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At its fall hardware event today, Amazon announced a new lineup of Kindle Scribe devices, less than a year after the release of the second generation of its writeable e-reader. All three of the devices sport a new design with smaller bezels and a larger 11-inch screen, but the key takeaway is that the same display tech that powers the Kindle Colorsoft is coming to the digital notebook—along with a hefty price tag.

Three new Kindle Scribes are on the way

At the event, Amazon revealed plans for an overhauled Scribe lineup that includes three different devices: The standard Kindle Scribe (starting at $499) with front light and the Kindle Scribe Colorsoft (starting at $629) will both be available later this year, while a third version without lighting (starting at $429) will arrive “early” in 2026. None of them are available for pre-order just yet.

Given Amazon launched the Kindle Colorsoft e-reader last year, it’s unsurprising they are bringing their best-in-class color screen stack to the Scribe—though competitors like Boox have offered color digital notebooks for years. (The $530 Boox Note Air 4C is currently my pick for the best all-around digital notebook for most people.) But I find the addition of a Scribe without a front light to be a tad confusing: While it’s true that adding a lighting layer puts additional distance between the tip of the stylus and the inner display, which can make the writing experience feel less “paper-like,” the 2024 Kindle Scribe (with a great front light) already performs extremely well in that regard. Honestly, I’m surprised Amazon thinks there is a large enough market for a version without lighting, especially given the fact that, at $429, it costs more than the current model with lighting.

A new design and new features

Amazon promises that these Scribes offer an improved experience, whether you opt for color or not: In a press release, the company touts a new front light system with more uniform lighting, new textured glass that feels better to write on, a new display stack that reduces the distance between the outer glass and inner display, plus a faster processor and more memory.

The three Scribes all look the same, save for different colored bezels; gone is the offset chunky bezel of the current generation, replaced with thinner, uniform bezels on all four sides of the screen. Without a case, they’ll weigh in 400g, 34g lighter than the older model.

It’s hard to say what all that means in terms of practical use—for example, Amazon touts that the new Scribe is “40% faster for writing and page turns,” but Kindle page turns are already lightning fast, and as I noted when I reviewed the 2024 Scribe earlier this year, that model already had a great writing experience. The jury is out on whether these updates justify the price increase, whether you’re upgrading or buying for the first time.

Hardware aside, Amazon also talked up software changes, including a redesigned home screen that puts your notes front and center, Google Drive and Microsoft OneDrive integrations, AI-powered search for your notes, and a forthcoming “Send to Alexa+” feature that will allow you to converse with the paid version of Amazon’s digital assistant about the contents of your notebooks. As yet, it’s unclear if previous models will get the new software.

Pricier than the competition

Without having gone hands-on with the new Scribes, I can say that all these changes sound great—but those prices, oof. Amazon didn’t clarify whether tariffs were a factor, but even given the larger screen (11 inches versus 10.2 inches on the 2024 model), the apparent $100 price jump for the black-and-white Scribe is significant (granted, it’s currently unclear how much storage that will get you, but Amazon does note the device “starts” at $499, while the 2024 model is priced at $399 for 16GB of storage and goes up from there). And again, the forthcoming model with no front light costs more than the current generation with a light (and a storage boost to 32GB, for that matter).

With a starting price of $629, the Kindle Scribe Colorsoft is $100 more than the Boox Note Air 4C, and the latter can do a lot more, given it isn’t tied to Amazon’s restrictive ecosystem—Boox devices run on an open version of Android with access to the full Google Play store, meaning you can download your preferred reading and productivity apps, rather than restrict yourself to Amazon’s OS. The Kindle will likely offer a better writing experience and Amazon’s typically frictionless user experience, but when it comes to a pricey tool like this, that’s only part of the equation.

Get a deal on a 2024 Kindle Scribe

If you aren’t sold on the promised changes and don’t care about color note-taking, it’s not a bad time to buy last year’s version of the Kindle Scribe: In advance of October Prime Day, it’s currently on sale starting at $299 for 16GB of storage—though I’d probably opt for the limited time bundle with a cover and an upgrade to 64GB of storage for $372.

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This past Saturday night, someone, presumably the President of the United States, posted a video clip to Donald Trump’s TruthSocial account that seemed to show the President appearing on Fox News’ My View with Lara Trump to announce “America’s first MedBed hospitals,” as well as the imminent release of “MedBed cards” so Americans can access said hospitals.

“These facilities are safe, modern, and designed to restore every citizen to full health and strength,” Trump says in the clip.

The video was clearly AI-generated, Fox News confirmed that the segment had never aired on any of their platforms, and the TruthSocial post was deleted on Sunday. While this incident raises a variety of questions, I’m only going to focus on one: What the hell are MedBeds?

Real MedBeds vs. fake MedBeds

While there are actual “medical beds” that do things like tilt patients to prevent bed sores or provide constant vital sign monitoring, the MedBeds mentioned in the video are not these. MedBeds are a deep-cut from the world of conspiracy theorists: wonder-beds that use quantum field theory, vibrational energy, and/or holograms to cure all diseases and injuries. They can restore missing limbs or reverse aging—and all you have to do is lie down in one for half an hour. Neat, but not a real thing—no evidence of such technology exists.

MedBeds are predominantly a far right theory with a lot of crossover with QAnon and NESARA/GESARA, but there are plenty of folks on the far left who believe in MedBeds too. Different theorists may have different ideas about where MedBeds came from, as well—sometimes they are back-engineered alien technology and sometimes they were made by the military—but nearly all MedBedders agree that “The Elites” are hiding the technology from us proles, hoarding all the youth and health for themselves. As belief in MedBeds grew in over the last decade, grifters predictably arrived.

The scammy kind of MedBed

You can’t have a bunch of people believing in a fake thing without folks trying to profit from them, so there are companies like “Tesla Biohealing” (no relation) that will sell you a “Biophotonizer-M” MedBed so you (or your pet) can enjoy “your own quantum healing environment at home.” There’s also this anti-aging bed, or you could book a session in a “ThetaPod” that looks like this:

These companies seem to carefully avoid making specific medical claims for their MedBeds, but they definitely suggest medical benefits, and these claims are highly dubious (and some MedBeds are part of the “antichrist system“?).

It’s easy to see how these kinds of sales pitches hook people. The sites look legitimate, the claims sound real, and the people spreading MedBed nonsense can seem legitimate too. But they aren’t.

It always goes back to science fiction

If you’re wondering where MedBeds really came from, it’s science fiction movies. The current MedBeds conspiracy theory is basically the plot of 2013 science fiction flick Elysium. But there are MedBeds in older science fiction too. In the original Star Trek, Dr. McCoy’s sick bay is full of “biobeds” that could cure things his tricorder could not. In 1951’s The Day the Earth Stood Still, Gort revives Klaatu with a chamber that looks very much like descriptions of MedBeds. And if we expand the definition of “MedBed” from a physical object to a description of what the object does, the history of MedBeds goes back at least to ancient Sumeria.

The eternal allure of the fountain of youth

The earliest surviving great work of literature, The Epic of Gilgamesh, details the title character’s search for a substance that grants eternal youth. In Gilgamesh it’s a thorny plant at the bottom of the sea instead of medical device being hidden by rich people, but the idea is the same. People have been looking for the literal Fountain of Youth, a source of water that cures all diseases and reverses aging, since at least 500 BC, and searching for an anti-aging elixir motivated the alchemists who laid the foundation for chemistry that led to all the actual medical advances that keep us alive longer.

The ultimate lesson of MedBeds

There are no MedBeds hiding in secret military bunkers, about to be rolled out by some shadowy cabal, and the government isn’t going to send you a “MedBed card” either. But the desire that drives people to believe in miracle cures is very real, very old, and nearly universal. Judging from the comments on MedBed videos, the people drawn to this stuff are sick and old and scared. The real doctors have told them to get their affairs in order; you can’t blame them for reaching for hope—we’re all going to be asking for a little more time eventually.

Gilgamesh was driven by the same fear as MedBed believers. The hero travels to the bottom of the sea and finds the plant that grants eternal life, only to have it stolen away by a serpent before he can return to the surface. The lesson is clear: We don’t get to live forever. Rather than despair, Gilgamesh concludes that people don’t get to live forever, and the meaning of life is in living virtuously and the legacy we leave behind.