Come summer vacations and the parents – especially the working ones – are at their wits end as to how to keep the children busy and indoors away from blistering sun. Not just busy but also engaged in activity which is recreational and contributes to their intellect. This apart they are also keen that children read stories and books which do not form part of their curriculum – to widen their horizon, language and vocabulary.
This summer Amazon India brings Kindle Paperwhite to engage the children in a fruitful way while entertaining them though the gadget serves all age groups. The e-reader incorporates several features keeping in mind the needs of the young users and the concerns of the parents. Books can be read out to small children to fascinate them and teenagers can be encouraged to buy books with the help of their parents and read them.
The reading material on the e-book is truly extensive and encompasses all genres – comics, mangas, action, adventure, arts, film, photography, biographies, true accounts, crime, thrillers, mystery, history, literature, fiction etc – over 500,000 titles that are exclusive to the Kindle store. Apart from this the e-Book store from Amazon allows access to an extensive collection of books which include over 250,000 books priced at Rs.99 or less and over a million priced at Rs.299 or less.
According to Amit Agarwal, Vice-President and Country Manager, Amazon India, though e-books market in India is small, it is growing and has huge potential. “India is amongst the top ten markets for books and the third largest market for English books,” he said. Asked about inclusion of books in Indian languages, he replied: “Overall India is still an emerging market for e-books and within that the language e-books market is also small but we see huge potential.” He added that their aim is to have “every book, ever written, in every language, all available in less than 60 seconds.”
The collection includes new releases and works from a range of famous Indian authors, like APJ Abdul Kalam, Sudeep Nagarkar and Ramachandra Guha, to name a few. So there is assurance of enough stories and books to read – all without loading up the rucksacks. Also part of the store are many Indian classical stories which can be browsed under sections like children’s traditional stories, myths, legends, sagas, children’s classic fiction, etc. The Smart Lookup feature integrates a full dictionary and Wikipedia allows access to definitions, characters, settings and more without leaving the page or losing text. The vocabulary builder automatically compiles new and difficult words looked up into an easy-to-access list.
If it is holidays then keeping kids away from comics is cruel as parents chide them to stay off these when the academic session is in progress. Kindle Paperwhite supports children’s books and comic books, including many from “Amar Chitra Katha”, with Kindle Text Pop-Up and Kindle Panel View. So it is not just read and read but fun and laughter too.
The design of the device ensures no distraction as the font size can be increased for easier reading. The high contrast and better reflectivity guarantee that whites are whiter and blacks are blacker thus making the pages indistinguishable from a physical book. Also the eye strain is avoided due to the built-in light.
The guardians are seized about the impact of technology which the youngsters are keen and adept in using. The parental controls in the device allow restrictive access to Kindle Store, Cloud and Experimental Web Brower.
Also a progress report keeps parents updated on total time spent reading, number of words looked up and books read.
With eight weeks of battery life and weighing 206 grams, the product is priced at Rs.10,999 and with wi-fi and 3G it comes at Rs.13999.
