Review: Tokidoki Spring 2014

I have a love / love relationship with tokidoki. There's no hate in my heart. If I lived in an area that actually sold their product it would be difficult not to have a different handbag for every day of the week. As it is, I'm limited to what I can reasonably mail order or convince a friend to pick up in person. (tokidoki mail order has been very good to me - I'm also known at Ju Ju Be and The Giant Peach.) 

The Spring 2014 line has some interesting and not entirely welcome changes. While I absolutely love the prints (a big improvement from Winter 2013 but not as stunning as 2013's Portrait) the bag selection has been narrowed. Many styles have removed their interior zipper pockets, replacing them with sewn in card rows. Making that an even more questionable choice, some of the same bags don't zip at all. (So I am going to move my ID and credit cards from my wallet to unsecured slots in an unsecured bag? Someone at tokidoki lives a very different life than I do!) The shoulder drop feels tighter and the zippers a little tighter. The good news is that the lining problems of Winter 2013 appear to have been resolved. 

The photo to the left shows two bags from the City print and one from Vintage America. Vintage America is adorable, and will likely sell out first. Elvis, Route 66, Jukeboxes, everything that makes you say Baby Boomer Nostalgia is redesigned into a more modern presentation. This hobo could use a slightly longer strap, but it's workable. This is the bag I most missed a zip closure on - with it's tendency to drift around the back it would be too easy for an item to wander off. It's not a great public transit option but it's too cute not to own. 

The taller Shopper is going back. The handles have a nice feel but shopper tote needs a shoulder option and this one won't stay put. Great depth can't make up for a snap top and an inability to sling it out of your way. On the other hand, the Bowling bag is a solid win. This comes in Vintage America as well and might be the best bag on offer. Spring 2014 is much larger than previous Bowlers (which could be a negative, depending on your needs). Featuring a deeper exterior zip pocket, a top zip and an interior zip, this offers more security than the other bags. I can carry this anywhere I go without having to make sure it's not going to attract grabby hands. If I knock it off my desk, I won't be picking my lip gloss out from under my coworkers feet. The Bowler is a solid win and the City print really invokes NYC. In a good way. Unfortunately the Spring 2014 collection doesn't include any cosmetic bags or small cases for electronics. I mix and match my tokidoki items so it's not a deal breaker, but I did miss certain small sizes I'd have picked up in this print run. 

I've also been very pleased with the collaboration between Ju Ju Be and tokidoki. While most of the Ju Ju Be product is geared toward the baby crowd, there are pieces that suit those of us past the diaper zone as well. Pictured on the right are three bags in the Animalini print. Ju Ju Be is less expensive than the main tokidoki line, but also less durable. After about 6 months of kid use a Fuel Cell lunchbox gives up and quits. I love the careful thought they've put into strap lengths, pockets and zippers. I also love being able to throw them in the washing machine after the beach or gym.  

Review: Wii-U

Before the Wii-U came out it was firmly at the top of my household's holiday list. As Nintendo devotees we were early adopters of every platform they've released. When the Wii-U hit stores, it was quickly removed from the holiday list and replaced by iPads. The Wii-U, with Nintendo's bizarre DRM, seemed overpriced and underwhelming. Store displays did not allow you to play the game, relying on prerecorded commercials to sell you on the new concept. It was the exact opposite of their Wii launch and it was a disaster

I've listened to store clerks who have not played the Wii-U struggle to explain it to parents before directing them to other consoles. I've watched Nintendo issue press releases about the supposed supply shortage while my local retailers heavily promoted an excess of stock. Individual game titles went from $60 USD down to $19. The Wii-U made me think my time with Nintendo had come to an end. Nintendo is trying to make an improbable world happen. In this world you pay for a virtual version of a game which you can only play on one device. You cannot share it with a sibling or a friend. You cannot carry it to a friend's house. If you lose your device, or it dies, you lose all of your games. Nintendo makes no price concessions for this. You pay full price for a crippled version of a game. Apple charges small amounts for games you can put on any of your devices anytime. You can upgrade or change devices at will. Replace a device and Apple will load all your settings for you. Buy one copy and both kids can play. This is a battle Nintendo is going to lose and in my house they lost it long ago. We have no WiiWare. No 3DS paid downloads.

With the Wii-U falling off the holiday list it seemed that Nintendo was going to follow Little People and Playmobil out to the dustbin of growing up. The kids took their holiday cash and bought iThings. We didn't look back. Birthdays rolled around and the kids found themselves kicking around Gamestop with giftcards they weren't sure how to use. Skylanders? iCases? Like a Pixar film come to life, a fully functional Wii-U made it's play. Once it was in the kids hands their hearts beat a little faster. They remembered Mario and all the good times they'd had. The cumbersome iClone control pad stopped confusing and started to make sense. This is the marketing experience Nintendo should have opened with. Giftcards hit the counter with a clatter. Birthday money flew out of pockets. Frantic counting led to begging, then cajoling and finally pleading. iTunes and Target cards were sold on the spot to an agreeable parent. Promises destined to be broken were made. Allowance was forsworn. Spring Break belonged to Nintendo and times thought past.

Is the Wii-U more fun to play than it's weird kid averse marketing leads you to expect? Yes. Absolutely.  It's the Wii, with some added features. Unfortunately one of the added features is a cumbersome load time. I expected a dial up modem soundtrack to accompany each interminable wait. Want to start the system? That multi hour update and load thing isn't a myth. (Do NOT buy the base model, you will fill it with the first update.) Want to play a game? Wait for another system update. Now wait for the disc to load. Now wait for the .... and so on. Want to switch games? It's going to take a while. You might take this chance to fix a snack or catch up on your favorite magazines. While the Wii-U may be underpriced for it's components it is overpriced for it's out of the box experience. If you love Mario like our house does the investment may still be worth it. Super Mario Bros U is much more challenging than recent Mario games. NintendoLand beats WiiSports. Pikmin 3 is coming. If you are not a Nintendo devotee the frustration factor may drive you to another console. Perhaps that explains the lack of playable systems in the stores - a fear that encountering load times would discourage sales. It's a fair concern. If I hadn't wanted to get my Mario on I might well have said screw it and flipped the unit back to the store. The Wii-U has been a very enjoyable purchase but it certainly isn't a necessary one.

Review: BBC History Magazine Delivery Options

As a long time fan of BBC History Magazine I was frustrated when my bifocals were no longer up to the challenge of it's text. It is a beautifully designed magazine, the sort I enjoy flipping through as much as I enjoy reading. Unfortunately the effect of small fonts and bold colors meant slow going. So last year I started exploring my iPad options.

My first stop was Zinio. The subscription price was reasonable and I read other magazines with this app. Unfortunately, the thing that makes Zinio ideal for those is not enabled for the BHM. When reading articles in some magazines, Zinio brings the selected article up in a pop up window, allowing you to enjoy the layout without sacrificing readability. For BHM you can only pinch and zoom - moving the entire page and being forced to zoom it back before turning the page. It's tedious, but not impossible. My life doesn't lend itself to tedium, so I have 12 issues all half read in my Zinio library. A big change from my cover to cover preference.

Next I gave Amazon a shot. With the Kindle Fire on the market I assumed the BHM would be a full color magazine with all the detailing I adore. It was very much not. Large blocks of black and white text, tiny tokens of art begging for space on the page, the effect was to make me appreciate even more the artistry of BHM's staff. Kindle for iPad rendered BHM high school textbook dull. I quickly abandoned it. It was a can of Ensure when I wanted a full meal.

The last option under consideration was the native iPad app. I use a few Newsstand apps. The lack of consistency across them is similar to the lack of consistency across Zinio, but with a further irksome aspect. Each Newsstand app requires it's own password and it's own operation quirks. While the magazine in the iPad app is the most attractive (and possibly the most readable) it still lacks complete immersion. The iPad native version of BHM is my favorite, so I committed for a year. We'll see how that stacks up against my Zinio experience.

I didn't try Google Play out - but there is always next year. BHM has a roundup of your delivery options with prices per country as well. It's interesting to me that unlike American based magazines UK Print subscribers have to pay extra for a digital version. The U.S. market has a weird convention that buying a paper version means free access to the digital one. I think digital delivery is a medium that hasn't quite matured but my eyes hope we find the right balance soon.

Review: Cravebox Teen Time

Oh, patriarchy. You never change. 

Before the holidays I briefly touched on Cravebox. Normally I wouldn't revisit the topic. After all, this is a book blog. If I turned it into a consumption blog you'd either endlessly read about my handbags or be grossed out by an examination of Victorian medical practices. (Both of which would be epic, now that I consider the matter.) We're back at Cravebox because I decided to give them one more try. Cravebox and I are breaking up. We are never, ever, ever getting back together. (You go talk to their friends.)

Last month Cravebox offered a Teen Time box with the description: "Being a teen girl can be kinda hard. Finding them cool stuff just got easier. We at Cravebox think girls deserve their own space… and their own stuff. That’s why our creative curators thought “outside the box” to find fun, girl-friendly discoveries to put into a box, just for them." 

I don't know why I expected anything other than what arrived. Maybe it was the words "outside the box" or perhaps "girl-friendly" instead of "gender normative mandates". I thought they might have chosen an upcoming young adult fiction title, coupled it with craft or club items. You know, some gender marketing, some "outside the box" acknowledgement that a growing teen girl needs to be shown that she is more than her sexuality. (I must have been drunk. I really have no defense.)

The Teen Time Cravebox arrived with an inspirational card I'm too depressed to quote from. More of the same about unique challenges and adventures. Being a teen sure is hard, but Cravebox is here to help. First up, a razor. Now that you're leaving your prepubescent years behind you'll want to erase as many traces of that as you can. While you're shaving, you can chew gum. Teens chew gum, because food makes you fat. (I actually have no issue with the gum.) Don't blow bubbles! This is chewing gum and your new hot pink Mary Kay gloss might smudge. 

Now that you're clean shaven and smacking those pink lips, it's time to address the rest of you! That's right - your hair. With the enclosed moisture mousse you can address all those nasty split ends you might have earned playing sports. Well groomed hair is a must for teen success. It's almost as important as clear skin, which is why Cravebox gives you a bottle of Vitamin E. You might have your skin under control but acne scars reveal a time when you didn't. Scars, burns and blemishes - Vitamin E has you covered. And that's it. Four products reinforcing the media message of your visual inadequacy and a pack of gum to chew your insecurities away. (Give mom a hug!)

Cravebox, they're just a bunch of crazy radicals. Radicals who totally know how to find cool things for teen girls struggling with questions of worth and identity. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to buy mine a gift from Think Geek. 

Holiday Boxes: Ipsy vs Birchbox

In the food boxes I valued novelty over value, but in the beauty boxes it was the absolute reverse. Ipsy was my choice for gift giving here. Each month is several full sized products in a small cosmetic bag. (I might have a bit of a bag problem, so this conceit really spoke to me.) I don't wear cosmetics very often so I didn't try these out on myself. I sent trial boxes to a girlfriend and got her thoughts. Ipsy was the clear winner. Ipsy is not a consistent box - some of the selections are limited in availability and others depend on the beauty profile the recipient fills out. Here's a look at a sample Ipsy box from Break The Sky.

Where Ipsy has some mild differences in their boxes, Birchbox appears to have a feast or famine mentality. My friend's sample box was definitely on the small and skimpy side. Birchbox is more of a grab bag service than a consistent sampling. Every subscriber is randomly sent one of ten or more possible combinations. With Ipsy, I'm sure my recipient is going to get a few decent sized products each month. With Birchbox it could be a granola bar and less cosmetics than you score walking past a Sephora. Modern Mommyhood had a pretty nice box this month. Fabulous But Evil liked hers as well. Fontenot Four was also pleased with her selection. It's possible our sample month of Birchbox was bad luck but there just wasn't enough in it to justify giving it as a gift.

Holiday Boxes: Cravebox vs Love With Food

What do you get someone really hard to shop for?

This year I decided to jump on the sample box craze and give gift subscriptions to a few sample services. I've given two Love With Food subscriptions so far with one of my recipients already ordering five more gift subscriptions for people on her list.  The concept behind Love With Food is that each month you purchase a box a meal is donated to a hungry child. (Charitable chowing?) I'm about three months into my own subscription and I'm a huge fan. Generally I like everything in the box save one item. Since I'm fairly picky food-wise that's a great track record. Unfortunately since it's food, we always eat it before I remember to take any photos. Wisconsin Mom takes great pictures but likes the Love With Food program far less than I do. She's looking at it as a dollar value box instead of a curated culinary experiment box. If I was adding it up the same way I might agree with her, but I'm just wanting a small monthly treat for my recipients.

If you're looking for a larger payout, Cravebox is probably for you. While Cravebox doesn't offer gift subscriptions, I was curious enough to try them out for myself. Most of the Cravebox reminded me of the boxes we'd get at the food bank when I was a kid. Dollar for dollar, it's a better value but the contents were pretty common. MsMommyHH6 loved hers. The printed cards gift certificate to Walgreens was worth twice the cost of the box, so I can't call it a wasted trial. I'm not sure I'd give anyone a gift subscription if Cravebox did offer them. Canned green beans and gravy powder don't really say culinary excitement to me. (I do wish Love With Food was occasionally more ingredient focused. Ready to eat seems to be their concept, which is smart branding but hard to keep fresh and exciting.)

How To Spend Your Money: Waring Pro CC150 Cotton Candy Machine

I don't understand the Ladies Who Refuse Lunch. Why do people eat 100 calorie chemical snack packs when they could have 40 calories of sweet sugary goodness on a stick? I'm sure there's a reason that has to do with blood sugar crashes and refined carbs. Tell me all about it later. Right now I am excited about my latest kitchen toy. After a No Good Terrible week full of Problems I Can't Solve I found myself at Sur La Table. Some people drown their sorrows in sex with strangers. I buy a new spatula. Or a cotton candy machine. You know, like you do.

Commercial cotton candy machines? I've run them, disassembled them, cleaned them, and patronized them. I've never thought a home unit could do more than produce a token puff. The kind (and by kind I mean evil) people at Sur La Table invited me to play around with one of their units. Dude. DUDE! Look at that photo! I used half a tablespoon of sugar! I totally bought it. I also bought a jar of classic pink vanilla spinning sugar by Hammonds. At $9 for a small jar it's 32 cents a serving. The floss sugar Gold Medal puts out is less than 11. On the other hand, you have to store that sugar nice and dry until you've eaten 90 odd sticks of cotton candy. It seems sensible to pay a little more to eat a little less.

I've been playing with the machine a few days running. It's quick to clean and much more fun than most kitchen toys. A cup of table sugar mixed with 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon made a delicious cotton candy but only produced half the fluff of sugar alone. When the flavor mix gets too heavy the sugar builds up in crisp little sticks on the side of the bowl. A good person would crunch it up and respin it, but I have to be honest. I just eat the cinnamon shards outright. (Waring suggests mixing Kool Aid with table sugar. Um. No. Super nasty.) I think later this week I'll mix up a cocoa / sugar base or a ginger / sugar base for some other interesting flavors. In the meantime, there is nothing wrong with vanilla. Nothing at all. (If you're going to throw a carnival in your kitchen I suggest starting with a reversed chopstick. Those paper cones aren't meant for home units. They only pack them in because you've been programmed to think cotton candy belongs there.)

Review: Barnes & Noble vs Anyone Else

No. Really.

This is a US-centric tale told in reverse order. It begins yesterday. 

I very rarely do business with Barnes & Noble.  I don't like the way they conduct themselves. As of today, I won't bother with them until the going out of business sale. The kids saw a book and craft combo for $16 during a kill some time browsing session. I told them before I opened it I wanted to check the online reviews. Turns out the chain exclusive set is available for $7 online. With free store pickup. From the same location.

Yes, I'm returning it. It's the final straw in my Barnes & Noble coffin. I differ from many readers in my choice of retailer. Here are my standards. Don't screw me over and I will shower you with money. That's it, that is the full list. You don't need rock bottom prices (although I love a bargain as much as the next girl.) You don't need the fanciest or most stylish location. You need to have the item I want to buy (or get it in a timely fashion) and not screw me. Barnes & Noble has repeatedly failed the test. 

The blogworld asks me to shower my money upon different vendors. In the beginning, I was as anti-Amazon as the next girl. I thought their discounted prices were a result of their inflated shipping costs and I ordered from other sources. Then Amazon stopped screwing me on shipping. I was a strong supporter of Waldenbooks until they closed, then Borders until they did the same. During these years the blogworld begged me to shop at my local indie retailer. I didn't have one. Haven't had one for a good 25 years. So thanks, blogworld, but I can't sign on. Then they wanted me to mail order from my local indie retailer, chosen apparently at random. I tried a few. I had an 80% order correct completion rate. I went digital. I supported digital indie retailers. Then Agency publishing driven by Apple and Barnes & Noble screwed me. And them. I stopped showering those publishers with money. I went Harlequin and Amazon. (Most of my big six reviews are library or ARC driven. I considered dropping all reviews for those publishers, but with book buying dollars more important honest reviews seemed more important to me.) Avon revised their pricing  and I said ok, Avon can get showered with my money again. 

The big trend in blogworld now is begging me to support Barnes & Noble. I don't see why. They screw me every chance they get. They screw me in the store by charging me double what they charge me if I don't impulse buy. (That is some messed up retail logic right there.) They screw me with the worst digital customer service of anyone I've dealt with ever. They screwed me with price fixing in the digital world which was preceded by price fixing in the paper world. None of the tactics they are currently in hot water for, that I am currently being asked to support them through, are new. Barnes & Noble has never been a retail white knight, ever. I'm done showering them with money and I'm done with being asked to. Stick a fork in them and let's all move on. You know what I would support? Here's a small business idea. Open a kiosk with a computer terminal and one copy of a few hundred books. Let me browse them. I'll pick the ones I want and you'll send a download link to my email. Don't screw me and I'll shower you with money. Just make sure the books aren't Agency, because until the DOJ is done with them I am as well. 

Why My Next E-Reader Will Be A Kindle

Safe As Houses, Ma!

E-Readers And Why I Bought Them.

1) Sony PRS-505 after the Smart Bitches, Trashy Books Test Drive.

2) Sony PRS-505 as a gift for a family member.

3) Amazon Kindle 2 as a gift for a family member who uses Audible.

4) Sony PRS-300 as a gift for a family member.

5) Sony PRS-300 as a gift for a family member.

6) Sony PRS-350 for myself.

7) Amazon Kindle with Keyboard given to me.

8) Sony PRS-350 as a gift for a family member.

You can see I have been a Sony loyalist. Amazon and I have a bit of a history. (It's sort of like the whole Matlin / Carville thing but with less procreation.) Events transpired this week to flip me over to the Amazon loyalist side which fit nicely into my prior comments about service dominating an industry where price is no longer a primary consideration. First, Sony created the opportunity. You may recall that the stylus on the PRS-350 broke after 3 months of use. Sony does not consider it a warranty item and wanted over $65 to send me a new stylus. I've been making do without one.

Since I got the K3 as a gift I've used multiple readers. There are things I like about the K3 and things I dislike. I am very attracted to Sony from a design angle and (stylus aside) they have been quite durable for me. Recently I heard an odd sound when taking my Kindle out of it's case. Apparently I bent or dropped it and the screen was broken internally. While the bottom corner of the screen refreshes normally, the rest of it appears to have delaminated (for lack of a better term) leaving a permanent mixed media of graphics and lines. This section of the screen does not refresh. I called Amazon. Amazon apologized and is sending me a new Kindle by 2 day delivery.

I asked Amazon if they understood that I almost certainly broke the Kindle myself.  My customer service agent not only understood, he asked if 2 day service was quick enough as I was still under warranty and the screen was completely covered. A few seconds later I had a return address label for the broken unit. A few hours later I had a tracking number for the new unit. Cost to me? Nothing. Nada. Zero dollars and zero cents. While I am still attracted to Sony from a design sense, it would be the height of foolishness for me to purchase another product from them. Obviously, with price removed from the consideration and features being roughly equal, buying a Kindle is a no-brainer.

It really is all about the service.

Review: Josie Loves J. Valentine

This Is How We Do Christmas, a photo by meoskop on Flickr.

You may have noticed a lack of content in the last few weeks. A certain unseen person in our household gave himself a Blu Ray dvd writer for the holiday and has been updating all of our home movies. Since it takes about 24 hours to process each disc and he is a bit of a home movie fanatic - well, let's just say my access to the home network has been limited. I finally get to show you my favorite holiday gift. (No, not the guy. That's my brother. I got him for the holidays before the bicentennial. He is so out of warranty it's ridiculous.)

The guy is wearing (and quite well, I must say) the Monster Vest in black from the Josie Stevens Josie Loves J. Valentine collection. I love everything Josie designs, but I can't pull all of it off. (Ok, at various times in my life I could, but I'm a realist who lives in the now.)

I love her design sense so much it's probably a good thing there isn't a local retailer for me. I think I would try it all on, and once tried... likely buyed. (Um, should that be bought? Doesn't sound so snappy.) I adore this vest. It's crazy warm, it has teeth (teeth are underused in fashion) it's fun, it's faux fur and it's made in America. The inside is lined, the detailing is there, it's adorable. It's also a fascinating litmus test. Wearing it gets you the most fantastic reactions. My friends adore it, think it suits me perfectly, and love it. My acquaintances either ask if I'm kidding or (loved this one) say they didn't even notice I was wearing something new. Strangers are evenly split down the middle. I could save so much time screening new social contacts. Love my vest? I'll probably love you! Just to be fair, I'm going to include a photo of myself so you can see that once again, it's my brother that rocks the style in the family while I drag it along behind him. (It's not my best photo, but my cousin snapped it and so I have it ready to go.) I totally need more from this line. It could get addictive pretty easily. If I'd had this back in the day, I'm pretty sure I'd have worn it with a bikini and stiletto boots.

Review: The Best Of Archie Comics by Various

I'm going to suggest this one as a stocking stuffer. If you're American, you're already very familiar with Archie and his eternal triangle of Betty and Veronica. If you're not, consider Archie our TinTin. (Yes, yours is better, I know.) Generations of American kids have grown up reading Archie and he has reflected a fairly conservative view of American culture back at them. From Josie and the Pussycats to Sabrina the Witch, Archie has introduced a number of long lived franchises. (Right down to the novelty single.)

Coming in at $10 USD this paperback is a great introduction for a tween reader or a trip down memory lane for an older one. While the curation of the volume is excellent, everyone who reads it will feel something was left out. (I'm a Jughead fan, myself.) From showing the limitations of the early gags (how many times can Archie give Veronica poison ivy?) to the weird soapy feel of it's current titles (Our abusive boyfriend Moose in anger management?) this paperback offers something for almost anyone on a gift list. Too often these retrospectives come as highly expensive hardcovers with their own slipcased and number collectibility conceit. The Best of Archie Comics is a thick pulp paperback perfect for folding in half under your bed. (Maybe I'd be rich if I'd carefully preserved all the Pep Comics I acquired in my youth. Instead I read them to shreds. I think Archie would want it that way.)

Spending Your Money: Yanni Cheese by Karoun

Brazilian Beach Cheese, a photo by meoskop on Flickr.

Technically, this is neither Brazilian Beach cheese nor Karoun's Yanni brand Grilling Cheese. The photo was taken at Lollapalooza so it is actually Brunkow Cheese out of Wisconsin. Brunkow isn't available near me but grilling cheese changed my life. Seriously. If you are thinking about giving someone a holiday basket with odd culinary delights, please get them some grilling cheese. It's easy to find the sheep's milk based Halloumi, but I find that too salty. The cow milk based Yanni (and Brunkow, if you're lucky) is amazing. This cheese cooks like a meat. Put your grill on medium, soak the cold cheese for a few minutes in your choice of spices (I like olive oil, red peppers and garlic) grill for a few minutes, die and go to Heaven. (It's ok, Heaven can totally wait. They will just kick you back when you finish chewing.) Be sure and tell your lucky recipient how to prepare it, because this would be a waste if sliced and put on crackers. Thank me later, I have to go grill some and get back to my book.

Apples To Apples: Taking The Sony Reader Off The Table

I'm not going to even talk about the Sony Tablet or the T series reader. I'm going to completely change my prior stance (that Sony is the elegant reader while Kindle is the clunky cousin). I still believe Sony offers a nicer design (so does Amazon, they appropriated it for their new line) and I prefer the versatility of vendors e-pub offers. These things haven't changed. Moves by both companies in the last few weeks changed my buying habits.

Amazon kills Sony at customer service. It's not even close. My aunt's year old refurbished Kindle broke. Amazon's response was to replace her unit with a brand new one. My daughter's three month old Sony PRS-350 had the stylus tip snap. Sony's response was to completely ignore her. We contacted three different customer service points with the issue and only one answered. That one directed us back to the other two non responsive contact points. After three weeks, I went searching and found I could order the replacement stylus (a small thin piece of plastic) for almost 70 USD. Seriously. Over 65 bucks. The unit was 90. We're using a Nintendo DS stylus that Nintendo sent me for free as a thank you for my loyal patronage. Sony didn't respond to an issue we had with her Bloggie camera either. Sony and I have to break up now. I have options, I don't need Sony telling me otherwise.

I sent the PRS-505 to a new home, told the family to use the PRS-350 until it breaks and began carrying the Kindle With Keyboard. Kindle has changed their software to support an easier method for building collections. If they ever tweak the software to allow me to partition my accounts or give me parental controls on the Kindle's abilities to download & view prior purchases, I will be buying three Kindles the next day. Having moved closer to Sony's design sense, Amazon has paired their better service experience with a better visual for their devices. Then they added library support directly to your device. One more tweak and I will take one of each of the above. Ozy and I still hang out together - he flows a PDF with more flair than Amazon (though they're trying). It's the K3 in my handbag, and soon in the backpacks as well.

It's not me, Sony. It was you. And your stylus.

Apples To Apples: Why You Care About DRM

This is an easy one. I've assumed through this that you already understand DRM, or Digital Rights Management. In case you don't, we're going to break that down. See that candy? (Right now, I could totally go for one of those fat frogs in the lower corner.) Imagine you've bought a big old bag of it. Maybe you've been opening the bag and eating a piece here and there. Maybe you've been saving it up. Whatever, it's your candy and you want to eat it. Now imagine that you take a piece of candy out of the bag, put it on a plate, and someone hits your hand. "That's not your candy." Of course it's your candy. You bought it. You saved it. It's yours. "No, it's not." That is the DRM experience, right there.

When you purchase a book (or the right to read a book, actually) it is encoded with security software designed to keep you from giving the file to 100's of your closest friends. Because of that, you cannot change the format of the book. If you buy EPUB (for Sony) or AZW / MOBI (for Kindle) you are locked into that choice forever. Deciding to change readers means buying all of your books over again. Because of DRM, you may find yourself unable to read your books even with that reader attached. Forget a password, have a computer clock error, there are literally dozens of ways your candy will be taken from you. It's absurd. DRM is a far greater impediment to legal book purchasers than it is to book thieves. As long as people make money off DRM, then DRM will be suggested as a helpful tool to publishing, data be damned. Removing DRM is either Not Cool, Illegal, or A No Brainer depending on who you're speaking with. (This issue is going to fall under personal choice.) Adding insult to DRM injury is a little thing called Agency Pricing. We used to call it Price Fixing and it used to be illegal, but now it just means that publishers can charge you the exact same price for a book at every outlet. If a retailer wants to offer you a discount or incentive? Too bad. They can't. Want to buy the book at Target? They can sell it to you for a penny if they want. In e-book format? Full MSRP with no ability to resell or give the book away and no promise that DRM won't (at some point) keep you from reading it. Attractive, huh? Of course there are publishers who do not practice Agency Pricing, and there are publishers who do not use DRM (Carina Press, that means you!). You could stick to their books (or free books) and live a perfectly happy (if restricted) e-reading life. But we both know you won't.

I'm not going to explain DRM removal to you. That's on you to find out, should you choose to do so, because I don't need the legal hassles. I can give you an example of a situation where you might choose to remove DRM even if you feel you would never want to do so. There's a Kindle owner I know who was reading a multi book series. All but one of the books was for sale as MOBI. One volume was inexplicably unavailable. She could buy it elsewhere in EPUB, or she could download it from a pirate site. She chose to buy it in EPUB, strip the DRM, convert it to MOBI with Calibre and load it to her Kindle. She jumped through 5 hoops to make sure the author was paid and she paid a price far above a used or new paper copy. I promise you that was no deterrent to piracy. (Her kid said they would have just picked up the pirated copy since it was less hassle.) So let's assume that you have decided not to lock you (and your books) to one device. Keeping track of your books is light years easier with a program called Calibre.

Calibre is a means to store your books. Think of it as your virtual bookshelf. You can (on DRM free files, files with DRM cannot be changed) modify a cover, assign tags for easy organizing, rate the books or arrange them by series. Calibre will convert whatever format the book is in to whatever format you need it to be in. Step on your Kindle and break it in half? Calibre will convert the AZW file to EPUB for your iPhone to use until you replace your reader. Here is another place your choice of reader is important. Files from iBooks are locked into Apple's DRM tighter than tight. Hope you don't run into any technical problems (On a computer? When does that occur??) because those books are not currently strippable. If you order from Amazon, you shouldn't update your software. When Amazon improves their software they tend to also improve their DRM restrictions. New hoops for the paying consumer. (I just want to eat that frog, I don't want to play Frogger.) When it comes to freeing your file, the big A's are not your friends. However, if all of this gave you a headache, my advice is to go with a Kindle and don't buy more candy than you can eat in one sitting. Make a wish list of stuff you might want to read and buy one book at a go. (It will minimize your losses, even if it doesn't maximize publisher profits.)

Did we cover everything? If we didn't it's going to have to wait. I feel downright fragile from all this thinking. My Courtney Milan Fan Girl card and I are going to spend some quality time with Unclaimed. I'll let you know how that turns out.

Apples To Apples: Which E-Reader Should I Buy?

I think we've established that there is (at least not yet) One True Reader to rule us all. If you don't mind reading on a backlit screen and don't mind the weight, I prefer using my iPad. I only use my e-ink devices as backup. (It's sort of like having an extra  house key in your wallet.)

That said, I wouldn't buy from the iBookstore unless you are 100% sure you are selling your book reading soul to the iThings forever. (We'll get into why I keep harping on DRM in the next post, just know that I'm using my iPad with files from other vendors.) So, iPad for me for the win, but it costs a bajillion and three dollars, weighs a ton, attracts attention, and gives most people headaches. Back to the Other Ones. Obviously I didn't discuss Kobo, Nook, or any of the other readers on the market. (If someone wants to give me one I will be happy to share my thoughts. I already know I kinda hate B&N, so I doubt we'll be talking Nooks soon.)

I Don't Like Using My Computer / I Want To Use A Lot Of Audiobooks / I Like To Knit Cats - Probably the Kindle is going to work for you. (Do you really knit cats? Because I think a knit cat would be kind of awesome. I saw a knit dissected frog once and I was going to give it to my cousin as a wedding gift but... right. E-reading.) Kindle owns ease of use, you don't have to get a computer involved. The only reason you might want to rethink is if you're not willing to use a Kindle forever. Kindle is second only to Apple in aggressive protection of DRM. Unlocking Kindle books requires you to partially cripple your device. If you side-load your Kindle with other retailers books, you won't get the full benefit of the product. That's sad. Kindle is also a great choice for Audible subscribers and low volume readers.

Should I Wait For The Kindle Tablet? That's a price point choice. I don't think the KT is coming out swinging at the iPad, I think it's going for the Nook. Either way, I expect Kindle 3 is going to end up practically free when the KT hits. You might want to wait for that holiday price drop and decide if the KT offers enough Touch to tempt you.

I'm Richie Rich, Bitch / Status Matters To Me / I Want A Multi-tasking Unit - Go ahead, take your bed self out to the Apple store for a shiny new iPad. Actually don't. Buy a refurbished one directly from Apple. Every refurbished item I've gotten has shipped directly from the factory in China and looked brand spanking new. All of them perform like champs with the same warranty and a lower price. Throw Apple Care on there if you're nervous.

Should I Wait For iPad 3? No. Are you kidding? That's in March of 2012 and you're not the kind of person who can wait for things. Buy it now, sell it later and eat the loss. That's kind of how you roll.

I'm Not Ready To Sell My Soul / Baby Needs A New Pair Of Shoes / I Gotta Get Touched / All My Furniture Comes From Ikea - Don't bother reading on any iThing but the iPad. You'll just break your thumb and spend the money you saved on electronics in healthcare. Get the Sony PRS-350 and call it a day. You might have trouble finding one, honestly. The 350 had a better reputation for reliability than the 650 and given the somewhat fussy attitude of my 350, that's quite a statement. With the new models coming out, these are scarce but can be found for under $130. With the Sony you're gaining public libraries and better book ownership, but you're losing WiFi and 3G book loading. (For now.) As of yet, Sony hasn't been too interested in playing DRM reindeer games so liberating your purchased file isn't exceptionally difficult.

Should I Wait For The Sony T-1? Yes. While the full specs of the upcoming Reader haven't hit, the T-1 could break into the Amazon experience by offering their own version of WhisperSync and computer free loading. If the price point rumors are true, Sony may have realized that positioning themselves at the top of the price market wasn't working. You could end up much happier by waiting. I can't tell you how much happier, Sony isn't calling me. (If you see Sony, could you tell them Angela and I don't want our two dollars back. Just them.) Hey, Sony! Over here! Let's have a play date! I've got cookies!

Brokie McBrokerson Is In The House / Touching Is Not For Me / I Rock My Atari 2600 On Date Nights - The Sony 505 is a perfectly respectable option. While we're probably nearing the battery failure point on some more heavily used units, my refurbished one is still going strong. (Actually, I just kicked Baby to the big curb. That's right. Baby's living at my inlaw's place now. Somebody had to go! It's like the moonwalker at the fair - first in, first out.) if you can pick a Sony 505 up at a decent price, it's probably worth getting. If the price is low enough, it might be a good entry point into deciding if you want to deal with e-reading at all.

Should I Wait For More Information? How should I know? I can show you where the trigger is but you've got to decide when to pull it. I think that e-reading is here and it's here to stay. While I do know a few who have tried e and gone back to p (paper, that is) I know far more who have embraced the e and never looked back. Readers who were telling me just ten months ago that they would never read a book they couldn't huff are sniffing electronic cases happily. (Of course I say I told you so, are you kidding me?) The choice has to be yours. You've been hanging out here long enough. You're curious. Give it a go!


Tuesday(ish) - All About Calibre, or, What Is DRM And Why Won't You Shut Up About It?

Apples To Apples: Reviewing The Kindle 3

Are we still doing this? (How can we still be doing this?) Ok then. Here we are. Drumroll for the big dog in the fight, the Kindle 3.  The Kindle 3 is the reader you buy your grandmother. Ordered from Amazon, it's ready to go out of the box. Picked up at Target, it just takes a few minutes to authorize. The Kindle has some serious weight behind it, so let's talk about it's limitations first. The Kindle has a visual design only it's mother could love. Let's be real, it's ugly. Grey may be my favorite color but carrying a keyboard around at the bottom of my reader... all I can think to compare it to is tying a fanny pack on a chubby teenager. That keyboard is not doing Kindle 3's styling any favors. Adding insult to that injury,  the letters are going to wear off the keys fairly rapidly. Sony is correct to place the page turn keys on the base of their units. While the Kindle buttons are smoother to operate, having them on the sides is cumbersome. There's no great place to hold a naked Kindle. Although it is extremely light, I haven't found a position that is both stable and enables one finger swiping of the pages. Mostly I hold it in one hand, hit the button with the other. That's way too much effort for someone like me. (It's probably my tiny mutant hands, but I need some buttons rearranged.)


Other than that, Kindle could eat everyone else's lunch and still have room for dessert. Yes, it's cumbersome not to have Touch after experiencing it with other e-readers and yes, there are some serious limitations in the Amazon interface, but let's not kid ourselves. WhisperSync makes up for a lot. The selling point of the Kindle is that buying and loading books is ridiculously easy. This is true. You want it, you click on it, you have it. There's no need to get out your USB cable, there's no need to shop around. Click. Read. Done. Additionally, if you forget your Kindle on the bus or in your other handbag or at the office, just pull out your iThing or your laptop or whatever you've loaded your Kindle App to and resume reading where you left off. Click. Read. Done. Amazon doesn't need to make the changes that would ensure it's dominion when it already holds that power. No other reader can follow you from device to device at this time. For sheer ease of use the Kindle cannot be beat. While it's plastic case is more prone to breakage than other units,  Amazon's customer service handles that easily. Broke your Kindle a day before the warranty ran out? Odds are good you're getting a new one. Day after? I still like your chances. Amazon recognizes that the real value of the Kindle is not the unit you're holding in your hand but the consumer relationship between your wallet and their store. Suddenly remember you forgot to order Aunt Seraphina's 80th Birthday Gift? Use the web browser to connect to Amazon and hook that up before resuming your read. It may not be an elegant or quick browser but it just saved you from having to leave the Lazy-Boy.


Click. Read. Done. and WhisperSync are so attractive that I would leave the better designed Sony product behind if Amazon would make a few changes to it's software. Kindle files everything under The. While you can make collections, it's cumbersome and annoying to do so. Instead of a fetishist joy, building collections is a root canal. You know the longer you put off getting started the worse it will be, but you still avoid it. Making things worse is the lack of WhisperSync for non-Amazon purchases. Did you sideload your previously purchased (now unlocked and converted) Sony library to that Kindle? No WhisperSync for you. Amazon only wants to maintain the library you paid it for. (It's a little ironic that Apple and Amazon are currently facing off over whose closed system can be the tightest. Both of those guys need to loosen up so we could fit more money in their pocket.) The other thing keeping me from Kindle is it's lack of locks. With the Sony and iPad systems I know my companions are too lazy to get a USB cable out and teach themselves how Calibre looks. I can load a reader with the books they wanted, hand it off, and call it a day. While Kindle has the (awesome!) option to link up to six units to one account, it does not let me partition which Kindles see which books. This means your four year old early reader can accidentally download your Erica Jong collection. You can't buy Puppies On Parade without Uncle Joe noticing. You can't even have a special folder marked YOUR BOOKS ARE HERE for when your partner (who still doesn't want an e-reader) borrows your Kindle (again) and asks who needs 360 books in their Archive. (As we all know this leads to said partner researching How To Delete Books From A Kindle Archive and tossing half your books out in their effort to 'help' you find 'things' more easily.)

On paper, Kindle is the perfect lover. In the flesh, it's easy to notice Kindle needs to floss more. I'm not sure what's going to happen to mine. I could de-authorize it and establish a separate account for another user, but that creates needless partitioning issues for my computer and iThings. I could hand it off to another user and tell them not to even think about messing about with the Archive. I could give up Touch and accept only some of my books will be both WhisperSync'd and automatically delivered on release. I'm completely on the fence. If you plan on only buying from one source and you don't like sharing; if you think organizing your books easily is for sissies or buy only a dozen books a year, the Kindle will never make you cry. With it's ease of use for Audiobooks and insanely simple text scaling, it is a huge hit with the older members of my clan. It is not an accident Amazon is dominating this market, but they haven't done so in a way that makes me stop looking at Sony.


Points Of Awesome

• No Cable Needed. WiFi or 3G Load Options
• Elementary Interface
• Customer Service Out The Wazoo
• Backed By Internet's Largest Store
• MOBI Also Sold Elsewhere
• Insane Battery Life
• Automatic Loading Of Pre-orders
• Limited Loaning
• Easy Gifting
• Lightweight & Pleasant To Hold
• Best Screen For Clear Reading
• Built In Support For Audible Books

Points of Bummer

• Keyboards
• Cumbersome Navigation For Large Libraries
• Lack Of Locks
• Must Jailbreak To Lose Ugly Screensavers
• Lack Of Support From Most Public Libraries
• Ugly As Shame
• Feels Kinda Cheap
• Only Fully Supports Amazon Purchased Product

Monday(ish) - So What Do I Buy? 

Tuesday - Why Calibre?

Apples To Apples: Reviewing The Sony PRS-350

I don't care if it's sex or it's cookies - there are some things in life that are very hard to refuse if you've said yes in the past. Touching your e-reader is absolutely in that category.

My Sony PRS-350 was a true impulse buy. We were planning 6 weeks of travel with a location change every few days. Ordinarily I would have taken the iPad for myself and the Sony 505 for my companions. Events transpired (cue doom and gloom music here) in such a way that I found myself traveling with a lifting restriction. One pound. No more. The iPad itself weighs more than that, never mind adding my passport, the iPad case, my wallet... you get the idea. I decided to borrow a second 505 from my sibling. Because our lives are an O'Henry story, my sibling sold it to make rent. Enter the Sony PRS-350. It fit two criteria; it was lightweight and it was in stock. OK, three. I already knew how to use it. My intention was to sell it after the trip and take whatever loss there was as a rental fee. I still have it. It's (I would say my precious but I absolutely loathe Tolkien) in my handbag as we speak. During our trip I found that my previously beloved 505 felt cumbersome and outdated after using the iPad. Having to press buttons and choose from text selections and all of that was soooooo much work after the ease of the iPad experience. Between the included stylus (that it took me a week to notice, I'm slow like that) and the ability to search my books by cover, the Sony PRS-350 was kicking my 505 to the curb. While not quite as crisp as a Kindle screen, the PRS-350 offered much better resolution than my 505. (Previous touch editions were too fuzzy for my comfort.) Rather than having to buy a pricey cover for the 350, it fit easily into the larger of a Tokidoki for Sephora Passe Pouch set. A selection of which, and I know this will shock you, I already had.

Loading the PRS-350 is the same as a PRS-505. Sony made some welcome improvements to the Reader Store in support of the device but the basic mechanics are unchanged. This is a USB street. My 505 charger didn't work with the PRS-350, but Sony did sell a dedicated charger for wall use. The unit may be significantly smaller than the 505 but the screen is large enough that I never felt like I was reading on an iPhone. It seemed like a mass market paperback, easily held in one hand. While my initial impressions of the touch mechanism were that it was balky and less refined than the Apple experience, part of that was simply needing an adjustment period. By the end of the trip I was at ease with the touch mechanism and reading smoothly. (In many situations I did find it more comfortable to use the navigation buttons for page turns.)  Having mechanical controls as well is wonderful when you're in a situation that makes using the touch screen unwise (Powdered sugar happens, ok? It happens!) While initially concerned that the raised edge / curved edge design would make it uncomfortable to use (I'm a lefty) the fit was natural and well balanced.

Design is where Sony excels. Even with the removal of the 505's full metal case (the 350 is made of several materials) the unit feels solid and expensive. The slightly rubberized back reduces slip while the brushed front reduces fingerprints. These are units people thought about. Although the PRS-350 lacks the memory card slots of the larger units, there is more than enough memory for casual use. I loaded around 200 books to mine without filling it up. Aside from a lack of WiFi or 3G support, Sony's main downfall is it's hang time. If you want to delete the notes you made about a book (or anything else) the spinning arrows go on for far too long. Suddenly your beloved partner is some ancient relative screaming "I'm thinking, ok? Keep your pants on!" instead of rushing to meet your needs with the joie de vivre of youth. You may hover between fear that the system has crashed and the knowledge that if you don't wait it out you could trigger a crash where none was occurring. PRS-350 moves at it's own pace. Sometimes that pace suddenly slows to a crawl. The page refresh is not invisible, but fast enough that you quickly become accustomed to it. (Page refresh is when you move to the next page, the screen flashes dark for a moment then returns to normal with the new text.) My PRS-350 is playful. It likes to play a game called Hide The Battery Charge. Sometimes it will tell me the battery has drained and it needs to go to sleep even if I have just fully charged it. Nothing works until I plug it back into my computer. Within moments it laughs and says just playing. We good. Full battery on board. Hey, let's get a snack. While this is rare, it's only fun for one of us and that one is not me.

I believe this is what keeps 350 from overtaking the 505 in people's hearts. Still, because we've gone Touch we can't really go back.  Even with it's little quirks, the 350 shoved 505 out of my life. The crisper text, the ability to navigate by finger swipe, the note taking and highlighting ease all combined to make 350 my dominant travel reader. Then someone gave me a Kindle. WHAT WILL HAPPEN? (A really long and certainly boring review of outdated tech I still own, for one thing.) Oh, it's go time around here. With four readers sharing real estate on a desktop meant for a maximum of two, someone is going to hit the curb. It won't be iPad, he's the 800 lb gorilla in this gang. Also, Steve Jobs would beat me up. I know he's super sick and all, but that guy intimidates me. I'm pretty sure his turtleneck hides super secret weapons from the future. C'mon, iThings AND Pixar? No way that's natural.) Hey! This would be a good place for a segue! I know I said we'd talk the upcoming Sony T-1 talk today, but as it's an Android based unit and Amazon is talking about it's Android based Kindle upgrade, I think we're going to talk about them together and later. Probably under What To Buy. (I love spending other people's money. Ask anyone who's stood near me with a wallet.) Also, I asked Sony if they'd pretty please consider giving me one because I am super extra special and they didn't call me back. I think I had the right number. I mean, it's not like Nook answered or something.


Points of Awesome

• Small Size Without Sacrificing Reading Experience
• Lightweight & Elegant
• Good Storage Capacity
• Long Battery Life 
• Touch, Not The Bad Kind
• Note Taking, Highlighting
• Custom Lock Screens
• EPUB (Public Library) Compatible

Points of Bummer

• Must Be This USB Connected To Use
• Can Be Fickle
• Super Extra Slow Compiling Issues
• Discontinued Product
• Lacks Flavor When You Lick It
• Sony Charges $65 For A Stylus

Sunday(ish) - Kindle, All That Or What?

Monday - So What Do I Buy? 

Tuesday - Why Calibre?

Apples To Apples: Reviewing The iPod / iPad Reader

I understand there are people who read on their iPhones or iPods. I do not understand these people. I've read two books on the iPhone and both times I thought it was great for repetitive stress injuries of the thumb. If you're basing your opinion of e-reading on your iPhone experience, stop. It's not fair to either of you. Reading a book on the iPhone is akin to eating with a single chopstick. (You know, last night this dude was telling me that people used to hook up multiple Nintendo Gamecubes into a hybrid home computer. There are things you can do and there are things you should do.) When I was given my shiny iPad I didn't expect to be replacing my Sony 505. The iPad is cumbersome to carry around on errands, difficult to balance in one hand, and impossible to use in direct sunlight. I also expected it to cause eyestrain, headaches, a return of the Salem witch trials and psoriasis. (While I still don't know exactly what psoriasis is, the trials thing is totally happening!)

I'm a night reader. I do 85% of my reading in bed or on the sofa so not needing a light source made the iPad a much better option than the Sony 505. People in my home (who are very, very sensitive to peas no matter how many mattresses you lay atop them) claimed the click of the Sony 505's page turn was impossible to sleep through. Pretty soon I found myself doing most of my reading on the iPad and just leaving the Sony 505 in my bag for emergencies. Reading on the iPad is a whole entire thing. Depending on which model you purchase an iPad will either store half a gazillion books or a gazillion and three. The iPad also offers the previously undreamed of ability to display books in color. This means cookbooks, comic books, magazines, all sorts of media that isn't very exciting at scaleable e-ink greyscale is super extra sexy on the iPad (as long as you stay indoors, clean your screen fairly frequently and make sure any ambient light isn't causing your face to reflect into the center of the page). While the iPad is crazy heavy compared to other devices, it's roughly the same as an average hardcover book. The page refresh is faster and feels more natural than the page refresh of an e-ink device. You flick your finger and the page moves - your brain is used to that.

The first choice a reader using an iPad has to make is which app to use. There are more reading apps than there are petals on a dandelion. Kindle will transfer your Amazon e-books directly to your iPad with all of the glorious ability to browse by full color cover intact, but categorizing them can be cumbersome and annoying. iBooks will give you a fairly easy interface to categorize your books (again, full color browsing intact) but it isn't very elegant. Once you get your permissions to agree (if you're working with DRM) it's a decent no-frills option for your EPUB and PDF files. Don't confuse iBooks with using the iBookstore. The iBookstore is the single worst place to buy a book in the history of books, even including German train stations. The iBookstore is so bad it makes me think Apple wants to hurt me. Friends don't let friends shop at iBookstore. Even after I switched to reading on the iPad I kept buying books from other sources. (I don't even download free books from iBookstore.) Granted, the iBookstore interface has greatly improved since launch. Adding it to the iTunes store was tempting, but Apple's extra special DRM is more than I care to deal with. Books purchased in the iBookstore cannot be transferred to my Sony devices. Books bought from Sony or Amazon can be transferred to my iPad. Holy no brainer, Batman.

Picking your reading app is a lot like picking out your shoes. Put some on your feet and see what you think. For me, using Calibre to load my books and Sony or Amazon to purchase them has been the best solution. Frankly, I buy from Sony (or various publishers directly, or Books On Board) far more than I do from Amazon. The Amazon ease of use is offset by a weird increase in typos or editing errors. For some reason conversions to MOBI are less carefully proofed than conversions to EPUB. (Download a few dozen free book samples and you'll probably run across this.) Another pitfall with the iPad is everything else it can do. Hit a boring chapter? Suddenly you're on Twitter or surfing the internet or playing Tetris and it's an hour later. An abundance of choice can lead to a scarcity of consumption. Still, if iBooks were DRM free and I never needed to read outdoors, the iPad would be a strong contender for the One True Device. Browsing books by cover and turning pages with a finger flick is a very natural reading experience, making it easy to forget you are not holding a paper book.

Points of Awesome

• No Light Required
• Large Capacity
• Natural Page Turns
• No Buttons, Swipe With Finger
• Supports Kindle via WiFi
• Loads From iTunes
• Color Screen
• Large Format

Points of Bummer

• Much Shorter Battery Life Than Alternatives
• Cumbersome
• All Those Distracting Apps
• Super Sucky DRM Issues
• Avoid Direct Sunlight (And Garlic)
• Pricey McPricerton
• Not Handbag Friendly
• Causes Eyestrain In Some Users

Tomorrow - The Sony PRS-350 & T-1 Thoughts

Sunday - Kindle, All That Or What?

Monday - So What Do I Buy? 

Tuesday - Why Calibre?

Apples To Apples: Reviewing The Sony PRS-505

In the Apples to Apples comparisons I'm going to keep it pretty straightforward. Don't worry, we're not talking "This is based on Linux" serious, let's not get crazy. More of a "Here's how we use this bad boy" instead of "Sony 505 and I make sweet, sweet love while looking at pictures of puppies." (Oh c'mon. Like you've never sneaked a peek at the puppy cams.)

Sony  launched the E-Reader in the early 90's with the Data Discman. (I distinctly recall seeing it in the store and saying "Cha-yea-right. Who's going to read books on a screen?" This is why I am not living on my own private island. That and I never met Richard Branson.) You would think Sony would own the market, but some key choices put Amazon on top. (I'll get to all that when we talk Kindle.) The Sony PRS-505 has held up as the gold standard for E-Reading. Despite being replaced by multiple updated units, the 505 still commands roughly $100 USD on ebay. Consider it the fetish piece of current e-readers. While a generation behind the most current e-ink screens the 505 offers a reading experience close to a printed mass market book. (Let's not kid ourselves, some of those paper pages are downright fuzzy). This was the first e-reader with a high enough resolution to make me consider jumping into the e-book world. From a design perspective, this is the Mercedes to other e-reader's Yugo. Brushed metal cases are well fitted with smooth and responsive buttons. The two memory card slots (I have a 4 GB SD card in mine) are nicely recessed to avoid trapping dirt. The 505 can be finicky on occasion - mine has crashed twice. Both times a hard reset brought it back, but without connectivity a hard reset means waiting until you can access your computer to reload your books.

Here is the 505's Achilles Heel - The Loading of Books. Angela James of Carina Press has been open on Twitter about the Sony Reader Store software refusing to install on her Mac. A major editor for the ebook only branch of a major publishing firm can't use your software? That's a (major) problem. When I obtained my 505 it didn't support Mac. We had some growing pains at first. After the Mac update, it was pretty smooth. I don't find the Reader Store software particularly versatile. I found myself switching to Calibre for file management. (Let's make file management it's own entry, since that is like, omgsoboringIwanttodie and all. For the purposes of these posts you have DRM free files that you maintain with Calibre. Ok? Ok.) The Sony 505 requires a USB connection and the ability to navigate (with DRM) Adobe, the Sony Reader Store, and basic file loading. This won't work for your 87 year old grandmother who pounds on the keys wondering why the laptop won't change the television channels. (Not your grandma. She could totally sudo my root tree, I give you that. Some other dude's grandma. My bad.) Without DRM, it's plugging the 505 into your computer and having Calibre feed it lots of yummy noms. Until the memory runs out.

The PRS-505 has the attention span of, well, me. You're going to need that SD card. Once you are using an SD card any category of books (ie tags you've given your files - like That Junk My Sister Reads or Books Where Everyone Dies And I Cry A Lot) that is also being used by a book in your main memory will duplicate itself. This means you will have 3 books in Super Hawt Reads About Puppies listed and right below that the same category will have 1 book listed. This is crazy annoying when your partner opens the collection labeled Here Is YOUR Stuff On MY Reader Because YOU Keep Saying You Don't Want One LOSER and complains they can't find the book they just loaded. (Pro-Tip: It's in the collection on the next page, the one with the same name.) An easy workaround is to give up the storage in the main memory and put all your books on the SD card. Do not fiddle with the SD card. If you lose it on the bus and find yourself stuck in traffic without any books in the main memory you will cry silent tears of regret. People will think you're the crazy homeless person that rides all day and drop nickels in your tote bag. It won't help.

Ok, so we've loaded our 505 via USB cable from the computer, we've checked out our library books or purchased them from a friendly e-pub seller near us, we've organized them into easy to find collections and tossed a few pictures onto the 505 for custom screen saver action. Now what? Now nothing. You're done. The battery life on this thing is insane. You can charge the PRS-505 roughly once a month (sometimes less) via the USB cable or a wall charger. Sony sold a charger for way too much money so I use a third party PSP wall charger that works perfectly. I've dropped it, set things on it, tossed it to rattle around the bottom of my purse and handed it off to my kids. The text navigation is easy to use and the learning curve ends with Get My Freaking Books To Open Class (also called DRM 101). It's workhorse nature is why the 505 lives on after it's been taken out to pasture and shot as a product line. This is a well designed reliable reader. So why did I kick it to the curb? (Ok, the tween's backpack, but still.) Stay Tuned.

Points of Awesome

• Reliable
• Expandable Memory
• Long Battery Life
• Intuitive Controls
• Many Public Libraries Support Format
• Beautiful Design
• Decent Page Refresh Time

Points of Bummer

• Must Be At Computer To Load
• Requires Adobe
• No WiFi / 3G Support
• Internal Memory Small
• Loading From The SD Card Slower
• Discontinued Product

Tomorrow - iPod or iPad?

Saturday - The Sony PRS-350 & T-1 Thoughts

Sunday - Kindle, All That Or What?

Monday - So What Do I Buy? 

Tuesday - Why Calibre?