First reactions to the Kindle Fire

Updated on Saturday, November 19, 2011 at 11:50 PM by Logan Molen

I’ve been playing with the Kindle Fire tablet since it hit stores Tuesday and am generally impressed with a powerful tablet that acts bigger than its $199 price. 

Before we dive into the details, let’s get this out of the way quickly: the Kindle Fire is much more than an e-reader but it is not an “iPad killer.” But it’s a very good hand-held computer with lots of upside. 

Reading content is at the core of the Kindle brand, but the Fire does so much more. Because of it brings good bang for the buck for mainstream America, expect the Fire to be a big hit this holiday season, giving Amazon a strong foundation in its ongoing battle with Apple, Barnes & Noble, Netflix and who knows else in the battle for consumers’ time and money. 

Some quick observations after a few hours of playtime with the Fire: 

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Should e-books cost more than printed books? Maybe

A co-worker recently lent me a fantastic business book called "Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action."

I've been so impressed with the book -- and I'm only halfway through -- that I decided I needed my own copy to mark up. When you borrow a book it's not exactly kosher to start leaving your own graffiti, no matter how valuable you might think your observations are. 

Markup is where the Kindle excels. I love being able to digitally highlight important information, see "public notes"  other Kindle readers of the book have highlighted, and view the Kindle community's most popular highlights to make sure I didn't miss any major points.

That layer of digital curating and social sharing is what gives the Kindle and e-reading an edge over paper versions. 

Having said that, I was bummed when I checked Amazon and learned the hardcover version of "Start With Why" could be had for $14,68, a full $4.31 less than the Kindle version. Really? 

I had never seen a Kindle edition that cost more than the printed counterparts. And I don't know the reasons why the Kindle price for "Start With Why" was higher than the hardcover price. It could be politics (some publishers don't want to promote low-cost e-books because their margins are lower). But something tells me someone smart figured out that in some instances, an e-book can demand a higher price because there's true value in the intangibles. 

Maybe "they" took their own advice and asked themselves "why?" 

Amazon Kindle, Part 2

I promised to talk about some audience-building things Amazon is doing with the Kindle, and my favorite is what I call "snacking."

Amazon gives its Kindle customers the ability to download for free a sample chapter of any of the 300,000 digital books it has in stock. This does a few things: One, it mimics the experience one has in a bookstore, where you can physically sample a book before buying.

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