The value of 24/7 wireless, as shown by MiFi 2200

UPDATE - 5/17/09 is at the bottom of this article.
  Original posting: 5/12/2009 08:00:00 AM

The New York Times's David Pogue is excited by "Wi-Fi to Go, No Cafe Needed" though I have a memory of Pogue finding the Kindle 2 pricing unfathomably high (his editors had omitted the price), but that paragraph is gone and the price is there now.

That article explained the outstanding Kindle feature (wireless 24/7) and the cost of this normally.

'The big Kindle breakthrough was its wireless connection. Thanks to Sprint’s cellular Internet service, the Kindle is always online: indoors, outdoors, miles from the nearest Wi-Fi hot spot.

This sort of service costs $60 a month for laptops, but Amazon pays the Kindle’s wireless bill, in hopes that you’ll buy e-books spontaneously...

As a bonus, the Kindle includes a simple Web browser, great for quick wireless Wikipedia checks and blog reading.'

That $60/mo. x 12 = $720! Not much mystery in the pricing, on a unit with the expensive e-ink screen.

Pogue really knows the Kindle's features, unlike most columnists covering a wide range of gadgets.

With the article on Novatel's MiFi 2200 'Personal Hot Spot,' he sings a strong tenor on the amazing ability of this small gadget to provide cell phone style wireless wherever you are.

'But imagine if you could get online anywhere you liked — in a taxi, on the beach, in a hotel with disgustingly overpriced Wi-Fi —without messing around with cellular modems. What if you had a personal Wi-Fi bubble, a private hot spot, that followed you everywhere you go?'

Kindle users don't have to imagine that.  I use the Kindle to go online to read sites like Wired (with excellent photo reproduction) anywhere I happen to be.  But I've described that in previous posts.  Pogue continues:

Incredibly, there is such a thing.  It’s the Novatel MiFi 2200, available from Verizon starting in mid-May ($100 with two-year contract, after rebate). It’s a little wisp of a thing, like a triple-thick credit card... When you turn on your MiFi and wait 30 seconds, it provides a personal, portable, powerful, password-protected wireless hot spot.

The Mifi uses Verizon's 3G for its signal.  Pogue writes:

'If you just want to do e-mail and the Web, you pay $40 a month for the service (250 megabytes of data transfer, 10 cents a megabyte above that)... And if you don’t travel incessantly, the best deal may be the one-day pass: $15 for 24 hours, only when you need it.
  In that case, the MiFi itself costs $270 [rather than $100].

So that's another illustration of the often ignored value of the wireless feature of the Kindles.  There should be huge interest in the MiFi, because it also has a 30-foot range and up to 5 people can share this "Wi-Fi umbrella."

  The drawback of netbooks for me is the lack of wireless, but this will be a big help here, with the minimum $40/mo being more attractive than AT&T's program of wireless for netbooks, which starts at $50/mo. and is probably most useful at the $60/mo. level, and the Mifi unit can be used with any of your devices, including cellphones, the iPod touch, as well as the usual laptops.

  Be sure to read Pogue's full details and entertaining descriptions on this, and there's a video demo there.

Update - 5/17/09: The MiFi unit is being released Sunday.  Gizmodo wrote today that the $40/mo. wireless plan was "useless" and EVDOinfo writes, after their thorough review (including cons):

"...$40/mo plan that offers 250MB allowance, but only those who access the internet very infrequently should consider that option as 250MB is typically used up by most customers in less than a week of normal internet usage...

and JK On the Run's long review and replies to commenters says he already has the $60 Verizon plan.  Wireless and Mobile Reviews reviews the many reviews and it's a set of raves. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
-- The Send to Kindle button works well only on Firefox currently.

Send to Kindle

(Older posts have older Kindle model info. For latest models, see CURRENT KINDLES page. )
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The Kindle and Sprint EV-DO's 24/7 wireless costs

There are no wireless costs at this point for the customer.  But there are for Amazon.  Information Week's Howard Anderson writes:

"On vacation, my wife was busy reading books on her new Kindle 2.0.  Do you know what they call Sherpas in the developed world? Husbands.  For years, I would go on vacation with a hernia-producing bag of reading material.  I was carrying atoms; now I carry electrons -- much lighter. The publishers make money because they don't have to buy paper and pay printers and the Postal Service.  Amazon makes money because it doesn't have to ship anything.  The consumer (me) gets books for $9.95.  The Kindle is as impressive as the iPhone, maybe more so.  How is this possible?  Because Sprint Nextel has excess capacity, which it sells to Amazon.  If you can't use your extra capacity to sell cellular service, then wholesale it to someone who can.

So Sprint Nextel is going to try to replicate what it's done with Amazon with any number of consumer electronics companies, such as Garmin, which offers a GPS device.  And since Sprint has excess capacity, it can assume that its costs are (almost) zero.  No billing expenses, no customer service.  That was what really cost money..."

It seems Sprint is looking to make similar deals with other companies, including Garmin.  Might that have an impact on wireless network speed?  There are times when I wonder if they intentionally throttle the download speeds for the Kindle access (unless we happen to be at the Amazon Kindle store).

Also, there are now many articles mentioning the enthusiastic use of the Kindle 2 by either the writer or the spouse.  I was surprised to see a somewhat over-the-top love letter to the Kindle by Slate.com's Jacob Weisberg, who is Slate Group's chairman and editor-in-chief and author of The Bush Tragedy.  A few of his remarks:

"I'm doing my best not to become a Kindle bore.  When I catch myself evangelizing to someone who couldn't care less about the marvels of the 2.0 version of Amazon's reading machine -- I can take a whole library on vacation!  Adjust the type size!  Peruse the morning paper without getting out of bed! -- I pause and remember my boyhood friend Scott H., who loved showing off the capabilities of his state of-the-art stereo but had only four records because he wasn't really that into music.

So apologies in advance if I'm irksomely enthusiastic about my cool new literature delivery system. Like the early PCs, the Kindle 2 is a primitive tool...But however the technology and marketplace evolve, Jeff Bezos has built a machine that marks a cultural revolution."

But then he goes too far, in surmising:

"The Kindle 2 signals that after a happy, 550-year union, reading and printing are getting separated.  It tells us that printed books, the most important artifacts of human civilization, are going to join newspapers and magazines on the road to obsolescence..."

WELL, I don't think so.  This is more like the idea that television would spell the death of movie theaters.  Most of us K-readers want both DTBs ("Dead Tree Books") AND K-books and periodicals (plus personal docs) on our Kindles.  I read far more than I did before but also find myself spending more time in Barnes & Noble enjoying hard-copy books of the type that cannot be shown successfully on a small e-ink unit.  However, in time, that will change too, I suppose.

 But a book or magazine with its own unique physical attributes and layout will always be an attraction, and a special treasure, although for actual ease of reading, it's hard to beat being able to change the font size and spacing between lines to suit our particular eyesight preferences and being able to carry around so much with you when out of the home.  Long waiting lines are no longer a problem for me.

If you click on the image that starts this entry, you'll be at a page that explains how wireless technology works, without hammering the reader with jargon. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
-- The Send to Kindle button works well only on Firefox currently.

Send to Kindle

(Older posts have older Kindle model info. For latest models, see CURRENT KINDLES page. )
If interested, you can also follow my add'l blog-related news at Facebook and Twitter
Questions & feedback are welcome in the Comment areas (tho' spam is deleted). Thanks!