Kindle Flunking Out Of Princeton?
from the bad-grades dept
theodp writes "At Jeff Bezos' alma mater, The Daily Princetonian reports that less than two weeks after 50 students received free Kindle DX's as part of the University's e-reader pilot program, many of them said they were dissatisfied and uncomfortable with the devices. 'I hate to sound like a Luddite, but this technology is a poor excuse of an academic tool,' said Aaron Horvath '10, a student in Civil Society and Public Policy. 'It's clunky, slow and a real pain to operate.' How about a second opinion? The device is 'hard to use,' added Horvath's professor, Stan Katz."I have to admit that I don't quite understand the value of the Kindle DX as a reading device for schools or... anything, really. In the meantime, why are schools using closed off DRM-encrusted devices for training students anyway?
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I read the story a few days ago and some students do like some parts of using Kindle. When we are discussing a story/news, I think it's only fair to point them out too, instead of just pointing out the part to be criticized.
However, I personally don't think the story is about Kindle's DRM but about how Kindle in its current form is not a good educational tool to use. What Mike wrote is off topic, really.
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Re:
Really, you have to know what you need the e-book for. Current generation has it's own limitations, but things will improve in the nex year or two.
Meanwhile, as an early adapter, I can live with what we have today. And no, getting Kindle with all the DRM stupidity, was never an option for me; I always needed straight and honest PDF support, not some transcoded BS.
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However, the Princeton story focused on the "educational" use of the Kindle, which is very different from casual reading of a book.
The main complain, if you didn't have a chance to read the actualy Princeton article is as follows.
#1 - very very VERY hard to take note of. This is the common problem for all ebooks. Unlike your mother who just enjoys a good fiction/non-fiction, students NEEDS to take notes, do dog-ears, write in margines, highlights, etc.
#2 - no page number, make it incredibly hard to a) reference to it in the term paper your are writing, b) talk to your classmate, who couldn't afford a kindle and has a regular book, about certain passage in the book
#3 - some people find it hard on the eye (and some people actually find it EASY on the eye)
another point not raised by the student now, but could be a problem in the future, and what Mike's main concern it, that you don't own the book. What if Amazon/Publisher decided not to "license" the book anymore. They delete your copy. What if you happen to like all your work and notes and bookmarks and want to keep it? You can't.
eBook would have a place in eduction if they can over come some major hurdles, but right now, it's, and I quote, "A poor excuse of an academic tool."
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I don't think Amazon would ever take away anything that was paid for again after the 1984 fiasco. The bigger danger there are the books that people would take on as a rental for the term. Pay less and lose access after a set period.
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ebooks have a place
Ebooks definitely have a place in higher ed. The current crop of college students have grown up reading screens rather than books, and a lot of them actually prefer to read on a screen rather than on paper. I have even had students who scan handouts to pdf files so they can read them on the computer.
Our campus has been looking at ebooks, but I doubt that we adopt anything until there is an open platform. Personally, I think the Kindle is a fantastic piece of hardware. However, the DRM-lockdown and the account cancellation shenanigans Amazon has pulled is more than enough to keep it out of our classrooms. One of the big appeals of ebooks is the ability to let students with vision impairments listen to their books. Unfortunately, that ability is sometimes taken away with Kindles, so that is one more strike against them.
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Re: ebooks have a place
i don't know a single person in real life who actually prefers screens for Reading. more than a few wish they didn't have to deal with them as much as they do. i do know several people who, if sent an e-mail, news letter, or other such document electronically, will promptly print it and never look at the digital copy again, though.
then again, a lot of the people i know have interesting sensory issues, so i suppose that skews things a bit.
meh *shrugs* people, world, blah blah blah blah.
i really don't see the one replacing the other by any natural process, at any rate.
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ebooks
ALSO, as a further note on this, having used a kindle, its garbage. As a device it is slow, sub standard, proprietary junk. Sure my mom loves it, but she doesn't do key word searches on PDF's or spend time trying to read mathematical formulas off of an ebook reader that is simply not up the the challenge of rendering it properly.
Finally, do I think ebooks are the next step, indeed the correct next step in educational materials, for the benefits of both students and teachers? Absolutely. Is the kindle or ANY ebook reader on the market a proper choice for use currently? Certainly not, none of them have gotten the hardware right, let alone the software or marketing strategy to make it worthwhile or workable.
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Because it's the only way these devices will sell. Think graphing calculators. Prehistoric, SLOW, you can't modify the firmware without TI threatening to sue, VERY LITTLE memory, really overpriced, haven't advanced much at all. Why do they sell? Monopoly, schools require them, TI makes a fortune and pretends it doesn't.
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Re:
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1899924/hating_on_the_iclicker.html?cat=9
N o one would buy this overpriced nonsense if it weren't required.
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Re:
These business models are advancing.
If you can't compete in a free market then lobby the government and sue people.
This is an extension of that business model, if people won't buy your product then lobby the government to force them to.
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TX2500 is my friend...
I went from carrying a laptop, notebook, 6 text books, at last, and other stuff to just 1 tx2500 and 1 small notebook for storing handouts.
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eBook readers - why buy a Kindle ?
I always have a book to read if I have my PDA with me. It remembers where I am up to with several books at a time. I can search, bookmark. I can read plain old PDF's or DRM eBooks that I bought from the eReader.com site.
I can even autoscroll so I don't need to keep moving my hand to press an end of page button.
And I would definitely take it to a beach because I can pick up a replacement so cheap. (I have a few on the shelf in case)
I read at night by backlight without keeping my partner awake with a bedside lamp.
I get access to a huge no of Gutenberg books (for some I pay a couple of bucks but I am happy to pay that as someone has added value by getting them into Palm eBook format and delivered them to my device).
Ebooks are not new. The Kindle is an integrated ecosystem like the iPod/iTunes.
If someone decided to make a device that was aimed at schools it could be better / cheaper for that application (wifi but no mobile, autolockout if not periodically authorised by school so not worth nicking, non volatile storage, rugged, able to use conventional batteries so if student turns up with it flat they don't lose ages)
Problem here is one idea (eBooks) being denigrated because of problems with a specific (non matched) device.
The eBook ecosystem as it applies to a school is what is important. The device (be it a tablet, netwbook or dedicated reader) is probably not where most work is required.
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>you have to study hard just to barely pass?
Princeton NJ. An Ivy league school without hype of a Yale or Harvard.
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Re.: ebooks have a place
Ahem: Me! But then, you have no idea who I am, so...
And my e-reader isn't a Kindle. It's an iRex iLiad. I got this one because it was much much more open sourced and because I could write notes on/near the text (if the doc's a PDF) using a stylus. Yeah, handwritten notes!
But it's also substantially more expensive than the Kindle.
/Would NEVER print out an email message to read it... Gah!
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Sony E-reader
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Kindle
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