I recently picked up reading again and shortly after I read my first two books (technically I wasn’t quite through with my second book, though), I got the idea I might need a Kindle. My wife has owned one since I gave her one about a year ago and she was very positive about it. She uses it a lot since her studies involve a lot of reading and research. I tried borrowing one from friends and got two responses. I got hold of a first generation Paperwhite and a second generation Paperwhite, which aren’t really different from one another and in my opinion at the time (I thought I was a daytime reader) didn’t earn the extra € 70 to become mine. Through some luck I got to ‘keep’ one of the Kindles and I have used it intensively, way more than I initially expected. So, I thought I was a daytime reader exclusively, but it turns out the reading in the dark is very comfortable and in my situation also required quite often. With two kids (one being a child of nearly 3 years old and the other being an infant of just 4 months) it’s really handy to be able to read in the dark. The older one prefers me to bring her to bed at night, rocking on the chair while singing bedtime songs. Childrens’ songs are quite easy and after over 2 years of experience you can sing while reading. The younger one sleeps a lot during the day, but kids are always distracted by small movements and sounds — which we have plenty of at home: 2 grown-ups, 2 children, a dog, bad walls and a crappy uneven wooden floor. Kindle for rocking, Kindle for feeding!
Another awesome feature is the third party stuff you can send to your Kindle, like news, blog articles, wiki pages, all that shit! And that’s awesome! Currently I use Readability to send me a daily digest of stuff I saved for later in the web app or any of the apps that send content to Readability. It’s a beautiful digest, with clickable and interactive content intact. And it’s soooooooo easy!
Text in photo copyright John Green (Looking for Alaska, 2005)
– 2018/06/06
If you’re reading this after September 30, 2016 (wow, congratulations and thank you), please note Readability is no more. They might come back, but not likely. Since 2013 I have moved from using my Kindle as a daily digest provider to using bookmarks and good ol’ Pocket. From there you can have still have digests arrive on your Kindle.