I considered buying an eBook reader when the first e-Ink based readers were introduced but I wasn’t convinced of their usability at the time. Now, after a little time’s gone by and the market’s a bit more established and with a nine-hour flight coming up, I thought I’d take the plunge.
The Kindle still isn’t available in the UK, presumably because Amazon can’t hammer out the deals with the cellphone networks. The SonyReader 700 isn’t available in the UK either – that’s the touch-screen one but anyway I’ve heard a few complaints about the screen being too reflective.
So my only option was the Sony 505s.
Some pluses:
The type’s very clear
Easy to read in strong light
Excellent battery life – about 7,000 page turns
Page turning becomes less noticeable as you grow used to it
Bookmarking’s useful
It uses ePub, an open standard, rather than the Kindle’s DRMd AZW
It holds plenty of books with SD-card expansion if you need it
some minuses:
I’d like more screen real estate
I’d like more, and better formatted, ePub books available
That last point’s a bit of a pain. The 505 will read RTF, HTML and PDF but works best with ePUB. Unfortunately a lot of ePUB downloads haven’t used the specification very well and consequently don’t use the functions of the reader very well.
Now I’m going to have to learn the EPUB format (essentially a set of XML files with additional content, all compressed) and write my own software to convert.
I discovered that Flight 447 was reported missing from trending topics on Twitter. I then read more breaking news and followed expert in-depth discussion on the pprune forum (the Professional Pilots’ Rumour Network), which described the composite materials of the Airbus body, posted links to detailed weather maps of the area, and debated possible causes of the crash.
I tried the BBC several times throughout the day but the story posted there hardly developed and had very little explanation.
Recently the MSM has been making noises about attempting to charge for content. Let them. They’ll just die more quickly.
Anyway, I still have FSX, the latest version, and as a slightly anxious flyer I like to prepare for long journeys by trying to make the flight myself – epecially the landing. So for our upcoming trip to the US Northwest I have a 747 in BA livery and I’m going to plan the flight from LHR into Seattle with as much realism as I can build in.
Here’s another tip for nervous passengers. Keep your eyes on the faces of the cabin crew. As long as they look bored you know you’re ok.
Saw the Tomas Alfredson film Låt den rätte komma in (Let the right one in) last night, in a cinema audience of just six people.
Eli’s Theme, from Låt den rätte komma in
Oskar, bullied at school, meets a newcomer to his block of flats, a slight, dark-haired child named Eli. They grow close, despite Eli warning Oskar at the beginning that they can never become friends. When Eli’s mysterious guardian is caught while trying to kill a youth to drain his blood before making a final sacrifice for Eli, she admits to Oskar that she is a centuries-old vampire.
The hesitant and tender relationship that develops between the two children is delicately explored, and the sorrows, mistakes and pleasures of friendship are played with assurance by the two young stars, Kåre Hedebrant (Oskar) and Lina Leandersson (Eli).
The cinematography (Hoyte van Hoytema) is beautiful and the sparse soundtrack, full of pauses and near-silence, perfect for the pace of the film and the night and snow of Sweden.
I’ve read that the book on which the film is based is darker and more unsettling. Eli’s guardian is a paedophile and Eli, a castrated/emasculated boy, which explains one very brief but puzzling moment in the film and Eli’s repeated assertion that she’s not a girl, which i took to mean that she was saying she was a vampire.
One slightly farcical moment (the unconvincingly cgi cats) to take the edge off perfection but that aside it’s a quiet, thoughtful, disturbing film that’s left quite an impression. Recommended.
The Rocky Mountain News. The San Franciso Chronicle. The Seatle Post-Intelligencer. The Boston Globe. Ann Arbor News. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Closed, closing, moving online and harbingers of things to come in the UK. I’m undecided if it’s a good thing or a bad thing but the likes of NYT executive editor Bill Keller persuade me in one direction:
New York Times executive editor Bill Keller, in an email to POLITICO, explained telling an audience at Stanford yesterday that “saving the New York Times now ranks with saving Darfur as a high-minded cause.”
