in the shelf and when space runs out a triage process kicks in. Some books are given away to friends and family, others go to a public book collection service and some just vanish.

No WLAN / GSM download has extra cost

I would like to have a WiFi version of a ebook reader. With my MiFi 2352 I’m equipped with GSM connectivity where ever I go. And  the extra cost for any “International” = GSM download from the Kindle store is not nice, but understandably. For a long time there was a rumor that Amazon was planning to move internationally, but the talks with at least German GSM providers broke down this summer. Carrier quotes for the data traffic are rumored to be the deal breaker. Now leveraging AT&T is expensive but it removes plenty of complexity for Amazon and also for the average consumer.

Form Factor

I’m really curios how good or bad my reading experience will be in the long run. My expectation is that reading a “normal” eBook will be fine, but reading and browsing a newspaper will be challenging. For me the nice side effect will hopefully be the availability of “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung” with up to date content.

I’ll keep you posted.

– PTL –