Kindle Updates Software, Adds Real Page Numbers and Public Notes

Kindle has announced some of the software updates that are making their way to its latest generation of e-readers, including one of the most requested features currently absent from the devices: page numbers.

Although, on one hand, digital books free us from having to think about “the page” as a physical construct for holding the words, the lack of page numbers on the Kindle has frustrated many readers. If you’re moving back-and-forth between and print and digital version, for example, it can be a challenge to find where you left off. And referencing and citing passages with proper bibliographic notation is impossible.

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No longer. Kindle is adding “real page numbers.” Rather than simply numbering the pages as they appear on the Kindle screen, Amazon says it will make sure the page numbers correspond directly to the print addition. Page numbers are being added to tens of thousands of Kindle books, says Amazon, and the feature will be available on Kindle apps in coming months.

One of the features about the Kindle that I have long felt wasn’t developed to its full potential was the highlight feature. While you could choose to see which passages were the most often highlighted, you couldn’t really tell who was highlighting those passages, and you couldn’t opt to share your notes publically – say with colleagues or classmates.

Kindle is adding a “public notes” feature, that will let you make your notes and highlights available for others to see. You’ll be able to follow the notes of others – an interesting to see what others are thinking about a particular book or passage. This is another big move towards taking advantage of the technologies that can make reading more social.

Kindle is also improving the magazine and newspaper layout, something that makes it far better as your go-to device for reading this digital content. And Kindle is adding a new feature that, once you reach the end of the book, you’ll be able to rate it and push your thoughts and recommendations out to your social networks, as well as receive other recommendations about what you should read next.

If you have the latest generation of Kindle, you can try an early preview of these features by downloading the software update. Once it becomes available, it will be pushed out to all devices via WiFi.

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