Electronic Paper's Past and Future 154
Iddo Genuth sends us to TFOT for his extended series of interviews around the question of how electronic paper will change our lives in the next few years. The article leads off with the "father of e-paper," Nick Sheridon, who came up with the idea almost 35 years ago at Xerox PARC, and goes on to explore how e-paper may evolve past its current incarnations in the likes of the Sony Reader.
Other devices might be better (Score:4, Informative)
Bookeen is coming out with their own device any day now that's really similar to the Sony reader but will use different file formats. They all read RTF, TXT, etc... but if you want to buy a new book, it's likely to have DRM in the file. The DRM file format that the Sony uses is different from the DRM files that the Bookeen and Amazon Kindle will use.
The Iliad is bigger and can render letter size PDF files without the hassle of the smaller devices. It has wifi and a writable screen that you can take notes with... but it's supposed to be slower and more than twice as much money.
I want one really bad, but I'm waiting to see what Bookeen and Amazon finally release before I throw down my cash. Sure they're all kind of expensive, but you can load up with free classic books from Project Gutenberg and you'll save money in the long run (if you read a lot and are too lazy/busy to make trips to the library).
http://www.mobileread.com/ [mobileread.com]
http://www.engadget.com/2006/09/11/amazon-kindle-meet-amazons-e-book-reader/ [engadget.com]
http://www.engadget.com/2007/10/03/kindle-edition-books-appear-on-amazon-reader-launch-imminent/ [engadget.com]
http://www.bookeen.com/ [bookeen.com]
http://www.irextechnologies.com/ [irextechnologies.com]
Re:E-Readers (Score:1, Informative)
I don't, but I have an Nokia N800 that I use sometimes as an e-reader. The default reader software sucks, but there are some MUCH better ones available as open source. Battery life is excellent as long as you don't go wild with the display brightness - which means in effect, indoor use only.
It's shirt-pocket size, so there is always the tradeoff between "small enough to carry anywhere" and "big as a page". The n800 tends more towards the small-enough-for-shirt-pocket end of it. Oh, and it runs Linux
Re:E-Readers (Score:5, Informative)
They're actually quite nice.
The e-paper screen is *beautiful*. The only thing you'll miss is a book light. It's very nice and contrasty (but more like black on a dull grey background), and the text isn't buried under glass, but appears on the surface, like real paper. It's a nice matte surface, so glare is a non-issue, and is extremely readable in all lighting conditions except pitch black (like a regular book).
The bad thing - if you want to use its internal memory, you need to use Sony's software (a poor imitation of iTunes). But luckily, it accepts Memory Stick and SD cards. Just plop in it text files, RTF, or PDF files onto your SD card and away you go (making this the OS agnostic way of using it - just need a card reader and external card). The other issue is ghosting - when the screen updates, the parts that were black don't return all the way to background color, but leaves an imprint. Not to worry - another refresh will fix it. Might be slightly irritating if the book lines alternate.
The other bad thing is when it needs to refresh the area - what happens is it inverts the entire screen, then writes the new image to it (in an effort to alleviate the ghosting).
But the screen is really nice, you can easily forget about such issues. Just remember the flashlight if reading beneath the covers.
Re:Price (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.sonycard.sony.com/sonygateway/gateway.aspx?offerlink=iklipze [sony.com]
Re:I don't know... (Score:5, Informative)
The Sony screen is 6.9" x 3.9", whereas the iPod Touch's is like 3.5" x 2.2" -- not even close. Add to that it is usable in full, direct sunlight and has an almost 180 degree viewing angle and much higher contrast ratio and for READING, not browsing, ePaper blows the iPod (and iPhone) out of the water.
Screw web content. Believe it or not there are people with attention spans not defined by MTV. Try a few of these [literature.org] on the iPod Touch and then the Sony, then get back to me.
Totally different targets.
Re:E-Readers (Score:5, Informative)
Re:E-Readers (Score:4, Informative)
sony is not the only option (Score:2, Informative)
I have two models, V8 - which doesn't have an OS and runs on Epson cpu and V3 - that runs LINUX and runs on ARM 200mhz processor.
Both are great. Both have MMC/SD card, no DRM. V3 can display PDF and DJVU files. Both have SDKs for you to tinker with. While V8 is very basic and you have to use ANSI C to code your things, V3 is somewhat more powerful.
Nevertheless, as a reader, I prefer V8, because it has cover built in and an additional small display :) and I do most of my reading in FB2 and TXT.
Re:E-Readers (Score:2, Informative)
On DRM, the reader's best supported format is the sony one (.lrf files), which provides the best rendering, and which *can* support a DRM layer. It also happens to be a trivial format that also works without embedded restrictions. Therefore, you can download many books from the Gutenberg project in unencumbered lrf format from Manybooks.net [manybooks.net]. You can also convert many document formats (txt, rtf, html, doc) to unencumbered lrf. PDF support is not good though, as most A4 formatted pdfs will be too small when read in portrait, and will require you to scroll when in landscape. Good enough if you really need to access a pdf from time to time, but there's no way you'll ever read a book that way.
Finally, on accessing the device, mine doesn't work as a usb mass storage device, and i don't know if that's going to happen in the next models (sure hope so, obviously). However, there's a cross-platform open source driver [kovidgoyal.net] available, which means that since i have the reader, i never had to use the crap software sony provides more than once, just to have a look. Never bothered again, and it doesn't run on my linux box anyway. That driver also comes with a GUI software, and many basic command line tools to access the device (cp, rm, ls etc), and to convert file formats (html2lrf being one of the most useful).
In the end, i really love that 'toy'. The hindrance of not having a backlight on the screen makes it more comfortable on the long run: no more visual fatigue than reading paper. The battery life is good, it is small enough to be carried comfortably (i'm looking at you iLiad), it can read most of the free books out there on the web. The main downside of course, is that you won't get access to the most recent books, as they're only sold with DRM, and usually not in Sony's format. Personally, i wasn't looking for that, so i'm fine, but this *is* a hindrance, and will be until ebook shops change their policies, which could take many years... Ah, and also, it's an ebook reader, nothing else. Well ok, it can display images and play mp3s, but that's really a waste of battery life. It doesn't browse the web, it has no wifi. It's only a book reader. But it's a damn good one.
Re:E-Readers (Score:3, Informative)
If I had the choice, I would go e-book all the way.