As the owner of a Motorola Droid (the first one), and as someone who reads a great deal, I was pretty excited when I heard that Amazon was going to finally produce a Kindle app for Android phones. However, now that I've tried it out, while it's nice to have, I'm not sure how much I'm actually going to use it.
The Kindle app (which requires Android 1.6 or later) offers the expected comfortable reading experience. You go from page to page either by swiping your finger across the screen, or by tapping on the left side (to go back) or the right side (to go ahead). Tap the center of the screen to get access to the Android top menu bar and a sliding bar at the bottom that lets you navigate through the book.
When you tap the Menu key, you can access options that let you change front size, switch between black lettering on a white background, black lettering on a sepia background, or white lettering on a black background; you can also adjust screen brightness and add bookmarks.
Of course, the difference between the Kindle app and other Android reading apps is that you have access to your Kindle e-books -- and the Kindle store. The last time I reviewed a Kindle, back in March of 2009, I bought a couple of books that I haven't accessed since I returned the review unit. I was pleased to see that, once I installed the new Kindle app, my "archived" books were immediately accessible.
To purchase a new book, you select Kindle Store off the menu. From that point on, you're working from your browser, rather than from within the app. You can do a search for a book, browse books by category, look at New York Times Best Sellers, Kindle Top Sellers, what is called "New & Noteworthy," books "Recommended for You" (which are the same that you usually see when going to your Amazon page), and Kindle editions with audio/video.
I was interested in what would happen if I tried one of the books with audio/video elements, and went for a sample from a book called Bird Songs: 250 North American Birds in Song. (Okay, so I'm an occasional birder. So sue me.) What I got was several text pages from the book -- and at the point where there should have been audio, a caption read: "There is audio content at this location that is not currently supported for your Kindle device. The caption for this content is displayed below." If I had paid the $9.99 cost of that book, I would have been pretty disappointed.
I "bought" a free copy of The Devil's Disciple by George Bernard Shaw, and it was as quick and painless a process as if I was using a regular Kindle device. (Be aware -- if you want to get books through the Kindle app, you will need to have a credit card registered with Amazon, even if you're just getting a free title.) Within seconds of the purchase, the title was in my list of books and accessible for reading.
In short? The Kindle app is a perfectly decent e-reading app. And it's free, so there's no reason not to try it out, especially if you're already a Kindle user. Amazon is promising several improvements on the horizon, including the ability to search for content within your books, a better interface for the Kindle Store, a dictionary, and the ability to zoom images. No word on when/if it will deliver the ability to access the audio/video, though.
However, unless you're wedded to the Kindle format, this app is no better, in my opinion, than other reading apps already available on Android devices. I've been using one called Aldiko, which uses the ePub format -- a popular one outside of Amazon's universe -- and whose interface is as comfortable to use as the Kindle's. The only difference between the two is the ability to purchase books directly through the app -- or to read books available in a non-commercial format.
The Kindle app (which requires Android 1.6 or later) offers the expected comfortable reading experience. You go from page to page either by swiping your finger across the screen, or by tapping on the left side (to go back) or the right side (to go ahead). Tap the center of the screen to get access to the Android top menu bar and a sliding bar at the bottom that lets you navigate through the book.
When you tap the Menu key, you can access options that let you change front size, switch between black lettering on a white background, black lettering on a sepia background, or white lettering on a black background; you can also adjust screen brightness and add bookmarks.
Of course, the difference between the Kindle app and other Android reading apps is that you have access to your Kindle e-books -- and the Kindle store. The last time I reviewed a Kindle, back in March of 2009, I bought a couple of books that I haven't accessed since I returned the review unit. I was pleased to see that, once I installed the new Kindle app, my "archived" books were immediately accessible.
To purchase a new book, you select Kindle Store off the menu. From that point on, you're working from your browser, rather than from within the app. You can do a search for a book, browse books by category, look at New York Times Best Sellers, Kindle Top Sellers, what is called "New & Noteworthy," books "Recommended for You" (which are the same that you usually see when going to your Amazon page), and Kindle editions with audio/video.
I was interested in what would happen if I tried one of the books with audio/video elements, and went for a sample from a book called Bird Songs: 250 North American Birds in Song. (Okay, so I'm an occasional birder. So sue me.) What I got was several text pages from the book -- and at the point where there should have been audio, a caption read: "There is audio content at this location that is not currently supported for your Kindle device. The caption for this content is displayed below." If I had paid the $9.99 cost of that book, I would have been pretty disappointed.
I "bought" a free copy of The Devil's Disciple by George Bernard Shaw, and it was as quick and painless a process as if I was using a regular Kindle device. (Be aware -- if you want to get books through the Kindle app, you will need to have a credit card registered with Amazon, even if you're just getting a free title.) Within seconds of the purchase, the title was in my list of books and accessible for reading.
In short? The Kindle app is a perfectly decent e-reading app. And it's free, so there's no reason not to try it out, especially if you're already a Kindle user. Amazon is promising several improvements on the horizon, including the ability to search for content within your books, a better interface for the Kindle Store, a dictionary, and the ability to zoom images. No word on when/if it will deliver the ability to access the audio/video, though.
However, unless you're wedded to the Kindle format, this app is no better, in my opinion, than other reading apps already available on Android devices. I've been using one called Aldiko, which uses the ePub format -- a popular one outside of Amazon's universe -- and whose interface is as comfortable to use as the Kindle's. The only difference between the two is the ability to purchase books directly through the app -- or to read books available in a non-commercial format.
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