nook?

[jrtom]

The Kindle has never really grabbed me, somehow, and the crap that Amazon has been pulling around its content ("you thought you owned this e-book, but you were wrong, kthxbye") hasn't made me any more enthusiastic about it.

I also have reservations about e-books in general--while I value individual books, there are very few that I value to the tune of $250...and I do read books on occasion in contexts in which I wouldn't take my cellphone. (Waterproof e-book readers, anyone?) Plus I am somewhat fond of paper books' 'look and feel'.

All that said...the Nook does look pretty cool in several ways, and I wouldn't mind the opportunity to play with one.


On a vaguely related note, I am watching with interest to see what convergence (or divergence) happens in the design/conceptual/functional space occupied by ebook readers, smartphones, netbooks, and laptops.

Comments

[kightp.livejournal.com]

Looks like you'll be able to try them out in B&N stores, which is a definite plus - I didn't buy my Kindle until I found someone who let me try theirs out, and that took a long time.

The main advantage, as far as I can tell - and it's potentially a significant one - is that the Nook will let you "lend" books to other readers; Amazon allows that only among Kindles owned by the same account (ie, by family members)

You may be surprised at how book-like the reading experience is. I would have said I preferred the look and feel (and smell) of paper books, too, until visual problems cost me the ability to read most of them; as it is, I find reading on the Kindle exactly like reading a paper book in every way that really matters. And superior in terms of portability, especially for those of us who have several books going at once!

[jrtom.livejournal.com]

Yeah, they mention the ability to try them out in the store as a selling point on the Nook/Kindle comparison page. :)

The other advantages that caught my attention: ability to expand the memory, wifi, and supports PDF/epub/ereader formats. (The fact that it runs on Android doesn't hurt, either. :) )

[kightp.livejournal.com]

Amazon doesn't make this clear, but the Kindle also supports most formats - if you run them through the (free) MobiCreator software available from http://www.mobipocket.com. I do it all the time with .pdfs, .docs, .txt files, etc.

The memory expansion isn't that big an issue for me - I offload my Kindle books onto my external hard drive when I'm done reading them, so the 2GB of memory is more than enough for my purposes.

[jrtom.livejournal.com]

It appears that MobiCreator only runs on Windows, and I don't have any (i.e., I live in an underground bunker. Or a tree house, if you like. :) ) I could borrow Megan's, but that's at least awkward.

Also, I have yet to meet a PDF munger that does a decent job with anything other than text; scientific papers with PostScript figures are generally right out, for example.

I don't know that the memory expansion would be a big deal, and I would certainly keep an archive of my ebooks elsewhere, but I appreciate the possibility.