Sunday, May 31, 2009

Free "Nurse Jackie" Script for Kindle

Kudos to Showtime for exercising the power of innovative synergy and making the pilot script of their new show "Nurse Jackie" starring Edie Falco available on the Kindle for free through August 31.

A June 1 article in Advertising Age reports that "Showtime may have finally cracked the code on using Kindle as an ad medium." Jon Haber, director of the team that works with Showtime's media shop Omnicom Group's OMD on the project, told Adage.com that they were looking at the Kindle "as a new concept platform that no one has figured out."

It will be interesting to see if they've figured out the formatting problems that have plagued screenwriters trying to transfer and read scripts on the Kindle. But for a network that has already gained a reputation for employing new media when it introduces new shows, it's nice to see the Kindle get a chance to show its versatility in a different way.

UPDATE: Received my copy of "Nurse Jackie" overnight and it looks almost perfect as far as the format. The only thing I've noticed so far is that the right side of the dialogue passages don't have proper indentation, but it's still quite readable.

Five Great Kindle Tweets - May 2009 (II)


I've tweeted @ messages to the five folks included in the tweetset above, and the first of these five who posts a comment to this blog entry will win a free copy of my book "Kindle Culture."*

I'll be giving away at least 10 books this way throughout the summer, so tweet poetic about the Kindle and you too could be picked for a chance to win one of my non-contests. Good luck!

*Prize will be awarded in the form of an Amazon gift card for the price of "Kindle Culture," currently available for the Kindle at Amazon.com.

UPDATE: We have a winner! Congratulations @KlavdyaB!

Saturday, May 30, 2009

Colorless Kindle Continues

Folks waiting for the Kindle to take on a few shades besides gray before they buy are going to be left waiting a little longer if this week's speech by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is any indication.

Speaking at the annual Amazon shareholders meeting, Bezos said that a color Kindle was still many years away, despite the arrival of Fujitsu's full-color FLEPia looming on the horizon.

"I know it's multiple years. I don't know how many years but it's years," he said. "I've seen the color displays in the laboratory and I can assure you they're not ready for prime time."

Image credits:

Rainbow - Oren neu dag - cc3.0
Eyes - Brightster

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Kindle Culture Blog Subscription on Kindle for $0.99


The Kindle Culture blog is now available for the Kindle through Amazon for a monthly fee of 99¢.

A lot has been written recently about why anyone would pay for something they can get for free with a few clicks, which I generally agree with. But I also think the same can be said for paying to get newspapers delivered to your door when many of them are available on the Internet for free. I personally subscribe to the AP Entertainment blog on my Kindle for 99¢ because I would rather have those headlines collected and presented to me every day than go looking for them, and that service is worth 3¢ a day to me.

That said, potential subscribers should know that Kindle Culture is dedicated to the social, cultural, artistic and political expressions on, about, and for the Amazon Kindle, and sometimes features images and links to video clips that aren't fully accessible on the Kindle. Readers who are looking for daily news, tips and information about the Kindle would be better served by a number of other great Kindle blogs that are now available, all for 99¢. Three of my favorites are Abhi Singh's Kindle Review, Kindle Books - iReader Review, Andrys Basten's A Kindle World and Stephen Windwalker's Kindle Nation Daily. I plan to take a look at these and other Kindle-focused blogs as seen through the eyes of the Kindle in a series of posts coming in the weeks ahead.

Deep Space Nine Kindle


Nice homage to the Kindle via "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine." Posted to Twitpic by JensBest of Germany.