Kindle2 to Launch February 24
-- Publishers Weekly, 2/9/2009 7:21:00 AM
With a media line that stretched nearly to Madison Avenue and such publishing heavyweights in attendance as Random House’s Markus Dohle and HarperCollins’s Brian Murray, Amazon unveiled the Kindle2 in an elaborate, and crowded, presentation this morning at New York’s Morgan Library. The new device is significantly slimmer than the original--about as thin as a pencil--has a text-to-speech function that can read the book out loud, and easier and improved navigation. The device also includes improved graphics and more storage--it will hold 1,500 books, Amazon chairman Jeff Bezos said, and its battery will hold a charge for two weeks.
Kindle2 will debut on February 24 and will still be priced at $359. For customers who have a Kindle on backorder, Amazon will automatically upgrade the purchase to the new e-reader. Bezos said for existing Kindle owners, anyone who orders a new one within 24 hours “will be put at the top of the queue.” It was unclear if current Kindle owners will receive a discount for upgrading.
In his remarks, Bezos said Amazon had been selling e-books “for years” and “it wasn’t working until 14 months ago” when the Kindle was launched. He displayed a graph which showed flat e-book sales from 2003 through 2008 when business spiked, but there were no numbers attached. Bezos did say e-book sales now account for 10% of sales (and didn’t mention the usual caveat that that figure is for books available in both print and e-book formats). Ian Freed v-p for Kindle said he hoped the company would be able to keep Kindle2 in stock, something that has sometimes been a problem with the current version. He said Amazon has increased capacity to meet expected demand. A new Whispersync feature syncs the new Kindle with the old and Bezos said Amazon is working on ways to sync the Kindle to other mobile devices.
The presentation included an appearance by Stephen King, a self-described fan of the Kindle and who was persuaded by Amazon to writer a short story to be offered exclusively on the device. In the novella Ur, King includes a scene which is a long product placement for Amazon and the Kindle, and noted that in the piece the main character’s Kindle gives him super powers.
