What is Digg?56 Comments
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1[Just because the screen is easier to read doesn't make it an innovation.]
I beg to differ, i have tons of books saved on my computer that I don't read because i cant stand looking at a computer screen so long. Same goes for cell phones, ipods, etc. NOTHING right now is as easy and comfortable to read as looking at plain paper. I constantly find myself turning down the contrast on my monitor because it is downright uncomfortable so if this e-book reader thing is nearly as decent as a paperback book I'm all for it, though i wont pay $300 for it. Oh and please don't give me a brutish reply, I'd rather not reduce my eyes to 20/1000 vision. - jamester, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1To all who feel that ebook readers are expensive, what you guys aren't thinking about is that ebook readers may not necessarily be geared towards the paperback novels you guys are thinking of when you say "$30 on down to free". Think school textbooks. Think $100+ *each*.
THEN you will see where an ebook reader could really shine. - headzoo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Needs to be just a bit bigger.
- frice, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Yeah, so it is expensive. It is new technology, so of course they'll want to make some money on it before it becomes commodity. But finally a reflective screen to read from!
Pity the resolution is low (600x800) but it shows jpg and pdf, and there's a tool on the net (makelrf) that can convert plain text files to the format the Reader understands.
What I do find odd is that Sony didn't change the screen from the Libre. It has exactly the same specs, and we are few years further... It seems E-Ink is not capable of making larger screens easily. Still I'm looking forward for a newspaper-sized Reader. - Mr.X, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Doing that already with just a Palm and ebook sites. Total cost of the unit was $30 and the books are quite cheap also. Not to mention I can carry 100 books with me at once if I was so inclined.
- noneloud, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Holy electronic-birck batman! That thing looks like an accessory to murder.
- FunkyGuy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0sounds awesome exept for how many books can you buy for $300
- moshguy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Digg + +, because I love the idea of e-paper. I can't wait until I can buy an e-book reader for less than $100.
Digg - -, because I know Sony is going to ruin a perfectly good product with tons of ***** DRM. Most likely rendering it an e-paper paper weight. - GreenStop, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0That thing looks bulky and ugly.... I was expecting real "electronic paper". Paper thin, bendable but with electronic text.
- iMMersEd, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I always welcome e-books -- any time I'm asked to buy a $140 textbook that weighs about 7 lbs I wonder why these ridiculous paper things still exist, when some offer an e-version for a small fraction of the price. Being able to carry 5 books with no extra weight is a happy thing for me. And searchability is gold.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1you will plug in the cable and a message will say this
we own your system
_____________
for more sony hating visit my blog and have a cup of fine gravy
http://www.frontlinetech.blogspot.com - johnpombrio, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I need to see if it will show straight text files or pdf. files or is Sony going to lock it up with their damn DRM.
- JTMON, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I don't think they have a problem making it big, one of the very first uses was for big hanging advertising signs in JC Penny's I believe. They were updateable via pagers built into them.
- wompiman, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0If Sony price this right it should be a winner, hopefully the DRM will not be too restrictive.
Knowing Sony though, neither of the above will occur. - Scott_T, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0ths isnt epaper but I have one and its great, $100 too:
http://www.ebookwise.com/ebookwise1150.htm - _skin_, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Too expensive. I will stick to paper backs thanks!
- RiddickRom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I'll be all over something like this when it is able to expand. That's the big problem right now, they are far too small and if you make them bigger, no one wants to buy them as they aren't really that portable anymore.
e-paper has to extend, unroll, unfold or do something smart to increase the size of the display to A4.
Until then, no product will ever be very successful. - Mousse, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Dude, you read your books 50 times over? What a freak. J/K :)
- Swift2, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I cannot possibly think of a dumber product than e-books. For anywhere from $30 all the way down to free you can get one of these handy things that are made of paper, fit in your hand, and don't require batteries. They do well even after 50 or more uses. You can take them in the can without fear of shorting something. Until you've got genuine e-paper that's clearer and easier to read, I don't think the book will be displaced. It makes no sense to have this.
Oh, and my library stores about 500 volumes, and I could buy another bookshelf easily. - tlink211, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0With Sony...while you read the book...the book reads you.
- Magnitude, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Ugly. I'll wait until there's an Apple / Jonathon Ives e-book.
- antimattr, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0um, just get plucker for your palm pilot and download and convert books using pdaconverter (from project gutenberg, for example), and/or get ereader and buy contemporary books from them...then you have a palm pilot with tonnes of other functions, as well as an ebook reader.
- hayseed, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Pentarix: it's all in the title - better title=more diggs
- Vaporware, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0It's really more e-ink technology rather than e-paper in the sony. Samsung is the one doing research on flexible e-paper and should have a product available on the market in this year.
- StanrickKubley, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0The thing looks almost the right size, about the size of a paperback. Personally, I can't wait for this kind of technology to get here, as long as we don't have to deal with stupid DRM, and I don't want to pay as much for an e-book as a paper book. If the price is right and the consumer gets a fair shake, I can't wait to be able to fit all my books on a device and do to my bookshelf what I've done to my CD shelf - pack it away.
- zforrester, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0i wanna see more pictures
- ViperDaimao, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0@riddickrom
Thanks. Sounds like OLED, but it doesnt mention it in the wiki for either. - RiddickRom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0code007 that was utter garbage and how you got the subject onto how much you love Apple I'll never know.
The VERY thing that people have been waiting for with e-paper is reduced eye strain and increased resolution. The same kind of experience of looking at paper rather than an illuminated screen. It takes innovation to get closer to that you muppet. - code007, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Sony is so freaking behind, this concept was introduced many years ago with PalmOS with either the pocket pdf readers or the microsoft ebook reader. I used take college lectures and PDF's with me to the gym and read them while I was on the bike. So you can see this is just old news. Just because the screen is easier to read doesn't make it an innovation. I think Sony has the "marcia marcia marcia!" syndrome where Apple is getting all the spotlight and they have to prove themselves against them. Well good luck cause everyone is saying "down with Sony, up with Apple"
- Desidarius, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I like the idea, but the file types sound a bit restrictive. If it were compatible with more file types maybe I would consider it. A slightly bigger screen would also be nice. Of course it would also need it to be around half the price they are estimating.
- RiddickRom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0It's fine to compare the devices to paperbacks in terms of size, but the screen makes up much less real estate than the paper book does. Also making them this size, you miss any chance of viewing web documents properly or magazines. The format has to be flexible enough to replace reading on a computer screen and this is far from that.
Who wants to scroll left/right and up/down just to read one page? - alceria, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Hrmmm, UGLY, expensive, and probably only reads certain formats. My PDA offers a beautiful, sharp display, the ability to make notes, instant dictionary access and can open a variety of formats.
Why is everyone already complaining about DRM? Like there isn't a million e-books available on usenet or in irc bookswapping channels? I have downloaded more books than I'll ever read.
And the person that says this doesn't beat a regular book is nuts. I can carry dozens and dozens of books around on a tiny SD card, and read them anywhere, even in the dark. I cut myself off from regular books when my bookshelves started overflowing, ebooks are the best things ever! - Kam3k, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Apparently it can use regular PDFs or text files. Also it uses SD media rather than Memory stick so Sony are getting some things right finally. The dl.tv episode in Las Vegas gives you a good look at it, its suprisingly thin.
- ViperDaimao, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0E-paper? What is e-paper? Is it OLEM or something? E-paper tells me nothing, what is the technology behind it?
With this and the warp drive, we're catching up to star trek very quickly. - TheRappingShoe, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0This looks very promising. If it can, as suggested, read PDF's then I would seriously consider getting one. As a Phd student I spend hours reading e-journals and it inevitably involves either killing your eyes or your printer.
With one of these I could download 100 journals and read them at my leisure wherever I want without eye strain.
Of course, the market for pirated pdf's of books will go into overdrive! - xeeton, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0For four college course books I paid $466. $300-$400 doesn't sound too far off the mark.
- agentgray, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Sony = who cares?
They've got to do a LOT better than that to earn back my love.
Sony ereader = $400
Sony ereader propriatary book = $50 (you know it...look at all ebooks and audiobooks now)
or
paperback of same book with almost no maintenance = $7.99
I guess it would make sense if you bought 400/8 books a year...er wait the math is bad it needs to be (400/8) * 50 = the cost is even higher...geesh
Forget it. - RiddickRom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Viperdaimo Electronic paper was developed in order to overcome some of the limitations of computer monitors. For example, the backlighting of monitors is hard on the human eye, whereas electronic paper reflects light just like normal paper. It is easier to read at an angle than flat screen monitors. Because it is made of plastic, electronic paper has the potential to be flexible. It is light and potentially inexpensive.
Electronic paper, or e-paper, is a technology that allows the text on a piece of paper to be re-written. The "paper" is actually made of organic electronics that use conductive plastic which contains tiny balls that respond to an electric charge, changing the page in much the same way that pixels change on a computer monitor.
Thats from wikipedia.
Elsewhere I learned that the technology behind it uses Flexible active-matrix displays and shift registers based on solution-processed organic transistors.he displays can be bent to a radius of 1 cm without significant loss in performance. Using the same process flow we prepared row shift registers. With 1,888 transistors, these are the largest organic integrated circuits reported to date. More importantly, the operating frequency of 5 kHz is sufficiently high to allow integration with the display operating at video speed. This work therefore represents a major step towards 'system-on-plastic'. - bf01, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I saw this at CES and was very impressed. The display is just beautiful.
However, there are some problems (many already mentioned). Another is that the books are still too expensive. You are saving trees, yet you only save a few percentage points off the price of the physical book. They should make it a loss leader and make it cost half of its physical siblings. At least until they get a foot in the door.
Another problem, and this was big for me, is that the words are black on a matte white background, but turning pages inverts the black/white for a second and it looks really *****. This would annoy me to no end. - InvisionUK, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Nice and pretty thing. Not a bad price too really considering the technology involved.
Just a shame the chairman and CEO is Howard Stringer now, a media fat cat (who used to head a company the BBC is reknowned for hating. CBS), instead of the infinitely more qualified Ryoji Chubachi.
Pfft. - MasterDwarf, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0good idea heavydownpour
Too bad its a Sony. Losers.
I do like the concept of e-books. Imagine the reduced publishing costs. But, it will succumb to piracy, like music because book publishers wont know how to handle technology.
Funny, they bitch about piracy jacking up their prices but they reduce costs and never pass along the savings to the consumer. What a crock. - HeavyDownpour, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0If they made one of these things that would optionally read the book aloud, I'd be all over it. That way I could read it when I had the time to sit down and read, and listen to it if I were, say, in the car. Until then, it's interesting, but not worth the price.
- Dustyb, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Stupid. Regular paper is on sale now for .30 to .70 USD.
- ersiusp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0If college texts were available I would buy one tomorrow (well, since it's sony, so I would wait for a competing company to make one, then buy that). Education is going to be the market that pushes this. I hate having textbooks so huge that I can only read them at a table or desk.
- RiddickRom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0heavydownpour wrote "If they made one of these things that would optionally read the book aloud, I'd be all over it. That way I could read it when I had the time to sit down and read, and listen to it if I were, say, in the car. Until then, it's interesting, but not worth the price."
You can do that now if you are willing to add a few extra clicks before its ready to listen to. Get hold of AT&T natural voices (demo here www.naturalvoices.com so you can hear how good the voice is) then get hold of text aloud mp3. Now you can set your fab new text to speech to be recorded as an mp3.
I tried this over a long period of time, the voice needs a lot of hand tweaking, so it can handle odd words but it doesn't take too much effort to get it to start speaking fluently 95% of the time. It also helps enormously if the written material is very well punctuated. This thread for instance would really turn to mush through an AT&T natural voice lol
Still the technology is there to use right now in windows. - felchdonkey, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Yes, it's important that the screen is easier to read tha a conventional LCD. Very important. Too bad it's still a brick with batteries. Call me when I can roll it up and stick it in my pocket.
- barthosch, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0boring
- noodhoog, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0"Pity the resolution is low (600x800)"
Well, I guess it's all relative, but that sounds perfectly adequate for text to me. I've been reading ebooks quite happily on my palm PDA with a resolution of 160*160 - Flipino, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Easy on the eyes, but hard on the wallet. Getting better though...
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0People are not going to pay 300 - 400 dollars for a reading experience that is lower than if you had a nice new hardcover with nice photos and crisp text. If they made a super cheap version that cost 50-70 dollars, than you will see people give this a look.
It will die like all the other attempts. -
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