Amazon Kindle: Will it make your Christmas list?

During my sweep of the LA Times website, a small advertisement caught my eye. It read ‘LA Times Now on Kindle’. In order to appease my curiosity about this rather festive-sounding device, I decided to conduct a little research into this nifty gadget.

Following in the footsteps of the Sony Reader, which condenses approximately 160 digital books into a device  ‘smaller than a typical paperback‘, the Amazon Kindle allows the user to download  ‘over 245,000 books plus U.S. and international newspapers, magazines, and blogs.’

Although it may seem that eReaders like the Amazon Kindle are serious competitors to traditional newspapers, freelance technology writer Joel Johnson believes that they have  “a long way to go before it replaces ink on paper, but it’s comfortably on the right path.”

Currently, a current price tag of $359, which in current markets equates to about €260, this device is considerably pricier than a copy of a daily newspaper. In addition, each Kindle product carries an extra charge,  whether it is the Wall Street Journal or ‘Twilight‘ by Stephanie Meyer.

With the credit crunch tightening our pockets and purses, the Amazon Kindle may not be top of our priority lists at present. However, 2009 may be the ‘Year of the Kindle‘ after all.