Jul 10
31
A Busy Week of e-News
Several articles appeared in the NYT this week of interest to the e-reading community. To summarize:
íPrice War!
Amazon is releasing the “Kindle Wi-Fi” (you guessed it, it connects only through Wi-Fi, not a cellphone network) at the bargain price of $139. Barnes & Noble counters with its Wi-Fi Nook at $149, and Sony has the (non Wi-Fi) Reader Pocket Edition listed at $150. Apple’s multipurpose iPad remains in the >/=$499 range. The Kindle 2 is also being updated with a new improved model, lighter & smaller but with the same reading surface, for $189.
Nook-Nook
B&N will devote a larger footprint to its Nook displays, dedicating 1000 sq ft “boutiques” in @ of its stores as a try-em-out petting zoo for its Nook line. Publishers and retailers, incidentally, are hoping that e-readers will be hot gift items in the 2010 holiday season, given the very rapid fall in price point toward the magic number of $100, where electronic devices become impulse buys for many.
2(The Enriched Books are Coming!)
Shades of JR Rowling’s “Daily Prophet” in the Harry Potter movies: There are now e-books available with embedded videos, utilizing the multimedia apps of the iPad (Sorry, Kindleers can buy these at the Kindle Store, but can’t use this on the K machine itself). These books, including “Nixonland” and novels by David Baldacci and Ken Follett, are somewhat pricier than regular e-books, but do sound like fun.
