Readability - An Arc90 Lab Experiment

Readability - An Arc90 Lab Experiment

Readability™ is a simple tool that makes reading on the Web more enjoyable by removing the clutter around what you're reading. Follow the steps below to install Readability™ in your Web browser.

This thing is awesome. Configure your preferences (white text on black background, big font and small margins) and drag the javascriptlet to your browser's bookmark toolbar. Practically everything I've read in the last three hours has used it. It strips out everything except the article and presents it in a neutral sans-serif font. I may get to sleep without a headache tonight.

Paolo Bacigalupi: This is What It Takes to Write a Novel - Techland - TIME.com

Paolo Bacigalupi: This is What It Takes to Write a Novel - Techland - TIME.com

Lev Grossman interviews Paolo Bacigalupi and asks the question formeost among fans of the Hugo/Nebula award winner: How do you pronounce your last name?

Very good interview. Inspiring for writers who need a little boost to keep plugging away.

Publishers Weekly panel provokes e-royalty discussion - Hachette gets schooled

Publishers Weekly panel provokes e-royalty discussion | TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home:

"With his math, which he walked the audience through, a publisher, on a title with a $26 list price, makes roughly $5.10 on the hardcover while the author makes $3.90. On the e-book sold through the wholesale model, the publisher brings in $9.25 while the author gets $3.25. On the e-book sold through the agency model, the publisher gets $6.38 and the author gets $2.28."

This nifty bit of arithmetic came after:

Neil DeYoung, director of digital media for Hachette, repeated in his opening remarks the standard publisher “company line” that most e-book production prices are just as high as print book prices—the only difference is the costs that are there are less visible.

Publishers will continue to demand to make huge amounts of money for the simple reason that they are huge powerful corporations and, as such, they deserve to remain an integral part of the writer->reader supply chain.

With Amazon offering %70 royalties to authors who self-publish, it is hard to see how publishing houses can stick to the same business practices.

The "diminutive" Sharper Image Literati - NYTimes.com not impressed

Hands-On with a New e-Reader - NYTimes.com

Which brings us to the latest entry in the e-reader field, the Literati, from The Sharper Image. Priced at just $159, one doesn’t expect the diminutive product to be an iPad clone, and of course it’s not. First off, like the Kindle and Sony Reader products, it is strictly for reading printed materials, not for surfing the Web or playing with apps.

Why does he call it diminutive? Its huge! I'm not fond of e-reader devices that have a keyboard jutting off the bottom like that (including the kindle) and this keyboard looks like crap. Add to this the huge bezel and you have the bigger-than-a-breadbox handheld device. I can't imagine holding this one-handed for more than a minute or two.

I like the size of the screen and the fact that its color, but the lack of touchscreen and a measly 512Mb is a deal-breaker. I'd pick it up if it was sub-$100, but only if the firmware updates are sweeping and coming soon.

I'd Rather Fingerblast a Lamprey Than Use This tyPad iPad Keyboard Case - Best product review ever

I'd Rather Fingerblast a Lamprey Than Use This tyPad iPad Keyboard Case

Hilarious.

Copyright termination deadline approaches, authors regain control of backlists - expect more cheaper ebooks

Copyright termination deadline approaches, possible benefits to backlist republishers on the horizon | TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home: "A post in E-Reads’s blog from Sunday warns about a “copyright asteroid hurtling toward earth”—the 35-year copyright termination clause embedded in 1978’s copyright law. Untouched by the Sonny Bono copyright term extension, this clause gives authors and their heirs the right to terminate their contracts starting 35 years after they were originally published."

As authors get their backlist of publications back under their own control we will see many authors striking out on their own or going with inexpensive services like Amazon to market and sell these books. We should see both lower prices and innovative marketing schemes when the big publishers and their own self-serving pricing plans are taken out of the equation.

Joe Konrath’s e-book sales pass 100,000 mark - take that Hyperion

Joe Konrath’s e-book sales pass 100,000 mark | TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home

"as of 9/21/10, his overall e-book sales had topped the 100,000 mark. He is selling over 7,000 e-books per month via Amazon alone, and Amazon represents almost 3/4 of his total e-book sales."

A great success story of a reasonably successful published author writing mystery novels (Jacqueline “Jack” Daniels) becoming financially self-sufficient and profitable by going it alone.

Suffice it to say Konrath is ecstatic about the distribution possibilities offered by e-books, is greatly disappointed by how his properties currently handled by traditional publishers are performing, and feels that publishers are pricing e-books considerably higher than they ought to.

So take that Hyperion. If you wise up now you can keep your A- and B-list authors and keep making some money, or you can keep e-book prices high and royalties low and end up with nothing as all your authors leave the sinking ship (note that I didn`t say rats)

National Coffee Day: Do You Know What's in Your Joe? - Health Blog - CBS News

National Coffee Day: Do You Know What's in Your Joe? - Health Blog - CBS News

Yay! The lists of caffeine content for Starbucks, Dunkin`Donuts, and home-brewed varieties can be useful. For instance you can calculate how many cups of instant to choke down if you run out of ground coffee at home.

It is US-National coffee day so there may not be any freebies in Canada.

Coffee Association of Canada
Coffee and Health

Kno Creates 14-inch Tablet for Students | Gadget Lab | Wired.com

Kno Creates 14-inch Tablet for Students | Gadget Lab | Wired.com

Its probably out of my price range, but its a pretty sweet tablet. The dual, hinged version with two 14 inch screens was the first version. I think this one is more practical.

Check out the pictures:
Kno single-screen tablet textbook hands-on: all the power in half the size -- Engadget

Amazon Offers Book Previews with Kindle for the Web

I`ll play with this in the next week or so. I don`t think anyone has ever clicked through to amazon from here so this may not be worth the effort.

Amazon Offers Book Previews with Kindle for the Web

Kindle creator Amazon has announced this morning the release of "Kindle for the Web", a way to sample and embed excerpts of e-books in your browser.

The new feature will allow users to preview the first chapter of any Kindle book for free directly on the Web, just as iTunes users can sample songs before buying them.

Amazon Debuts “Kindle for the Web”, Which Is Pretty Much What It Sounds Like

Books to read

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet

by David Mitchell (a Booker nominee).




The Evolutionary Void

Peter F Hamilton




The Dervish House

Ian McDonald


The Long Price Quartet

Daniel Abraham


A Shadow in Summer review

A Betrayal in Winter review

An Autumn War review

Speculative Horizons: Book review: The Price of Spring



The Fall
Chuck Hogan and Guillermo del Toro

The Wertzone: The Fall by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan


CLASH OF THE GEEKS | A fantastical chapbook to benefit the Lupus Alliance of America - Wil Wheaton, John Scalzi, Patrick Rothfuss featured in this weird SSC.

RIM Unveils Tethered Tablet, the BlackBerry PlayBook | Lots of coverage in tech and business world

The playbook may turn out to be a serious contender to the iPad. It is getting lots of coverage on the tech sites, but also the major news and business sites. It is also getting coverage on the major cable news channels. The 2011 availability is bad news both for Rim and Samsung`s Galaxy Tab; people may hold off buying a Galaxy Tab until they see the Playbook. In the meantime the Apple iPad will continue to rack up sales. The tables has a great feature set, and the decision to tether for 3G makes the tablet easy to lock down in a business environment -- the market with the big money.

 

RIM Unveils Tethered Tablet, the BlackBerry PlayBook | Gadget Lab | Wired.com

SAN FRANCISCO — BlackBerry maker Research In Motion is jumping into the tablet arena with the PlayBook. It will have a 7-inch screen and is designed for both personal and business users.

“This is an ultramobile, always on, ultrathin device,” Mike Lazaridis, co-CEO of Research In Motion told attendees at the ongoing BlackBerry developer conference. “The first time you hold it, it just feels right and you want to take it everywhere you go.”

BlackBerry PlayBook Could Usher New Breed of Augmented Reality - readwriteweb.com
Blackberry Playbook Tablet Revealed | Good E-Reader Blog - Electronic Reader and Tablet PC News

This is a news website article about a scientific finding | Martin Robbins | Science | guardian.co.uk - very funny

This is a news website article about a scientific finding | Martin Robbins | Science | guardian.co.uk

This is a blog re-post of an article that makes fun of the shallow science journalism often found on some of the web`s more popular news sites. I quote a bit I found interesting, but add nothing of substance to the conversation.

I will then briefly state how many years the scientist spent leading the study, to reinforce the fact that this is a serious study and worthy of being published by the BBC the website.

This is a sub-heading that gives the impression I am about to add useful context.

Here I will state that whatever was being researched was first discovered in some year, presenting a vague timeline in a token gesture toward establishing context for the reader.

To pad out this section I will include a variety of inane facts about the subject of the research that I gathered by Googling the topic and reading the Wikipedia article that appeared as the first link.

The Rats Are Alright - Rub the leather, smell the glue

The Rats Are Alright

But all of this is broad brushstrokes (of course). We have no figures to tell us how readers (and what kind of readers) move this way and that. We have no way of knowing whether people that buy 100, or 300, or 500 books a year are reading good things, or bad things, new things, or old things, whether they’re bibliophiles or merely prolific readers. We have no way of knowing when and if they’re going or have gone. And as for the rats, we have no way of knowing when they’ll jump ship, or if they’ll be pushed, and if they go then where they’ll land.

A good article, well worth reading. I strongly disagree with the idea that the changes to the music industry are different to the book industry because you are constantly holding the book. This is an underhanded attempt to reintroduce the idea that the `sensual` pleasure of holding a paper book is something people care about.

Aspiring authors fail to click during e-book emergence | MailTribune.com

Aspiring authors fail to click during e-book emergence | MailTribune.com

Another twisted article about how e-books are bad for authors. The heart of the argument boils down to the second last paragraph:

And when agents have a tough time, many writers do as well.

So the argument is that if the middlemen don`t get rich then the authors and the readers will suffer.

Zombi Authors and the Death of Publishing - Stackpole discovers Gutenberg

Zombi Authors and the Death of Publishing | Stormwolf.com

Days turn into months turn into years into decades. Many of the old classics and favorites from our childhood are losing their copyright (author + 50 yrs in Canada). You`d be surprised with what you can find with a little digging.

Publishing houses have to realize that their competition is now with the entire back catalog of published works, not what is in print and not decomposing somewhere in a basement. The rules of the game have changed.

enTourage pocket eDGe

enTourage pocket eDGe


Looks cool. There is no price attached yet, but I'd pay $200 for it.

Mims's Bits: The Death of the Book has been arrested by wishful thinking

Technology Review: Blogs: Mims's Bits: The Death of the Book has Been Greatly Exaggerated

This sloppy exercise in selective blindness and wishful thinking tries to prove that e-books are going to change the publishing industry irrevocably and that this "revolution" is really an evolution that began when the first home computers hit the shelves.

Books have a kind of usability that, for most people, isn't about to be trumped by bourgeoisie concerns about portability: They are the only auto-playing, backwards-compatible to the dawn of the English language, entirely self-contained medium we have left.

What kind of twisted argument is this? Bourgeoisie? Are you speaking on behalf of the workers and their preference for leather-bound hardcovers? No. You represent a view that has (or wants) a room in their house they call the "library" and don't have to stand in a subway car for an hour every morning to get to work.

SKYTEX - PRIMER - 7 Color eBook Reader and Media Player -no wifi or HDMI out

SKYTEX - PRIMER - 7 Color eBook Reader and Media Player - E-Readers


$99 US. No touchscreen or wi-fi, but the battery life of 7-8 hours is pretty decent for a tablet that can play audio and video. A video out (HDMI preferably) would have been enough to make this a serious contender for my next purchase.

The Winners of the British Fantasy Awards 2010 - Conrad Williams - One is best Novel

The Winners of the British Fantasy Awards 2010

Not many names I recognize. I haven't read Conrad Williams's One. Joe Abercrombie's Best Served Cold was pretty good so I hope he deserved the win. I guess I'll find out once I track down a copy of the book.

British Fantasy Awards 2010: the Nominees

Terry Pratchett creates a sword with meteorites | News.com.au

Terry Pratchett creates a sword with meteorites | News.com.au

With some help from friends he collected iron ore near his home, added some bits of meteorite and smelted the forged it into an iron bar of metal he took to a  blacksmith.

Sir Terry has to hide his sword because he's concerned that the police may confiscate it.

Take the Agency Ebook Pledge

Take the Agency Ebook Pledge

Amazon lets you know if the publisher set the price of a book. Do other online bookstores do the same? Is there an independent site keeping a list?

Authors' backlists of books hard to find - pirates can help

E-Finds: Books, Music, Video & Other On-Line Finds: About Author Profiles

Authors need to do more to get their backlists out there. Its a win-win situation just waiting to happen.

Jerry Pournelle is releasing his backlist and he is getting many of the source files for his e-books from the pirate community.

Samsung Galaxy Pad set for launch in Canada | Good E-Reader Blog - Electronic Reader and Tablet PC News

Samsung Galaxy Pad set for launch in Canada | Good E-Reader Blog - Electronic Reader and Tablet PC News

Woo-hoo! Pricing is going to be interesting considering how expensive cell service is in Canada compared to other countries.

Zhook is a simple ebook format. - Ochook.org

Zhook is a simple ebook format. - Ochook.org

This is interesting. Its essentially a single HTML file in a zip file (with images in the same directory level or a sub-folder). With the addition of a few semantic tags (html5) you can get the same effect as ePub without the mess involved in creating an ePub structure.

ECTACO - Jetbook Mini for $99US

ECTACO - Electronic Dictionary, Handheld Electronic Dictionaries, Electronic Translator, Translation Software, Ebook Reader.

The Jetbook mini is a nice design and looks like an easy device to use. I like how Calibre compatibility is a required feature for e-readers these days.

* Multi-Language interface support for English, French, Italian, Portuguese, German, Spanish, Polish and Russian
* First and only eReader in the world to run on 4 AAA batteries (Energizer batteries included)
* Up to 90 hours of reading time
* All-way reading rotation for righties and lefties
* 5" TFT screen and smaller size for ultra portability
* Adjustable font sizes
* Text alignment, spacing, breaking, and encoding options
* Clock and date functions
* Support for LIT, MOBI, EPUB, HTML, PRC, RTF, PDB, PDF via Calibre conversion to TXT and FB2.
* SD Card expandability up to 2 GB

The Problem Is: Publishers Don’t Read eBooks! And more.

An insightful look at the problems with the e-publishing industry.

The Problem Is: Publishers Don’t Read eBooks!

Okay, I admit I don’t know that 100% of publishers don’t read their own ebooks – heck, I can’t even swear with certainty that publishers even know how to read — but I am certain Tom Doherty Associates/TOR/Macmillan’s publisher didn’t read the ebook version of Brandon Sanderson’s new release The Way of Kings before releasing it on the unsuspecting public.

In the Face: eBook Errors

I’ve been thinking about the errors I find in ebooks. Sometimes they are small errors, the kind I would find even in a well-edited pbook, the occasional dropped article, the switch in tense, and the like. Nothing too serious, but noticeable. Annoying but forgivable, at least on some low level. After all, perfection is something we strive for but rarely attain.

Writing: Find the Time or Don’t - Tough love from John Scalzi

Writing: Find the Time or Don’t - Whatever:

"So: Do you want to write or don’t you? If your answer is “yes, but,” then here’s a small editing tip: what you’re doing is using six letters and two words to say “no.” And that’s fine. Just don’t kid yourself as to what “yes, but” means."

One of the best things I've read about finding the motivation to sit down and write. Whether you're blogging or writing the Great Canadian Novel you need to read this.

Work at it and keep working at it. And if you need inspiration, think of yourself on your deathbed saying “well, at least I watched a lot of TV.” If saying such a thing as your life ebbs away fills you with existential horror, well, then. I think you know what to do.

Need I say more?

Trading e-books for p-books: Why don’t publishers start doing it? - pretty soon you won't be able to give them away

Trading e-books for p-books: Why don’t publishers start doing it? | TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home:

"Why don’t publishers go into the used book business themselves? Set up a kind of “Gamestop for books”: let consumers send their old, in-resalable-condition paper books in, maybe charge a buck or two per book for handling, and send them an e-book copy of the book in return. Since digital media doesn’t have a per-unit manufacturing cost, they’d be turning a profit right there—getting physical goods (and possibly a handling fee) in return for something that cost them nothing to produce. The publisher gets something for “nothing”, the consumer gets the electronic copy he wanted and reclaims the space that book formerly took up—it’s win-win."

A great idea, but I doubt it will ever happen. Its a shame though; scanners are cheap and OCR software is incredibly powerfuly compared to only a few years ago. Books are going digital despite the recalcitrance of the publishing industry. All those p-books will end up donated to the public library.

Nine Important Trends in the Evolution of Digital Textbooks and E-learning Content - Disaggregate for fun and profit

Nine Important Trends in the Evolution of Digital Textbooks and E-learning Content � The Xplanation

Interesting summary of existing and new practices involved in providing digital content for the education "marketplace". The buzzword seems to be disaggregation. Instead of buying an expensive textbook and using 70% of its content you buy/rent/opensource the pieces you need to fulfill a particular course plan.

Without Geometry, Life is Pointless: Habits of Mind

Without Geometry, Life is Pointless: Habits of Mind

An useful top ten list. Intended for mathematics but good for everyone.
Follow the link above to see greater detail given to the top ten list:

1. Pattern Sniff
2. Experiment, Guess and Conjecture
3. Organize and Simplify
4. Describe
5. Tinker and Invent
6. Visualize
7. Strategize, Reason and Prove
8. Connect
9. Listen and Collaborate
10. Contextualize, Reflect and Persevere

The Lure of eBooks: Gotcha! | The Digital Reader

The Lure of eBooks: Gotcha! | The Digital Reader

Great little article about how switching to e-reading is a natural choice, even for those who still believe in the superiority of reading a "real" book.

I guess this needs to be viewed as a warning to all those yet to be initiated into the addictive pleasure world of ebooks. Once you stick your toe into the ebook waters, you will be captured because the reading experience is excellent and keeps getting better as publishers take ebooks more seriously.

$35 Indian tablet actually Chinese HiVision Speedpad? | TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home

$35 Indian tablet actually Chinese HiVision Speedpad? | TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home

As far as I'm concerned this is good news. Hopefully the "scandal" will not interfere with producing hundreds of thousandsm if not millions, of this cheap tablet. By the time it hits North America it will be $50 and come with a variety of open-source apps riding on top of various flavours of device-tuned operating systems; Android likely the most popular, but Linux based flavours as well.

What we need is an inexpensive, ubiquitous hardware platform to let the open-source community do what it does best: experiment and innovate. We'll likely see great things sooner if this were so. Neither iOS nor Android are open enough to guarantee the kind of innovation I would like to see.

Will ebooks change the length of novels? (and Penguin doesn’t care about typos) | TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home

Will ebooks change the length of novels? (and Penguin doesn’t care about typos) - Charles Stross's Wireless e-bok SSC

This caught my eye for two reasons. First, I am about to start reading Wireless by Charles Stross, and Teleread quotes the Stross's Afterword to the short story collection where he ponders the future of the long form reading experience when it is no longer restricted by the cost and complexities of binding, materials and distribution.

The second point that caught my eye was Paul Biba's complaint that he found a typo on practically every "page" of the Penguin e-book. I think its a disgrace that less effort, on the whole, is spent proofing and preparing quality e-books when they currently cost as much, if nor more, than a paperback version.

Purchasers should be able to receive updates when better-proofed versions become available.

Onyx Boox X60 – The Drop Proof eReader - bpuncy bouncy

Onyx Boox X60 – The Drop Proof eReader | The eBook Reader Blog


A nice feature for the fumble-fingers out there. As a critical feature looking towards my next e-reader I may want to hold out for a drop-kick proof e-reader.

Follow the link and check out the video of the tablet being dropped and bouncing around a bit. It should be available sometime in October.

India’s $35 to ship in January - name it Sakshat to prevent international sales

India’s $35 to ship in January | The Digital Reader

The $35 tablet is real: HCL Technologies Ltd will build 100,000 of them as a government project that is part of an overall plan to increase the use of technology in education.

Sakshat is sanskrit for "Embodiment". I'm sure if the technology ever makes it to Europe and North America it will be marketed under a different name.

Hey, it couldn't be vapour if there is a Wikipedia page for it.

Samsung Planning to Ship 10 Million Galaxy Tabs And Snag 1/3 of the Tablet Market

Samsung Planning to Ship 10 Million Galaxy Tabs And Snag 1/3 of the Tablet Market

The question remains whether the price will be $200-300 before or after the 2 year wireless contract. I kind of understand why Google forces a phone# to be associated with an android device before it can access the App market (security), but I think the hard-ass authoritarian control they want doesn't really differentiate it from Apple all that much.

There is always Linux and MeeGo for the crowd that just wants Wifi and no locked-down contracts.

2010 Hugo Award Winners! - Windup Girl and City & City tie for best novel

Congratulations to the 2010 Hugo Award Winners!

No complaints here, though I wouldn't have been surprised if Windup Girl had won it on its own.

BEST NOVEL
[Tie for first place]
The City & The City by China Miéville (Del Rey; Macmillan UK)
The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi (Night Shade)

BEST NOVELLA
"Palimpsest" by Charles Stross (Wireless; Ace; Orbit)

BEST NOVELETTE
"The Island" by Peter Watts (The New Space Opera 2; Eos)

BEST SHORT STORY
"Bridesicle" by Will McIntosh (Asimov's 1/09)

BEST RELATED WORK
This is Me, Jack Vance! (Or, More Properly, This is "I") by Jack Vance (Subterranean)

BEST GRAPHIC STORY
Girl Genius, Volume 9: Agatha Heterodyne and the Heirs of the Storm Written by Kaja and Phil Foglio; Art by Phil Foglio; Colours by Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment)

BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION - LONG FORM
Moon Screenplay by Nathan Parker; Story by Duncan Jones; Directed by Duncan Jones (Liberty Films)

BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION - SHORT FORM
Doctor Who: "The Waters of Mars" Written by Russell T Davies & Phil Ford; Directed by Graeme Harper (BBC Wales)

BEST EDITOR, LONG FORM
Patrick Nielsen Hayden

BEST EDITOR, SHORT FORM
Ellen Datlow

BEST PROFESSIONAL ARTIST
Shaun Tan

BEST SEMIPROZINE
Clarkesworld edited by Neil Clarke, Sean Wallace, & Cheryl Morgan

BEST FAN WRITER
Frederik Pohl

BEST FANZINE
StarShipSofa edited by Tony C. Smith

BEST FAN ARTIST
Brad W. Foster

THE JOHN W. CAMPBELL AWARD FOR BEST NEW WRITER
Seanan McGuire

Pseudovariety - soda pop or paperbacks

Pseudovariety

Interesting graphics of the hundreds of varieties of soda and flavoured waters mostly produced by the big three companies. Enjoy looking at the pretty bubbles while you consider the similarities to the publishing industry.

Or not.

A syllabus and book list for novice students of science fiction literature

A syllabus and book list for novice students of science fiction literature

A good mix of the classics and some contemporary novels.

DealExtreme: $135.50 Gemei GM2000 7.0" Touch Screen E-Book Reader HD Media Player w/ FM Radio Voice Recorder (4GB)

DealExtreme: $135.50 Gemei GM2000 7.0" Touch Screen E-Book Reader HD Media Player w/ FM Radio Voice Recorder (4GB)

It supports ePub and PDF. It has a touchscreen but I don't know if it supports highlighting passages and bookmarking. I suppose the price will drop to compete the the new batch of e-readers and PMPs coming out.

Samsung Galaxy Tab vs. the iPad: Compare For Yourself - PCWorld

Samsung Galaxy Tab vs. the iPad: Compare For Yourself - PCWorld

The Samsung Galaxy Tab Can Set Its Own Price, No Need To Directly Compete With The iPad’s $500 Price

Looks like the Tab is going to be just as expensive as the iPad. Maybe I'll wait for a Galaxy Tab clone to come out next year some time.

The First Samsung Galaxy Tab Commercial Shows Off Swype, Augmented Reality & Video Calling

The First Samsung Galaxy Tab Commercial Shows Off Swype, Augmented Reality & Video Calling

As slick as the Apple ads. Waiting on the price tag.
$200-$300 and this thing can take off.

bookofjoe: Easy Grip Portable Book Holder - I'll keep my e-reader, thanks

bookofjoe: Easy Grip Portable Book Holder

Check out the link to see how this gadget is used to make reading a hardcover book "easier". Reading the article reminded me just how much I love reading with my eBookwise reader. Its getting a bit long in the tooth but I'd take it any day over a paper book -- at least when it comes to reading novels.

Three New Editions in Sony Reader Family - decent hardware but SonyDRM fragments market

Three New Editions in Sony Reader Family | e-Bookvine

Of course Sony is using its own flavour of DRM on ePub books so they cannot be transferred to other systems. There are now three major ePub DRM systems out there --  essentially that means there are three versions of ePub. This can cripple the open ePub format thus opening the way for the standardization on proprietary formats like Amazon's AZW.