Here’s an insightful comment on our recent posting, Are You Too Young For Kindle?
RC
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Well, I’m 29 and I got a Kindle as a gift at the beginning of 08 right when they went on sale during Christmas 07. I LOVE my Kindle. Would I have bought one if it wasn’t given to me? No, but I would have been salivating with jealousy any time I saw one on the street. I didn’t pay money for books before I got my Kindle because books are too easy to come by. So I’d agree that my disposable income isn’t something I’d spend on books (I work in book publishing too) generally. Now, however, it’s almost too easy to drop $5.99 here or $9.99 there (btw – $9.99 is the absolute max I’ll pay for an e-book) for a book. I also have a NYTimes “headline story” subscription for a $1.99/month which gives me the top 15 or so stories of the day. I wouldn’t have taken a NYTimes subscription of any kind before then. It would have seemed like a waste of paper when I can get the gist of the news online.

The best feature is the “sample read”. If I pull a sample book its almost a sure bet that I’m going to buy the book. My buy rate has DRAMATICALLY improved since I got the Kindle. The Amazon library is a big deal as well. The library coupled with the wireless download is a hurdle that will be mighty big for any $99 application to beat…

The price point of the Kindle is only half the problem. I think young people would spend money on a piece of hardware they’d use. The sad fact is that many people don’t read enough to make a nearly $400 commitment to a piece of hardware. I carry my Kindle with me everyday and I use it regularly. The average reading in the US is like two books and a fashion mag, right? These people aren’t dropping $359 for a Kindle. All the 80G iPods, iPhones, and Wiis out there tell you that young people will shell out the dough for something they want and that they’ll use. Books aren’t the thing for the majority.

Also, I think old people were the ones commenting on the Amazon community pages because old people are the only ones who’d be tickled enough to go to an Amazon community page. I’ve had my Kindle for more than a year and I’ve never felt the need to visit the Amazon community. I didn’t need to ask a lot of questions on how to use it and I don’t really have the time to “make friends” with other people who have a Kindle just because they have a Kindle…

IMHO.