Lovely Little Shelf

So my tech-loving husband, of course, ordered an iPad just about the day that they were announced.  I never really got it- seemed like a hybrid between the iPhone and a laptop.  I’m still not totally sold, but I did get to play around with it today, specifically the iBooks app.

Here are my thoughts, laid out in a simple pros and cons list:

Pros

• The display is in color and it is seriously beautiful.  The book that comes on it automatically is Winnie-the-Pooh and it has all these color illustrations and they are stunning.  The words are crisp and clear.  It is simple to change the font to a larger or smaller font, depending on what you are comfortable with.  You can also change from a one page (vertical) display to a two page (horizontal) view just by flipping the iPad on its side.  You can lock that feature, however, so it doesn’t flip when you don’t want it to.
• The page-turning is smooth.  You can turn pages forward or backward by tapping the left or right side of the screen, depending on which way you want to flip.  You can also “pull” the page across by dragging your finger in the direction you want to turn for a more realistic looking page flip.
• There is a page count in the bottom left.  It even tells you how many pages until the end of the chapter you’re reading.  I loved this because I always try to make it to the end of a chapter before I quit, so it’s like a little countdown! I love that.  There is also a scrollbar at the bottom so you can quickly get back to a certain page or peek at the end if you’re that kind of person
• The iBook store has quite a selection of the books that are popular right now.  They have older titles too, but it takes a little more searching to find them.
• The library is set up so cute.  It has all the books lined up on these little “shelves” that you can organize however you like.
• You can get “samples” of each book in the iBook store.  I thought that this was really nice because a lot of times you can read the first chapter or a little chunk here and there.  For me, this is always more telling than the back of the book, so this sampling was pretty important to me.
• It’s backlit so reading in bed is nice.  It’s easy to make the page dimmer or brighter depending on what you like.
• I hear tell that the publishers can put movies and videos within the books, but I haven’t encountered that yet.
• All the Project Gutenberg books are on there for free. A lot of these are kind of “boring” books, but there are some goodies on there too.
• You can search, create bookmarks, highlight passages, look up words in the dictionary, all with one little easy click. Fun.

Cons

• For now, the iBook store is fairly limited.  I searched a few authors that were moderately popular and not all titles were there yet.  There are also not too many that have a description of the plot, like would be on the back cover.  There aren’t reviews or much info on any of the books yet, but I know that that will improve over time.
• My library has a ton of free e-books on their website. Seriously. A ton. They are in PDF format and you have to get them through the Overdrive program.  Overdrive and Macs are not friends at all, so none of these books load into the library in iBooks.  This was a serious disappointment for me.
• I am a cheapskate.  There are a lot of books on there under 10 bucks, but I get most of my books for free or for a buck or something.  Buying a real, new book is a big deal for me and coughing up money for an electronic book is even wilder for me. Most new releases are between 10 and 15 dollars. I saw a few that were more than that, but not many. For some this may be a Pro. For me it made the Con list. So there ya go. You also cannot share them between friends. I like to share. But I get it.
• I like to have a book with me at all times. I keep one in my purse all the time.  I’d be nervous to throw this in my purse.  I guess I could make some kind of little cover, or Shaun said that you can buy one for forty dollars, but if you refer back to the last bullet point, you’ll see why that’s an issue for me. I’m cheap.

So, here’s what I think so far: Very cool.  I am this reading purist, though, I think. I like the feel of a book in my hands and I like the smell of books and I like how they look on shelves.  If I were a commuter or a serious traveler or something I think I would be absolutely wild over it.  For now I really do think that it has tons of potential.  I’ve heard that textbook companies are releasing their text books in the iBook store and that would be incredible for college students. I would have killed for carrying around a pound and a half of iPad instead of 20 pounds of books.  I’m mega impressed and I’m excited to see where it goes.