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I've been keeping my eye out on these. I work in the publishing industry. The Amazon Kindle looks like crap. You should have seen the prototype. It looked like a Tandy circa 1980.
So far, the best items in the market look to be Sony's Reader and iRex Technology's iLiad. Unfortunately, they are both expensive, and neither are there yet in terms of a viable and acceptable technology for portable ebooks. It's just to early.
There is slow adoption for this technology because most book readers aren't tech savvy like other groups. The early adopters for the Reader, Kindle, and iLiad is such a small group that it makes things move pretty slowly.
I hope to see the "iPod" of ebooks soon, but I'm not holding my breath. But if I had to choose a product right now, I'd lean towards the Sony Reader. It has the advanced "digital paper" technology, which is a huge leap for readability. I haven't seen it with my own eyes (not available in Canada), but I imagine it would help with eye strain. Too bad it's greyscale, though. And it lacks flexibility and some functionality, which is why I say the technology isn't there yet.
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Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön
Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot
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