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Matthew Chan

About Matthew Chan

http://www.ascendbeyond.com

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Examples of The Culture of Poverty and the Poverty Mindset

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In my prior post on my attendance of the Poverty Symposium, I mention the Culture of Poverty and the Poverty Mindset.  I did not want to get too side-tracked by getting to deep a discussion of the Culture of Poverty and the Poverty Mindset.

Danny Bivins of the Fanning Institute said that in looking at the “root causes”, they also wanted to be able to measure it and collect data on it.  That is fine as a statistical exercise but I am not going to absolve common sense and my personal encounters with people who come from a culture of poverty and have the poverty mindset.  It is all around us.  The Culture of Poverty and the Poverty Mindset IS a root cause because it is a belief and life system that must be changed for all the other social programs to work.  Otherwise, the symptoms of poverty will continue to persist.

People have to believe, be driven to get out of poverty, and become self-sufficient not just talk about it and assume money will solve all their problems.

Instead of a textbook discussion, I am going to make give some pointed examples of how I know it exists and reasonably prevalent.  Let me preface my statements by saying there are always exceptions to the rule and some rise above it all.  But many do not.

1.  As a property manager and landlord, I am accustomed to dealing with tenants of all types.  Many are good tenants but many are not so good either.  I tell everyone the same thing, if you get into trouble, call me, and send in what you have.  Some call, many do not.  It has nothing to do with money, it has everything to do with the willingness to communicate and face a problem and not putting their head in the sand.

2.  Each year, there are some tenants that put Christmas gifts and the top of the list and rent at the bottom of the priority list.

3.  There are many poorer people who have much nicer and larger TV’s than I do.  Many also have nicer tire rims than I do on my car.

4.  How many lottery winners have we heard from over the years that said the money ruined them and that they were worse off than if they had not won the money?  It wasn’t the money.  It was their inability to become financially knowledgeable or responsible.  They were too worried about spending and impressing others with their new-found wealth than to learn to save or invest. Boxing champion Mike Tyson is fundamentally poverty-conscious despite the many millions he made over the years.  Yet, he went bankrupt years ago.

5.  I know tenants who intentionally keep their income low so that they can continue to get government assistance in their housing and food stamps.  Most people I know would do it as a very last resort, it it even came to that.  And if they did resort to that, they would do everything they could to get off government assistance.

6.  Poor people put a high priority in having cash on hand.  They do pocket accounting. What cash they have in their pocket is often how they manage their money.  They also seem to do better with cell phones with pre-paid minutes.  It seems they cannot self-control the minutes they use and so a billing system does not work for them.  They do not like checking accounts because it requires financial management.  The credit system is foreign to poor people.

7. The Internet and the digital world is entirely foreign to most poor people.  It is simply too abstract and non-tangible for them.  No one has shown them or educated them.  The digital divide is alive and well.  Anyone who can find and read this blog mostly likely did not come from the culture of poverty.  But that does not mean poor people couldn’t.  After all most public libraries have computers with Internet access.

These are some real-life examples that the Poverty Mindset exists and that the cycle of poverty can be very difficult to break because the value system is passed on from one generation to the next.  Also, people have a tendency to be friends and associate with others that have a similar value system.  Thus, the poor have other poor friends who have a similar poverty mindset.

Instead of just throwing money and offering more services, we need to provide more educational and mentorship programs that teach people how to adopt a new set of life values, life skills, and an entrepreneurial work ethic.  Hard work is not enough.  Working smart with leverage are concepts have to be introduced.

I may update this article as I learn more about the issue and culture of poverty.

Comments on the Poverty Symposium

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Last Thursday, I attended the 2nd Annual Poverty Symposium organized by Enrichment Services Program Inc., a Georgia non-profit organization.

It was interesting that I had received an invitation to this free event. It turns out that I received an invitation because of my prior attendance of last year’s Jim Blanchard Leadership Forum. In that event, it attracted many people from both the private and public sectors who had an interest in leadership and the future of business.

I was impressed that someone would create an event and assemble an interesting roster of attendees to discuss the issue local poverty.  Local politicians, representatives, public agencies, and non-profit organizations appeared to be the target audience.  Whereas I, representing small business in the private sector, seemed to be in the small minority.

Although the Poverty issue is certainly not the most exciting or inspiring subject to learn and think about, I am not oblivious of its impact locally, regionally, nationally, and even globally.  Poverty affects everyone even the affluent, wealthy, and the rich.

Unlike presidential candidate John Edwards, who made it a major issue in his campaign, I do not think that government and non-profit organizations can themselves solve this problem.  They can provide some funding and services to assist in the effort and deal with the symptoms but fundamentally, businesses and private sector must ultimately get involved to make a huge difference.

Danny Bivins of The Fanning Institute at the University of Georgia in Athens was the opening moderator of a Panel Discussion that included representatives from the Housing Authority of Columbus GA, United Way, Columbus Public Library, and Open Door Community House.

It was interesting because I have interacted with each of these agencies to various degrees through my normal course of business.  I listened as to what their opinions were regarding the local poverty issue.

A big part of the Panel discussion was finding and acknowledging the “root causes” of poverty, not simply the symptoms.  Issues such as high school education, affordable housing, diversity, home ownership, teen pregnancy, and marriage were all touched upon as “so-called” root causes.

In my mind, I agreed with much of what they said but I also disagreed with a good portion of it.  Most of the issues were politically-correct discussions that avoided the central and politically-charged issue:  the Culture of Poverty.

In the audience, were a few people that were beneficiaries of government programs and non-profit organization services.  So much of the day’s discussion focused on what the government, non-profit organizations, legistlation, and social programs could do help.  There was almost NO discussion on what the private sector and businesses could do to help.  There was also almost NO discussion of personal responsibility of what people in poverty needed to do to pull themselves out of poverty.

In the Poverty Symposium attendee folder, the Shriver Center included a packet that supposedly graded politicians and their performance in fighting poverty.  Not surprisingly, Republicans got failing grades and Democrats got excellent grades.  It was based on voting records on what the Shriver Center perceives as important bills to combat poverty.  From what I could see, there was little regard to the costs of each social program.  I have no doubt each bill have merit but I thought to myself, who pays for every single program that is going to be proposed?

In any case, it quickly appeared to me that the packet by the Shriver Center was clearly Democrat-leaning.  For the record, I classify myself as an Independent.  I cannot classify myself as a traditional Republican or a traditional Democrat.  I disagree enough with both parties to keep myself Independent.

Although Congressmen and Senators were invited, none attended in person.  Young representatives of each politician’s office were there to make their presence known.

Deborah Weinstein of the Coalition on Human Needs, concluded the day with her perspective on the national level. Admittedly, she said each community must do their part to deal with the poverty issue.  Not everything could be handled on the national level.  I agreed with her. But in her presentation, there appeared to be a “hole” in her presentation.

Like her non-profit peers, the focus seems to provide more services and more government programs.  Being patient for most of the day, I finally tried to ask a question regarding why there was no discussion about how businesses and the private sector could be involved in a way that didn’t always require donating money.  It seems that all businesses and private sector are good for are money donations which somewhat offended my sensibilities.

I also desperately wanted to know why no one wanted to tackle the Culture of Poverty and the Poverty Mindset which is ultimately what keeps many people poor, not necessarily the lack of services or opportunity.

Ultimately, a woman who came from poverty and a beneficiary of non-profit services got more “air-time” than others who had resources and fresh ideas to offer.

After the program ended, I had the opportunity to speak to Junie Christian who was a Host of the Poverty Symposium and Belva Dorsey, Executive Director of Enrichment Services Program.  I asked about why there was almost no discussion of the Culture of Poverty issue.

I brought up the well-known saying “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”  Quite simply, I wondered why there are not more educational programs that deal with this.

I also shared the well-known tales of lottery winners who come into a lot of money through their winnings but ultimately run their lives into the ground.  They do so not because they never had the chance to get money, they do so because they fundamentally are poverty-cultured.

They were surprisingly pleasant and engaged my discussion.  I told them I was also concerned about the poverty issue but my “small business” and entrepreneurial perspective vastly differed from the non-profit sector’s approach. Nevertheless, I told them I was willing to keep an open mind to any information they might have since I cannot claim to be an expert on the poverty issue.

All in all, I did not regret my time at the Poverty Symposium.  It did give me a different perspective on the poverty issue and it gave me time to reflect on how I might do my part to help.  But I did know that I wasn’t going to simply throw money on the problem.

It should be interesting to see what happens now going forward

I am Boycotting the Stock Photo Industry

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This article first appeared on “The TurnKey Publisher’s Blog”

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Because of my personal distaste and dismay of the Stock Photo industry which started with the Getty Images Extortion Demand Letter, I have taken steps to personally boycott the Stock Photo Industry and advocate not using stock photos altogether. The stock photo industry seems to be rapidly consolidating into two companies: Getty Images and Corbis, as they buy their way into near-monopoly status with them setting outrageous rules, policy, and pricing.

This article will not give you all the information necessary to entirely eliminate the need for stock photos in every situation. However, this article will give you some ideas and strategies to wean yourself and perhaps altogether eliminate your need for stock photos.I firmly believe that if you put your intentions behind the idea, you can make huge strides towards eliminating the need for stock photos altogether.

The very first thing you need to think about is whatever media project you are working on is, do you truly need a photo at all? Chances are that you are working on a website, book, magazine, brochure, news story, banner, or some other media project.Alternatives to photos might be diagrams, cartoons, illustrations, and drawings that you or a graphic artist you hire can create.Can you take your own photo to fit the need?

If you hire a graphic artist to create your own artwork, do not hire anyone in China or India where there is very little respect for intellectual property.They may be inexpensive but you can never be assured that their work is original. There is little recourse for their bad behavior because they are so far away. I recommend hiring graphic artists from the U.S. because as a professional community, they have a greater respect for intellectual property than their Chinese or Indian counterparts.They will think twice before using pirated material.

I would avoid hiring any company that outsources their work to graphic artist worker bees.In other words, I always want to deal and negotiate with a graphic artist professional themselves, not some agent or agency that farms out graphics art work.

If you do want to use and take your own photos, I highly recommend investing in a good digital camera so that you can begin taking your own photos.I also recommend getting to know amateur hobbyist photographers who have access to good cameras and enjoy taking photos.Very often, amateur photographers with good cameras are trying to find a way to justify the costs of their hobby. By hiring them inexpensively, you can get some great looking photos but also help the amateur photographer pay for his hobby.Make sure they understand that you are they are working for hire and that you will have full ownership and rights to the photos.

Professional photographers can be expensive depending on what you want and who you use. For these folks, I recommend bartering with them for exchange of services if you have talents in your profession. I find many professional photographers finicky. They will sometimes not give you full ownership or rights of the photo even though you paid them to take a photo. They are quite protective and their thinking is aligned to many in the stock photo industry. Admittedly, this is a broad generalization and based only on my experience. I am simply not optimistic that you will get good value from a professional photographer but it certainly does not hurt to try and negotiate with them.

Another source of quality photos is product photos from product manufacturers. Often, they are happy to have their products publicized and placed in a positive light and will give you free rights to use their photos. Product companies mostly police and control their photos because they don’t want their photos used in a manner they did not intend or in a way that paints their company or products in a negative light. Many will grant you free usage of their photos if you approach them the right way. However, large companies can be a challenge sometimes because of their size. They may be so large that they may not even get back to you.Again, it never hurts to try. Product companies are in the business selling more of their products, not sue people who use their product photos.

If you choose to take your own photos, invest in a digital camera that can take a resolution of 4 megapixel images or higher. You want to take high-resolution photos as your master copy.You can then “downsize”, crop, and enhance the photos for your websites or other uses.I recommend buying an easy-to-use photo editor such as Adobe Photoshop Elements 7 or Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 that allows you to crop and resize photos easily. The photo editor can greatly enhance the quality of the master photos you take. You can also enhance colors and adjust lighting with the software.Special effects such as blurring, stretching, pixelating, framing, adding captions, etc. are included with photo editing software.

I truly believe that with the increasing power and technical capabilities of digital cameras, cell phone cameras, and camcorders, the value of stock photos and stock photo companies will eventually decline. It is going to be a losing business to be in. This whole notion of extorting your way to profitability is distasteful and eventually will fall by the wayside much like what has occurred in the music recording industry. One only has to look to RIAA for that lesson.

Along the “do-it-yourself” philosophy, you should have the mindset that you will fit images or photos you create to your media project, not let your media projects deciding the specific images you need.Stock photo companies are trying to brainwash you the idea that THEY have the “perfect photo” for your particular needs. If you are creative, imaginative, and resourceful enough, you will almost always find an alternative or work-around solution that does not require the use of stock photos.

If you want to show the stock photo industry you don’t need them, the best way is to simply generate more of your own photos to devalue theirs and then use your own.I have published two books recently and have been able to successfully avoid using stock photos of any kind.I used my own photos as well as authorized product photos.I created my own artwork.If more publishers, graphic artists, and graphic designers started doing this, I truly believe the stock photo industry could be brought down to their financial knees very quickly.

Many years ago, people said that we would run out of .com domains available because all the good ones were taken. It is true it has become more challenging to find a good .com domain name. However, I have made it my policy to not deal with any domain speculators or domain squatters. I won’t be extorted into paying thousands of dollars for an available domain I can register for less than $10. And because I have set that restriction and policy for myself, I have always been able to find many suitable .com domain names for my various websites.

It is the same principle here. Think abundantly. Think creatively. Tap into your imagination. There are many ways to implement a visual concept besides a specific photo you might have in mind. There are many ways to implement a concept visually. Do not let the stock photo companies brainwash you into thinking you have to use their particular photos because there are no other ways of finding an image for your particular website, logo, banner, sign, book, magazine, or other product.

The best kept secret that the stock photo industry hates are government websites and their photo collections.Great public domain photos can be found from U.S. government agency websites. “The people” own the photos, not any one individual or organization.USA.gov is a government-operated website that was launched to help U.S. citizens have better access to various government agencies and resources.Specifically, USA.gov has a page called U.S. Government Photos and Images which contains links to government agency websites that have public domain images.The diversity of images available is quite impressive.An off-shoot of that page is the State Photo & Multimedia Galleries which links to public domain images at the State level.

Some of the more notable ones I like and found impressive are listed below:

Are you impressed with these websites? I was. It is all free and much of it is available in high-resolution.However, you should realize that not all images from government websites are public domain. You will need to seek out the image usage rights notices on each website. As I said USA.gov is a great starting point to a wealth of high-quality public domain photos.

If there are any other great public domain or government photo sites, please let me know and I will add them. If you have any additional tips to stop using stock photos and boycott the stock photo industry, send them to me and I will incorporate them into this article.

Melita Hunt of MyLeftLung.com – Rest in Peace

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melita-matt3I received a sad note a couple of days ago from the Van Tharp Institute that my friend, Melita Hunt of MyLeftLung.com, lost her battle against lung cancer and died at the young age of 41. It pains me especially because she never even smoked.

She valiantly fought the disease here in the U.S. but eventually went back to her country, Australia, to rejoin her family in the final weeks.

She brought many things into my life during our years as friends. I will miss her.

Melita, rest in peace. You will be remembered.

P.S. The photo you see were of us together in October 2001, nearly 8 years ago in Phoenix, AZ.

“TurnKey Publishing” Book Released to Printing

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TurnKey Publishing bookI am happy to announce that my newest book “TurnKey Publishing” has finally been released to printing.

It has been a long journey getting this book out. It was delayed several times last year as I took time out to work in and manage my real estate investments.

With the numerous and extended delays, the publishing industry continued to change and my publishing business evolved. The changes forced me to go back and revised the manuscript with the latest information.

I expect that “TurnKey Publishing” will be available for sale within the next two weeks on Amazon.com as well as my own websites.

There will be more special announcements as the book is made available for sale.

Last week’s Jim Blanchard Leadership Forum

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Last week, I had the great pleasure to attend the 3rd annual Jim Blanchard Leadership Forum here in Columbus, GA.  It isn’t often there is a collection of high-profile speakers and authors that come into the local area.  When I found out about it the Friday before the Monday-Tuesday event, I jumped on it.

The speakers were:  Dr. & Congressman Newt Gingrich, General Russel Honore, Daniel Pink, Thomas Friedman, John Maxwell, and GA Chief Justice Leah Sears.

I have to say each person made an impact on me in their own special way.  On Day One, I was impressed by how knowledgeable Newt Gingrich was in his presentation.  He went past political arguments to present his case on improving the health care system.

General Russel Honore of Hurricane Katrina fame gave a funny, entertaining but also very serious speech on preparedness.  I felt that more government officials should have heard his speech.  He gave me a perspective of public service that was inspiring.

On Day Two, GA Chief Justice Leah Sears gave a short speech on familes and education.  Her speech was much shorter than anticipated which led to an extended break.

Daniel Pink of “A Whole New Mind” was dynamic and brought a youthful energy into the presentations.  I loved his book which continues to resonate and impact me as I do business.

John Maxwell who has written many titles on Leadership (of which I have several in my bookshelf) gave his view of the 5-levels of leadership.  Those 5-levels made me reflect where I stood in my leadership abilities.

Finally, Thomas Friedman of “The World is Flat” and “The Lexus & Olive Tree” fame presented material from his new book “Hot, Flat, and Crowded”.  His talk was sweepingly huge and had global proportions.  He talked about “global weirding”, a flat world, that is growing in population exponentially.  I enjoyed his thoughtful and low-key approach.

The event was a success with around 800 people in attendance.  They provided two hot lunches and a hot breakfast as part of the event.  The part I did not like was that neither day were full days.  They were only partial days.  However, the 2-day event was only $299 which was a bargain for me especially since I did not have to travel as I normally do.

As the Leadership Forum ended, an announcement was made that Colin Powell would head next year’s line-up.  Colin Powell is an amazing role model, a tremendous thinker, and diplomat.  I will definitely be there for next year’s event.

In Seattle at Independent Online Sellers Conference

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This is a quickie post.  I am in Seattle attending the Independent Online Sellers Conference.  I almost didn’t come because this event is largely a grassroots effort.  There are about 200 Amazon resellers here.  Interestingly, this event is acknowledged by Amazon.com.  I am looking forward to visiting Amazon HQ on Monday.

I also learned about micro-blogging today.  So, I set up a Twitter account.  My account is mattchan66.  The link to my Twitter site is http://twitter.com/mattchan66 It is too early to tell how or what I will be using it for.  If it is anything like having a Facebook or MySpace account, I will probably not do too much.

Endings First, Beginnings Next

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I have known for many years that in order for new beginnings to open up, endings must happen.  Whether this is in personal or business life, this axiom is generally true.  The problem with most people, including myself, is that we dislike and fear change and taking risks.

There is a common saying that people should not burn bridges.  The problem with that is that sometimes that is the only way to let go and ultimately move forward.  Of course, there are upsides and downsides.  One has to focus on the positives and upsides or the negatives and downsides can be overwhelming.

I have had some practice on “burning bridges” and making endings and new beginnings.  And I am happy to say, as a whole, my decisions have been pretty good.  Short term, they were inconvenient and sometimes painful, but ultimately a greater good and opportunity opened.

Without getting into specifics, there are some things happening in my life that are simultaneously ending and beginning.  I am happy some of the circumstances and relationship are approaching their endings.  It is a welcome relief.  In fact, I have been looking for other things to end and leave behind.  I want to “lighten the load”, if you will.

The people I want to “keep” are people who have been “of service” to me.  They are solid people who are honest and stick to commitments they keep.  Their “flake factor” is very low.  The others are simply “needy and takers”.  In other words, they only come around when they need something.  Or there are other people who are simply lazy, unmotivated, and basically stuck in a rut.  They are in a situation of their own creation and like pigs in a pile, they continue to wallow in the mud.  You offer and try to give a helping hand out of the mud but ultimately they want you to do all the work to lift them out.  That won’t happen here.

On the opposite end of the spectrum are people who are inspired, ambitious, go-getters, risk-takers, enlightened, and action-takers.  I love and respect these types of people.  And when these people run into each other, they tend to get along quite well.  And the synergy they create is far greater than what the individuals can do.

I am not waiting until 2009 to prepare for it.  I am in process of “cleaning house” both literally and figuratively.  I am paring down the people I associate and correspond with.  I am leaving and abandoning those projects that don’t work anymore.  The unhealthy, fearful, lazy, unambitious, immature, and losers are left behind.  Life moves a lot faster when you stick with other winners.

It feels really good to make the endings happen.  It is amazing how quick, new people and opportunities open up.  It is easy to fall into a rut especially when you have a lifestyle like mine.  And so, I have to make a conscious effort to purge every so often.  I have a great feeling that come the end of summer, most of the purging I have to do will be done which will open up the rest of 2009 for interesting and great new people and opportunities.

Launching “Incredible Discoveries Information Page”

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I want to keep this post as brief as possible because this announcement is not one I consider “good news” but it was necessary given the amount of inquiries and information I have been getting regarding the infomercial company, “Incredible Discoveries”.

As a brief recap, “Incredible Discoveries” came into my life around June 20, 2007 when they wanted to talk to me about marketing my books with infomercials.  The conversations ultimately led to a $75,000 fee they wanted me to pay.  I was immediate suspicious and I declined the offer.

A disgruntled, ex-employee, Robert Danoff, and another individual made contact with me feeding me insights.  With my suspicions and their suggestions, I followed up on their insights.  I made a few more blog postings regarding Incredible Discoveries updates as it related to Robert Danoff.  I posted them because Robert Danoff gave me information that I thought might be of public interest.

To make a long story shorter, I eventually put an end to discussing “Incredible Discoveries” because I did not want my blog to become overrun with this story that really had little to do with me or my business. If you want to know more, go visit these posts.

However, since these posts last year, this blog persistently gets traffic on “Incredible Discoveries” which means many people are interested and someone is reading.  But I also continue to get emails and phone calls from people wanting my opinion on “Incredible Discoveries“.  I also get a few complaints.  But I am not the Better Business Bureau.  Nevertheless, I keep my ears open to what people tell me.

The straw that broke the camel’s back is when yet another person called asking me my opinion.  I told them it was up to them and it was their money.  It was like they wanted me to prove or disprove that “Incredible Discoveries” was a “bad” company.  Quite frankly, it isn’t my job to be responsible for others.

As a public service, I shared my opinions on the blog already and if you think you can part with $50,000 to $75,000 and take the risk, fine with me.  It is your money.  But I keep telling everyone that my internal radar says to spend your money elsewhere.  You can do a lot with $75,000 on your own plus I think a lot of the infomercial business is one that offends my sensibilities.  That is why there are so many complaints.

In any case, I did get curious enough to do more fact-checking on “Incredible Discoveries“.  After all, why does this blog get so much interest because of “Incredible Discoveries”?  Obviously, a lot of people are searching for information on them which led me to do some searching on my own.

And so, I am trying to put this issue to bed.  I dug out more interesting information.  I had some interesting phone conversations from various past plaintiffs and defendants against “Incredible Discoveries”.  I found information from the Florida Attorney General’s Office and Florida Division of Corporations.

With all of this, I compiled my findings into “The Incredible Discoveries Information Page“.  I have tried to be fair and I am upfront of my biases.  I give commentary and information but it is up to the reader to draw their own conclusions whether anyone should do business with them.

If you have additional meaningful information or corrections, I will accept them.  But I am resistant to taking any more phone calls on Incredible Discoveries. I got better things to do than discuss them.

To those who care, “The Incredible Discoveries Information Page” is a free resource. The direct link is:  https://matthewchan.commastersiteincrediblediscoveries-info.htm. To those who don’t care, you aren’t missing much.

My Review of Amazon’s Kindle eBook Reader

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Since coming back from the 2008 Book Expo America in Los Angeles, I have been wanting to write my review on Amazon’s Kindle.

My relationship with Amazon is multi-faceted.  Like most book lover, my first relationship with Amazon is as a customer.  In my opinion, Amazon has the best website to research and search for books.  It also has the best book community support.

Secondarily, I am an Amazon reseller.  I resell my books and titles through their Amazon Advantage and Amazon Marketplace programs.  Overall, it is a good business relationship.

Essentially, I have grown to like and appreciate Amazon over the years.

With the launch of Amazon Kindle, I find myself as both a publisher and a book reader evaluating the merits of Kindle.  At nearly $400, I am resistant to buying an electronic device to read books.  Although, I love my computer and everything it does, I still like to read old-fashioned books.  I just like the convenience of flipping through pages and basically jumping around at a moment’s notice.  I am still resistant to the idea of being depending on any electronic device to read.  What happens if the device is damaged or lost?

What I don’t like about books, however, is that they are subject to wear and tear.  They are bulky and take up a lot of shelf space when you have hundreds of books like I do.  They are a terror to move when packed into boxes.  It is an annual ritual to purge books and either sell them or give them away.  And it is difficult to find specific content within a book even with an index.

As a publisher, I would like to do away with the printing of books and sell more content electronically.  There is no hard printing costs, no warehousing costs, and it saves lots of trees environmentally. Having said all that, you will have a sense of my inherent biases and internal battle with Kindle.

At BEA, I was quite happy to see Amazon with their large Kindle booth.  Amazon intelligently and insightfully understood that there is still a huge portion of book readers who have never physically seen and fiddled with the Kindle.  Unless you are on the cutting edge and don’t mind blowing $400 on an untried device, most people including me did not want to spend that money without actually having some hands-on experience with it.

The folks at the Amazon Kindle booth seemed friendly.  They were ready to engage anyone interested in playing with a Kindle.  I awkwardly too the device and admired its design.  It was light and clean looking.  It had a relatively simple and elegant look.  The quality of the reading screen even when viewed at a steep away angle was quite good.

For the most part, Kindle was easy to navigate.  I goofed a few times but I attributed that to my user unfamiliarity.  The browsing of Kindle-titles was easy.  The Amazon employee pointed out that there were still many titles not available on Kindle but work was aggressively being done to get more titles.  As a publisher, I agreed with that.  Amazon has been heavily courting publishers to release their content on the Kindle format.  For me, I am interested but I have taken a wait-and-see attitude.  I will get into why in another post.

Back to the actual Kindle device, what I did not like about Kindle were the placement of the long page-turning buttons on both the left and right side of the device.  I am guessing the idea of having a long elongated button is to accommodate different ways and styles that readers would hold Kindle.  Unfortunately, I found it difficult to hold and adjust the Kindle with accidentally pressing one of the side buttons.

There simply was no easy way to hold the Kindle in my left or right hand.  If I wanted to adjust my seating position or get up, I found myself accidentally hitting the side buttons.  The Amazon employee said that once you get used to it, that would no longer happen.  That may be true but I feel the side buttons are too exposed.  The designers gave too much space.

My view of Kindle, like other electronic hardware or software, that this is a version 1.0.  I asked about future revisions and that subject seemed to make the person helping me uncomfortable.  I am guessing her job was to focus on selling the Kindle in the here and now, not focusing on a possible Kindle 2.0.

I speculate that there will inevitably be a Kindle 2.0.  There will be design enhancements and improvements to the hardware based on the feedback Amazon is receiving.  Perhaps this review will be one they will refer to.  They are likely to improve the battery life and viewing options such as including color.  However, I believe color will come in Kindle 3.0.  I think it is too much of a jump from Kindle 1.0 to Kindle 2.0.  I don’t think Amazon is quite ready to so quickly obsolete Kindle 1.0.

Overall, I enjoyed my user experience with Kindle.  I understand why there seems to be a growing bubble of support for it.  It really is a good device.  But the downsides is still a deterrent for me.  Kindle has to come down in price more.  Even at 50% off, it would be $200.  I am not sure I would still buy it at that price point.  There has to be more titles.  And the annoying side buttons need to be resized, relocation, or redesigned.

It is ironic that I do want Kindle to be successful.  And yet, for me as an individual reader, I still greatly prefer my books.

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