More Kindle Stuff

I know I should move onto another topic, but still--a friend told me yesterday that old original Kindle-1s were going on Ebay for $9.99.

But no, seems to be a misreading. Those are Kindle book collections go for $9.99. Kindles themselves seem to go in the range of $238.

But the essential point is worthwhile. I heard somewhere that when news reached Venice that Vasco da Gama had doubled the Cape of Good Hope, the Venetian commodity market collapsed: they knew the jig was up. Should be interesting to watch the Kindle market as an index of Ipad acceptance.

But now that I think of it, apparently TI still sells its BA-II Plus, the off-the-rack business calculator. Looks like they have tarted up the appearance a bit, but I bet the internal electronics are the same as when I bought my first one in the 80s. Prices seem to run around $23. I think I bought my first for about $30, so accounting for inflation, that's a bit of a drop. But they must have amortized their sunk costs years ago; from now on, it is just putting together the pieces.