Cuddle up with a Good Sony e-Book Reader
September 27, 2006 by Marcus Grimm
Doesn’t have quite the same ring, does it? Nevertheless, the Sony Reader is about set to launch. Out of the gate, it won’t play NXTbooks and only displays in gray-scale, but who knows – three years from now you might be using it to read your digital editions.
Three Years? Is that humor?
FWIW, if you all really believe in the digitial book form, you would find a way to be a part of every e-reader launch…
Hi Edward,
Thanks for visiting our blog and thank you for your comments. My comments on the Sony book reader are predicated on the following:
1) e-Readers have been notoriously slow to catch on. Seven years ago, a Pennsylvania firm not too far from us had an impressive prototype. The company, Everybook, failed, as did all of their first generation competitors.
2) The Sony e-Reader – like many of the companies trying to enter this field – uses a proprietary technology, whereas we favor an approach that allows our customers to have their content shared on any many devices as possible. Rather than spend development time and efforts on trying to hitch to every proprietary format out there, we think its in our customers best interests to develop content that can be read everywhere.
3) The power of a NXTbook is most optimized using a device that can display rich media and color. Current e-ink technology isn’t there, and I’d wager it’ll be at least three years until it is.
There is another philosophical answer in here, too: whether or not the person reading digital media truly wants to do so for hours on end. At NXTbook Media, our core audiences spend 15-60 minutes within their content (similar to a magazine experience). e-Book devices are hoping readers will spend hours on end staring at the screen.
Thanks,
Marcus