Daily Archives: November 17, 2009

e-maginings: e-Book Reader Market Heats Up by Lyndi Lamont

The e-book reader market is heating up this fall with the upcoming release of Barnes & Noble’s nook. B&N is hyping it as “the world’s most advanced eBook Reader, and I have to say, it looks great. It features e-ink display and AT&T’s Wi-Fi, so you can browse, buy and download books anywhere you find the network, including the B&N brick-and-mortar stores. At $259, it costs as much as Amazon’s Kindle 2, but offers the option of adding a memory card for additional storage. A nice feature is the full-color touchscreen at the bottom of the display where you can browse for titles or use the keyboard.

The only feature that has authors a little concerned is the nook’s “lend ebooks to friends” feature. Some of us are saying, WTF? Their site says books can be loaned for up to two weeks. I’m assuming they disappear from the reader at that point as library e-books do after the due date. I’d have to see that in action before I can endorse this feature.

The December issue of PC World magazine has a review of e-book readers, alas too soon for the nook to be included. They liked the Sony Reader Touch Edition at $300, but rated the Kindle 2 as the best buy at $259. All Sony and Kindle models were rated Very Good, with the Interead Cool-ER listed as Good. Two they did not recommend at this time are the Astak EZReader PocketPro and Foxit eStick Reader. Both need to do some “catching up” in PC World’s opinion. Click here here to read more.

PC World’s point about the e-book market being Balkanized is right on the mark. The problem hasn’t just been coming up with great hardware; there’s a software problem, too. And as long as publishers and distributors insist on using proprietary content it’s going to continue to be that way. It will be interesting to watch how this all plays out.

Lyndi Lamont
aka Linda McLaughlin
http://www.lyndilamont.com
http://www.lindamclaughlin.com