"...the device's real value is as a mobile blog and news reader." -- This wins its place in the top ten nonsense statements made about the Kindle. "Real value" is, of course, entirely subjective. To someone who reads many paperbacks (sometimes many at a time) and couldn't give a rat's patoot about blogs, being able to carry, in a few ounces of weight and thickness, a whole library of books onto a plane or into a waiting room is the "real value" of the Kindle. The Kindle's "web" capabilities are explicitly not offered as a key feature, but as an "experimental" beta. They can not fairly be critiqued without including this information. Newspaper reading on the Kindle is accepted by the Kindle community as weak in comparison to its book reading excellence. Blog reading is considered by the Kindle community a curious quirk, as blogs can generally be read for free - why pay? The strength of the Kindle is that it is a book - in fact, it is ALL your books at once. And as pleasurable to read.