H Songhai's List: eReaders

• The number of checkouts has grown to more than 1 million so far this year from 607,275 in all of 2007, according to OverDrive, a large provider of e-books to public libraries. NetLibrary, another provider of e-books to about 5,000 public libraries and a division of OCLC, a nonprofit library service organization, has seen circulation of e-books and digital audio books rise 21 percent over the past year.

  • A look at digital books
• the expansion of e-books into libraries heralds a future in which more reading will be done digitally.

• If you just ordered a Kindle, stop reading now or you’re in for a giant dose of buyer’s remorse. Barnes and Noble unveiled a new e-book reader called ‘Nook’, and it is hot, both inside and out.

   

  Nook looks a lot like Amazon’s white plastic e-book reader, only instead of the chiclet-keyboard there is a color multitouch screen, to be used as a keyboard or to browse books, cover-flow style. The machine runs Google’s Android OS and it will have wireless capability from AT&T.
• • I am curious if I can migrate my Zinio magazine collection to the Nook. (I speak like I already have the device)
  Add Sticky Note
• The Nook has the regular black-and-white E Ink display and a 3.5-inch color touchscreen. The latter allows users to browse books. The Nook also comes with built-in WiFi, 2GB of internal storage, MP3 player and supports open formats such as EPUB.

  • Have looked at the Nook. It is attractive but only offers a limited number of newspapers. No Philadelphia Inquirer
  Add Sticky Note
• Barnes and Noble has said Nook customers will have access to its online bookstore that includes books, newspapers and magazines. The Nook itself can hold up to 1,500 e-books.

2 more annotations...

• Like the Kindle, the Nook has a built-in 3G wireless connection (AT&T is the carrier) and a dictionary. However, the Nook also packs in Wi-Fi connectivity and a memory expansion slot--you get 2GB of internal memory, but can add up to a 16GB micro SD card.