I have been seriously thinking about buying a Kindle recently after hearing a lot of good reviews from people's blogs. I've been looking at buying an eInk device of some sort for over two years now. I read a lot and have a lot of PDFs, text files and more that I reference and read all the time. I also love public domain books and there are a lot of classics that I really want to read that I've never really gotten around to; Alice in Wonderland, Scaramouche, Walden, etc. I hate reading on an LCD screen. I usually can't keep it up for more than an hour and my reading speed is drastically cut while doing it.

I'm fascinated by the future of books and the reading experience. First, books shouldn't die. If libraries were to disappear, I think that would be the biggest tragedy in the world. But are they really the be all, end all? Of course not. For casual reading (you'll only read it once), newspapers and periodicals, digital is the way to go. You're not wasting paper or money making something that is basically not wanted. All you really want out of these types of reading material is the reading part, not the material. I will always have a copy of The Princess Bride around as a book because, dear god, it's important. But the New York Times? I'm not going to want that tomorrow let alone in a year. Put it in a digital document, archive it for future generations and save some damn trees.

So anyway, I put an order in for a Kindle a couple days ago. I knew that it wouldn't ship for about another month due to back orders, so I'd be able to think about it more before I was "committed".

Last night, I canceled that order for two reasons; DRM and vendor lock in. I moved away from Apple because they do it and I won't support anyone else doing it. Here's why:

• The device is designed for lock in

  I don't tolerate vendor lock in and the Kindle was designed for it. If you buy a Kindle, the only ebooks you'll be able to use are the ones from Amazon's store. If you buy ebooks from Amazon's store, you can only use them on the Kindle. That's worse lock in than Apple. At least with them, I can buy mp3s from Amazon to load on my iPod (although I'm stuck using iTunes). Many would say that this is for convenience, but there are already good DRM schemes out there that work on a lot of different devices, like Mobipocket. In fact, Amazon owns Mobipocket but still came up with a way to prevent you from buying an ebook on Amazon's site and using it on any device you want. This kind of lock in just to make a buck sucks and ...

• It's not future proof

  What happens in three years when you want to upgrade your ebook device and there's a cool new one out that's not a Kindle? You lose all your books if you move. Since the Kindle is the only device that uses the Kindle format books, then you have to buy a Kindle if you want to keep your books. If you're the kind of person that loves books, this could easily be in the hundreds of dollars lost. Gone and no way to get it back.

  Since publishers won't do ebooks without DRM, the key is to stick with a DRM scheme that is compatible across multiple platforms. That scheme right now is Mobipocket and it's a scheme that the Kindle doesn't support. That means that any books you buy through Amazon for the Kindle would be lost in a move to a newer device and you can only buy books through Amazon for the Kindle (unless it's not DRMed).

  I have no doubt that the DRM will eventually be cracked, but I really don't want to bet money on it. At least with the iTunes music store, I was able to burn and then rip from CD to get my music moved to my Linux laptop, but I can't guarantee that for ebooks.

• Kindle is a spyware device

  The Kindle's terms and conditions clearly lays out how the Kindle is a spyware device.

  The Device Software will provide Amazon with data about your Device and its interaction with the Service (such as available memory, up-time, log files and signal strength) and information related to the content on your Device and your use of it (such as automatic bookmarking of the last page read and content deletions from the Device).

  Is that really information I want them to have? Also, every document but .txt and .mobi files need to go through Amazon in order to convert them and they get stored on their server for, from what I can tell, ever. What if I want to review business documents or documents under and NDA? Amazon will have access to it all and I'm not comfortable with this. Apple's iPhone has similar language and I don't like the direction that takes us.

  I'm also pissed about this.

  Termination. Your rights under this Agreement will automatically terminate without notice from Amazon if you fail to comply with any term of this Agreement. In case of such termination, you must cease all use of the Software and Amazon may immediately revoke your access to the Service or to Digital Content without notice to you and without refund of any fees. Amazon's failure to insist upon or enforce your strict compliance with this Agreement will not constitute a waiver of any of its rights.

  In essence, you don't own the device, Amazon owns it and decides what you can do with it when. Frankly, that's fucked up.

It's disappointing that Amazon starts selling DRM-free MP3s and then do an about face and create a super restrictive DRMed ebook reader like the Kindle. They could have done so much better and really made a difference in this market.

I've been moving more towards open hardware now that I've been burned by a couple of these devices (iPod being the major one). The OSD has been outstanding and has totally changed how I watch TV. I've been using Linux for all of my personal computers now and, while it takes some work, I've been very happy with it and am amazed at what I can do without stupid proprietary stuff getting in the way.

The big losses going this route? Convenience and cost. I'm going to buy another ebook reader that also costs $399 but doesn't have any kind of wireless or ability to buy books from the device. I'm willing to pay that though to support companies who are doing the "right thing". I'll let you know how that goes.