The kindle book reader is a marvellous device for reading but did you know there’s more you can do with it? That’s right, besides placing a kindle cover on your device, there are lots of things you can do with it other than reading, some of which Amazon don’t tell you about. To date millions of kindles have been sold and few seem to use it for much other than reading. To give you some ideas, here are 3 things you probably didn’t know you could do with your kindle that don’t involve the use of a kindle cover.
#1 Browse the InterWeb
Did you know you can surf the internet on your kindle? Granted things wont look as flashy as they do on your computer, but if you’ve got an article you want to read or maybe even check emails, the kindle can do both. To launch the web browser press Menu button on your kindle, then click Experimental then Launch Browser. This will open your web browser and you can go to any site you wish. If reading articles on sites like nytimes.com its probably best to use article mode. To do this, click Menu then Article Mode on your kindle to display only the article.
#2 Be Social
This is one thing I was surprised to find out as Amazon don’t really let on this is possible, until you find it. You can actually select passages of any book you are reading and share them via twitter or facebook. Another feature which is probably better, is that Amazon shares the notes you make on your kindle with other Amazon customers! This means you can read other peoples notes on books you have not read yet – useful if you don’t want to read the whole thing. To be social with your kindle select Menu then Settings then use the next button to go to the third page and you’ll see ‘Social Networks’. From here if you select ‘manage’ you will be asked to authenticate your facebook/twitter logins. Once you’ve done it once it’ll be there forever.
#3 Searching a Book
Whilst the kindle makes reading easy, fun and extremely mobile, if you need to jump to a certain page quickly, you can’t. This is where a real book beats the kindle, something that I hope they rectify later. There is a method however to search a book on the kindle although it is not very specific, it is the only method available. If you look at the bottom of each page there are location numbers, indicating the location of each page. If you know which location you need, simply go to Menu then select Go To then in the message box that appears you type the number of the location you want. You will need to press the Sym key before being able to type numerical characters though. Whilst not perfect it does mean your books are searchable. Personally I like to highlight whole paragraphs that are useful and/or interesting for later reading. Then if I want to jump to that page I go to my clippings and find the page from there.
If you own a kindle you might not have known you could do these things with your device. If you don’t own a kindle, these are three good reasons to buy a kindle. Either way the kindle is a beautifully designed device, but it is quite delicate and you will probably want to purchase a cover for it. To get the best kindle cover of your choice visit www.covermykindle.co.uk and check out the selection of kindle covers and skins.
