I have never owned a dedicated reading tablet such as a Kindle. Thankfully, Amazon has created the Kindle app that can be used on every device. Using this app for years on both the Android and iOS platforms has been great because my purchases have followed me around regardless.
While practicing my social distancing, I’ve been reading more than usual and have been looking at some book purchases. Well, the process of buying a book from Amazon while using an iPad is a no-go. Some BS competition and licensing thing apparently. I have to log on to the Amazon website and order there as opposed to doing this in-app.Then it hit me like a stack of digital books over the head: why not purchase through Apple’s Books app instead? I have gone all in on everything else Apple, why not books?
Amazon started out as an online book distributor. As a charter member myself, I remember receiving books in the mail that even included free bookmarks and magnets. Amazon has innovated the books industry ever since. They are the best and the Kindle software follows.
Having said that, I reinstalled Apple Books to the iPad and looked around at all the redesigned changes. It is pretty and sports the usual customization standards for individual needs.
Both Amazon and Apple have this feature, both have a big store to shop your books. Both can be synchronized and read on multiple devices. I don’t listen to audiobooks but they are available. Apple’s is built in. I am even allowed to listen via my watch if I desire. May have to give audio books another glance soon. Even though Amazon bought Audible, I am surprised they don’t build that into their app. Both can read the PDF format. But from here they go their separate ways.
I have said it before and I will say it again. When paying for digital content, we do not own it. We are only buying the license to use it in the walled-off gardens we bought them from. My Kindle purchases stay with Amazon and that’s it. I learned this the hard way when I killed off my Google account. Goodbye purchased music, books, videos. It has’t changed and it will not change. When and if I decide to use Books over Kindle exclusively, I will not have access to my titles unless I re-install Kindle.
And I just remembered that Kindle has a $10 monthly reading program called Kindle Unlimited. These titles are not on anyone’s bestseller list but they are a great way to read a lot of books. Apple does not have this yet. Apple does make use of the ePub format however. With the wonderful people at the Project Gutenberg website digitizing and archiving the world’s literary classics, I download a lot of titles at no cost. Why pay a publisher money when these titles are now in the public domain? Kindle must have some partnership with local libraries too because I can borrow bestselling titles through the library/Kindle. Apple doesn’t have this yet. Grr.
Both platforms are amazing and I am glad to see that book lovers are getting the best of both worlds. It is a shame that everything has to be proprietary and profit-driven so I suppose I will find a healthy balance between. But for now, I will take some time and see how well Apple Books can be for my reading needs.
