Amazon Kindle Paperwhite Design Critique (5th Generation)
The Kindle Paperwhite (5th generation) is a greyscale portable device used to download and read e-books. The home screen of the device contains a menu bar with just a few items (Figure 1), and displays the covers of downloaded books. Users only have to tap on the cover of a book to start reading at the point they previously left off at.
While the user is on a page (Figure 2) they only need to press down on a word for a second or two and the definition pops up, as well as the ability to highlight however much of the text the user chooses. The easy access to the dictionary allows for high efficiency reading, especially for users trying to learn the language of the text. Tapping on the side of the screen or swiping across it turns the page, which emulates the experience of reading a physical book.
The touch screen interface was a later addition to the Kindle. This probably allowed it to stay competitive with smartphone apps like iBooks, which have the convenience of a touch screen but the inconvenience of a phone’s small screen. In addition, the Kindle remains competitive because of its long battery life, which is ideal for hours of reading on the beach without an outlet, or for users who spend a few weeks without using it and expect not to have to charge it each time they want to use it again. The need for a long battery life was likely a factor in Amazon choosing not to include web browsers or other applications that could drain the battery quickly.
The intuitive nature of the Kindle Paperwhite makes it easily learnable. Even users who are unfamiliar with technology are guided by the visual cues such as the scroll bar, search field and the “read” banner over the book (Figure 1). It is highly memorable, as even a user returning to the device after a few months will remember how to turn the page from muscle memory. It is efficient for most users, who are just reading books for enjoyment. However, it is an inefficient platform for virtual textbooks, because there is no easy way for users to look back on their highlights. Instead, someone trying to study on this device would have to flip through every page of the text to see highlights and notes.
Including an optional section for notes and highlights at the bottom of the device would be one major change that I would make (Figures 3 and 4). I would have a draggable window at the bottom that shows the most recent highlights and notes, which can be scrolled through. A user could edit their note by double clicking it, and triple clicking any note or highlight would bring the user to that page.
Currently, a user has to tap on the top of the page to access the menu bar (Figure 6). However, if the user accidentally taps too far left or right, they turn the page instead. To avoid this issue, I would include drop down arrows at the top of the page that the user can tap to see the menu bar. I think that the team avoided adding affordances like those because they wanted the Kindle to look as book-like as possible, but as a user I would prefer to sacrifice the aesthetic in order to be able to look through notes and highlights quickly and to access the menu bar more easily.
