I just saw a video by one of my business heroes Mr Guy Kawasaki where he discusses the new Amazon Kindle. I have been looking into this for some time now and, I have to be honest, I want one!! I really want one! I know what the iPhone groupies went through last year now!
This, to me, is more then a "no-brainer" as Guy puts it, it is a fundamental part of my travel / tool kit from this year forward. My problem... is that right now I live in the Middle East and NOT the USA so RIGHT NOW (when I really want it) I can't have one!!
Seriously though, I think this is going to provide untold value to consultants, and for a range of reasons.
E-Books are nothing new, but as Jeff Bezos said to Charlie Rose "Nobody has been buying them". So Amazon has set out to provide a platform, and gadget, that will digitize books, and in the process revolutionize the book industry. SO what are the differences between Kindle and "other" eBook readers, and how will this benefit the consulting industry?
The way I see it, LOTS! For example:
1. Easy access to up to 200 reference books without having to carry them around. Big plus for me. I work in a pretty theoretical area of consulting and I frequently need to cross reference points of view and opinions. This eliminates my mobile library and allows me to have access to an even greater number of references than normal.
2. No need to dock - If I want access to additional reference material I can just purchase it online (At $9.99 or less) and get it delivered in (apparently) less than a minute. AND - no monthly fee for the connection, I was pretty impressed by that.
3. Back up and storage - If I delete any of my books from The Kindle, Amazon immediately holds copies for me. Sounds great, not only my mobile reference material but my entire library.
4. Access to newspapers - I travel a lot. The days when I could wake up every morning and pick up the local newspaper from the front lawn are well and truly behind me now. So this gives me back that level of comfort with regard to the newspapers and magazines that I read.
5. Access to blogs from the internet also.
I'm sure there are other points, but these ones alone really scream CONSULTING TOOL to me. If anybody out there actually has one I would be very interested to learn how it is really going.
The one thing that I see going against this is not really functional but cultural. If we / I do go down The Kindle path, then there will be less books in my home. For me, this is no problem, I have already caught the bad habit of reading a lot. But for my young kids its a big issue, they won't see books around the house, and they won't just pick one up every now and then to see what Daddy spends his time reading.
