I own an Amazon Kindle, one of those e-reader devices that lets you read books, magazines, and just about anything else on a (relatively) small electronic device. There’s a problem with my Kindle, though. It’s broken. (Insert sad violin music here.)
The break stems from what, in my mind anyway, is a design flaw in the device itself. When you buy a cover for the Kindle, which most people do, the cover gets hooked directly into the side of the Kindle. Normally, this is nice. The cover doesn’t slide around, looks nice, and keeps the Kindle protected. What could go wrong?
Well, apparently, when you open the cover from the back of the Kindle instead of the front, it can bend the plastic pieces hooking the cover to the device. These pieces, once bent, slowly work their way into the wrong place inside the Kindle, and eventually start cracking and breaking it on the front. You can probably see this in my picture (you have to look pretty closely).
The Kindle isn’t technically broken; it still works. But the cover now doesn’t fit quite right, and it kind of weirds me out to try to read with it now with a little chunk missing out of it.
Don’t get me wrong; I’ve really liked the Kindle. It’s a convenient way to get a book whenever you want it. It’s comfortable to read. I think the best feature is its use of e-ink, which puts all the text you read into a very readable, easy-on-the-eyes form. If you’re like me, you’re not a fan of reading a lot off of computer screens. The e-ink solves that problem beautifully. Apple’s new iPad tablet might look neat, but the computer screen would make reading long books a problem for me and my eyes.
As far as my broken Kindle goes, I’m hoping that Amazon will make things right. (Insert trumpet fanfare here.) They even sent out an email about this very problem, suggesting people who experience it contact their customer service about getting it fixed. That’s exactly what I’m going to try. I’ll let you know in the future how it turns out. Hopefully Amazon can live up to the good service they’re supposedly known for!
