Barnes & Noble's Nook, Reviewed 260
harrymcc writes "Barnes & Noble's Nook — the most significant e-reader since Amazon's original Kindle — hits B&N's retail stores today. I've published an extensive review of the device, which is also the first e-reader to run Google's Android OS: It's an interesting and capable gadget in many ways, but the interface — which is sluggish and somewhat quirky — isn't polished enough to render it a Kindle killer."
Re:To beat Kindle you need better policy (Score:5, Interesting)
Bingo. No Kindle for me. Ever.
I did want one, and saw myself inevitably getting one when the price reached a reasonable altitude.
But they wrote me off with that stunt. Now any reader I do settle on must establish to my satisfaction that it does not have that "feature".
Re:Don't Need a Kindle Killer, Exactly (Score:1, Interesting)
B&N have priced their ebook reader at exactly the same price as Amazon's. It would seem price fixing has already begun.
Chinese generic 13" reader? (Score:3, Interesting)
Which reads any .pdf .djvu .younameit, e-ink, etc?
They can not be the ultimate quality, but they will put some fire in competition! Then prices will begin to be fair!
Mandatory AT&T contract? (Score:3, Interesting)
The review mentions AT&T 3G, but I couldn't find any mention of whether a new AT&T contract is required to buy the device at the stated price. If it is, then fsck that. If it isn't, then 'meh'. Its still pretty expensive. Wait for v 2.0.
Also, if one plugs its USB in, does it appear as 'USB storage', that one can copy PDF's to and be able to read them? Or is one required to use its proprietary software on a proprietary platform to load only special files with DRM?
And how about on wifi? Can one use any sort of standard protocol (ssh, ftp, smb) to copy PDF's in (or out) and/or can it navigate to an arbitrary URL and download a PDF, or does it only support the device accessing company-specified websites to 'buy' books?
Bottom line - Mandatory contract bad. Mandatory proprietary software bad.
wtb more booklike reader (Score:1, Interesting)
Wake me up when there's an ebook reader that works more like a real book.
It should have softish covers, and once you open it, there should be 2 screens inside (one for each page).
This way the screens would be protected all the time, and it would feel more natural as a reading tool
Re:While it may not be a "Kindle Killer"... (Score:4, Interesting)
Have you considered the Foxit eSlick.
http://www.foxitsoftware.com/ebook/ [foxitsoftware.com]
I haven't tried one myself. I'm a bit dubious about the way it's *all* PDF (reflowable text seems better for many kinds of writing). But if PDF works for you, Foxit are among the best at it. Their software PDF viewer is certainly better than Adobe's.
Re:Don't Need a Kindle Killer, Exactly (Score:5, Interesting)
The fact that it shares the same price point doesn't imply price fixing or stop it being beneficial to consumers. Firstly, if the B&N device is 'better' it is effectively cheaper than the Kindle. Secondly, if both devices are exactly even then sales should begin to spread between the two, this will encourage one of the parties to drop the price in order to gain the others market share.
Factor in other benefits like removing some dominance from Amazon's position as ebook superpower, which will hopefully add competition to book pricing and limit anti-consumer licensing/limitations and this seems (as it should) like a good thing for us little people.
Why buy either? (Score:3, Interesting)
cars not for me yet (Score:2, Interesting)
Saying you will wait for e-ink to scroll before you try it is like saying you won't buy a car until they hover, fly and go 500MPH.
But, I guess that's your prerogative.
Incidentally, my spell checker made me investigate... I've always heard the word pronounced "perogative", not with an extra "r" in there, but I realize now that I've never seen the word written down. Odd. Anyone have any light to shed on that?
Re:To beat Kindle you need better policy (Score:3, Interesting)
I'd mod you up but you're already at +5. My concern is that Amazon's example reminded people that with everything electronic, data can be changed with or without our permission. Tough for someone to walk into your house and remove your book without at least some defense on your part. But if a company can just click a button and remove your property without your permission or knowledge, we're walking right into Orwell's 1984, only we won't need thousands of people editing newspapers...just a small team to make the edits to the electronic newspaper editions, book bannings, etc.
Not saying my tinfoil hat is on, but Amazon's deletion of personal property means I'm wearing it sombrero style on my back with a string around my neck.
Re:Library of Alexandria (Score:1, Interesting)
Those were SCROLLS. He didn't say anything about scrollburning.
(Posting anonymously because slashdot's web 2.0 ui is crapping out on me, and not letting me log on.)
Broken Record (Score:3, Interesting)
I am so tired of hearing "e-readers will never replace books" arguments, as if it were an all-or-nothing thing. I can well imagine stone carvers makers the same "permanence" argument against books.
E-readers still can't do a lot of what books do, but so what? Half the books I read, I read once, then give them away or return them to the library. For these, an e-reader is perfectly fine. And as the technology advances, a physical book will have fewer and fewer advantages.
Frankly, I think all this strident ranting against e-books is just people resisting having to learn new ways of doing things. Which is fine for them, but why must they lecture the rest of us all the time?
And as a writer myself, I have very little patience when this attitude shows up in the people I work with. In particular, it's a pain when editors and reviewers insist on physical copies so they can scribble comments in the margin. So then I have to decipher their handwriting and cryptic comments. And once, when I did an actual mass-market book, the publisher's editor and I had to FedEx pages back and forth, at great cost in time and money. Learn to use Acrobat, people!