I've owned the Kindle 1 for a year and love it. I love having paper books, but the beautiful thing about the kindle is the books are usually cheaper. I find that I will try reading books that I normally wouldn't because it costs less to buy. then, if I really like it, I can always go and buy the paper version for my bookshelf. Also, there are websites, such as feedbooks.com that have the classics for free for any e-reader, they are public domain now, so as long as they are old enough, you can download them right there.