RE: Re: future of the Amazon Kindle

I think everyone is missing the main appeal of devices like the Kindle and Sony Reader - the fact they come close to mirroring a traditional book. 
 
When many people think of ebooks (those that think of them at all) aren't too keen on reading anything beyond work related, technical type material on a computer screen. 
 
If they are going to read for pleasure (yes, I am making a distinction here) and would consider an ebook, they'd want something kinda, sorta that looks like a regular book.
 
The Eee PC and all are low cost, but if given the choice for ereading for pleasure, I would be willing to wager if you put the same ebook on a Kindle/Sony Reader or an Eee PC, most people would prefer to read on the Kindle/Sony Reader type of device.
 
Which is why I still contend the Kindle/Sony Reader type of devices are where the emphasis should be placed for the further expansion of ereading, and not any old computer lying around.
Aaron J. WalkerPublisher
Walk Broad Publishing


To: ebook-community-hHKSG33Tihig7M29m/[email protected]: [email protected]: Fri, 25 Apr 2008 20:08:25 +0000Subject: [ebook-community] Re: future of the Amazon Kindle




--- In [email protected], Bill Janssen wrote:> The key question is whether they can actually close > the deal with the consumer without making the Kindle > a full-fledged Web tablet.Yes - a key point. One can see the Eee as a much greater threat to the Kindle than the Sony reader ever will be.On that note - check http://www.liliputing.com/2008/04/over-past-six-months-or-so-asus-everex_24.html to see a growing list of small form factor, light weight devices. These are all computers, but some of them cut below Kindle's price point.Battery life is the current problem with almost all of them. For devices like these, though, there is a killer component now shipping than could make this group into Kindle-killers in a heartbeat - the OLPC screen. The OLPC screen lets you operate in 
 a high-contrast greyscale WITHOUT the backlight. I expect that right now, a huge chunk of battery budget is powering the backlight on the small PCs.(See http://www.grc.com/pda/palmpower.htm for a technical discussion of small device battery, processor and screen power handling - prompted by the authors desire to read SF ebooks.)With that power drain gone, it becomes worthwhile to run the processor in ultra-slow power sipping modes. And if you design your OS to handle that, you can get into some serious power savings and run-time increases. I estimate that these two changes alone could allow run times to climb to about 25 hours.That's still not the "thousands of page turns" of e-ink, but it's enough to make a dramatic improvement in the ebook reading experience. 






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