Is it just me that thinks it's a little creepy that Amazon knows what I highlight? (Well, theoretically anyways, I don't own a kindle)
Maybe it's a little creepy they admit to 'snooping' it, but then again they're being honest and open about it so I don't have any problem with it (I'm a Kindle owner). As long as they keep it anonymous though I have no problem, it's similar to the Netflix anonymous data isn't it?
They also store your notes, and while I'm hoping those aren't snooped we really don't have any guarantee over it just as we don't have any guarantee that someone at Google doesn't read our gmail account, or any number of other sites and scenarios.
The demoralizing part for me is that a lot of the top quoted passages are from The Shack and The Lost Symbol, and the very top one is from a Malcolm Gladwell book. In fact all of the top 12 are from those 3 books, and 9 of the top 25 are from The Shack (which I had never even heard of before, then again I rarely read fiction and certainly not religious-inspired fiction).
I wish we could have a more normalized view of this- instead of just showing us the most highlighted, have an algorithm that somehow takes into account overall downloads as well. This would give us a better idea of the 'important' passages and could really help out in finding new books to read. Especially so if you could filter by genre because frankly I wish we could cut out the fiction part altogether. I don't really see much point in highlighting passages of fiction unless it's some literary classic or you're doing it for school or whatever, but really what's the point in saving some random passages from some Dan Brown book? To each their own, though...
No, it's not just you.
If you're a regular reader, get some kind of e-ink ebook reader even if not the Kindle. It's been amazing for me getting all the out of print classics for free off Gutenberg.org and taking the time to read philosophy, history, the best fiction of all time, and so on. I've got a Kindle and am very happy with it, but get something even if not the Kindle.
I'm reading different, often deeper things than I used to read, I'm reading more, and it's light - I travel so that's a huge plus for me. Also, I never finish a book mid-airplane or mid-train and get stuck looking out the window any more.
That makes sense, yeah. You can read on your netbook for long periods of time without your eyes hurting, though? I've never really been able to read things that require a lot of studying to get through on the computer without breaks. Seneca's "On the Shortness of Life" took me like five sessions with short breaks to get through on my laptop, where I could normally read something like that in one sitting on paper or e-ink.
> But I know there exist a small lamp which can be attached to a Kindle - but, can someone confirm it is convenient way to read that way?
I've been looking for something like that myself, could be quite a boon.
Bad-form Amazon.
Even presuming some dystopian future where The Government (cue hammy antagonist music) is busting your chops for what you read, the fact that Amazon has a receipt for you purchasing a copy is likely to be a bigger deal to them than which bit you highlighted.
Not all of Amazon's customers live in the U.S., either. It appears that they don't currently sell the Kindle in Iran and China, for example, but if they did, I sure wouldn't want to own one there.