The Pocket Edition of Sony's ereader.
The ebook market has been attracting attention this week due to Sony’s announcement on Tuesday that it will be debuting the new Reader Daily Edition by December. The Reader Daily Edition, which is intended to be Sony’s top of the line ereader, will sell for $399.00. The Reader Daily Edition will join the already released budget model Reader Pocket Edition and the already announced, though as yet unreleased, Reader Touch Edition.
The new Reader Daily Edition will feature integrated 3G wireless connectivity, which will be provided free of charge to the customer by AT&T. This connection will allow the ereader to access both Sony’s ebook store as well as receive newspaper and magazine subscriptions, similar to what Amazon offers with its Kindle line of ereaders. Sony has not yet announced which newspapers and magazines will be available.
This wireless connection seems to be an attempt to compete with Amazon’s Kindle, but Sony is also taking steps that Amazon has yet to take. The Daily Edition, as well as the Touch Edition, will have a touch screen. This is something that the current incarnations of the Kindle lack. Also, Sony has announced that the company is abandoning its proprietary BBeB format in favor of the open Epub format. While all Epub books bought from Sony’s ebook store will still be encoded with DRM, Sony’s use of Epub will allow all of its ereaders to display ebooks bought from a variety of online retailers. This means that customers who purchase any of Sony’s ereaders will not be limiting themselves to only making purchases from Sony. This also means that any Epub books that the customer purchases can be transferred and read on any device that can read the Epub file. To date, Kindle books can only be read on the two current incarnations of the Kindle, the iPhone, and the iPod Touch. Also, the Kindle can only display copy protected ebooks that are purchased from Amazon’s Kindle store. (DRM free Mobipocket ebooks are compatible with the Kindle, however. These can be obtained from sites such as Project Gutenberg or Feedbooks.)
In addition to these features, Sony has also announced that its new line of ereaders will be able to display ebooks that have been borrowed from local libraries. The Kindle currently lacks this feature as well. Also, the Daily Edition and the Touch Edition will both have seven inch screens, which is one inch larger than the Kindle 2. It is 3.7 inches smaller than the Kindle DX, however. At $489.00, the Kindle DX is $90.00 more than Sony's seven inch Daily Edition.
What say you, faithful readers? Does Sony’s new ereader interest you? Does it sound like a better deal than the Kindle, or does the Kindle DX sound like the best choice? Are you patiently waiting for the day when all ebooks are DRM free before you make your first purchase? Please feel free to discuss.
Comments