The Amazon Kindle has been an unmitigated success. There are no two ways about it, e-books are now in vogue and in demand. Today saw the Amazon Kindle 2 officially unveiled after months of speculation that it was on its way, and Stephen King was at the launch to give the product a boost.

The original Amazon Kindle launched in October 2007, to a quite apathetic response. Great, another attempt at turning the lackluster and wholly unwanted e-book business into a winner. But people started to buy them and the Kindle spent a good portion of 2008 sold out completely.

The Amazon Kindle 2 has been rumored for a long time now, and details even leaked last October. It then became clear that Amazon was planning an official launch at the beginning of 2009 although rumors and speculation surrounding details of the product were still coming in thick and fast.

On Feb. 9, 2009, Amazon finally unveiled the Kindle 2 to the public. At a press conference in New York, Amazon.com Founder and CEO, Jeff Bezos revealed the full details of the sequel to one of the hottest electronic devices to have been released in recent times.

Some things are staying the same, most noticeably the price. The Amazon 2 will ship on Feb. 24 for $359, exactly the same as the first Kindle currently sells for. And that makes sense because why drop the price of something that is so in demand that a waiting list meant the device was not available over the key holiday shopping season?

The Kindle 2 is only an ounce lighter than the original but does sport a new slimline design of just a third of an inch thick. The display has been boosted from 4 to 16 shades of gray, while page turning is now promised to be up to 20 percent faster.

The memory capacity has been jacked up considerably to 2GB, meaning 1,500 books can now be stored at any one time. And a 25 percent boost to the battery life means its now possible for two weeks reading on just one charge. There are also new features such as Whispersync and text-to-speech being added for this new iteration.

Stephen King also gave his blessing to the device, announcing Ur, a new novella that is exclusive to the Kindle. He read an excerpt from the short story at the event, as well as explaining why he loves the product. Which is because he can read it on the treadmill, and not because he’s getting paid to promote it.

The launch of Amazon Kindle 2 is a big deal. So much so that Google and other companies tried to grab on to the publicity generated for their own ends. Kindle 2 looks fantastic and should take e-book readers on to a whole new level. I just wish it wasn’t limited to the United States.

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Entry was posted on Monday, February 9th, 2009 at 5:51 pm under Amazon, Internet, Opinion, Retail, Technology.

Read more entries by Dave Parrack.
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