You’ve no doubt seen it breathlessly pushed – maybe even on this very site. The Amazon Kindle is going to revolutionize the way we read. It’s going to become the way we read everything from today’s newspaper to the Greek classics.
There’s just one problem. They aren’t selling.
No wonder Amazon is keeping Kindle sales results so secret.
I travel a lot for business, and I’m always in New York City, Boston, and Chicago. I’ve yet to see anyone on a subway, café, or terminal sitting there reading a Kindle. No one.
And these aren’t exactly dummy towns like Los Angeles or Miami. These are hip, literate, early-adopter places – the very same places I saw the iPod invade like wildfire.
But Kindle? Ain’t happening.
What do I see in these cities? I see people reading – you guessed it – newspapers, magazines, and their iPhones/Blackberrys.
If the eBook hype is ever going to become reality, it’s going to happen on iPhones and Blackberrys – and that’s a big "if". Much more likely, Kindle will be a fond memory from the turn of the century.
And people will read about it in a newspaper or on their Blackberry.