Companies developing new e-reader technology
Sony Daily Edition photo from technewsworld.com.
It’s hard to imagine college without textbooks, or high school for that matter, but someday that could be reality. Although it is hard to imagine, it’s kind of nice to think of being able to wander around campus without all the extra weight added from textbooks.
A lot of e-reader development has been going on since the Kindle came out, and Sony appears to be leading the charge to develop the perfect e-reader for students. What makes a piece of technology perfect for students?
Price
After Sony’s e-readers hit the market, Kindle dropped its prices to compete. Sony has created a Digital Reader Pocket Edition that goes for about $200. Its Touch Edition goes for $300 and the Daily Edition is $400.
Kindle has e-readers roughly the same size and price as Sony’s e-readers, but I haven’t seen a small one like Sony’s Pocket Edition with a 5-inch screen. That would certainly be a lot lighter an more convenient than lugging around text books. I certainly wish I could have purchased digital versions of my textbooks when I was in college. Hopefully digital textbooks will cost less, too.
Features
Christopher Dawson from ZD Net recently shared his thoughts on what makes an e-reader good for students:
We’d certainly want color and high-resolution images. Touch and note-taking capabilities are obvious choices. And we’d sure as heck want open file formats and a reasonable approach to DRM (if not a whole lot of DRM-free content).
Sony’s new e-reader products are definitely getting closer on many of those fronts and are certainly more education-friendly than the Kindle.
Convenience
Sony is partnering with OverDrive, a reader that works with a network of public libraries. Though many people have held reservations against e-readers because they love traditional books, the current generation of high school and college students are used to reading on computer screens and reading from small devices they keep in their pockets.
Both companies have put a lot of work into making e-readers better for people’s eyes than computer screens and with less glare. The closer they can get to making the e-reader experience like reading from a page, the happier they are and the more people who prefer regular books will be willing to use them.
Coming soon
I think students will be completely ready and willing to read from a 5-inch screen on an e-reader, but for people who like more hefty technology that more closely resembles an actual book, they will be interested in the Daily Edition. TechNewsWorld reports:
Sony announced Tuesday that the Daily Edition reader will sell for US$399 and will be available in December, just in time for holiday shopping sprees. The real news, however, focused on the Daily Edition’s wireless capabilities. Just as with the Kindle’s Whispernet technology, the Sony device will allow for instant downloads of books no matter where the user is, thanks to back end infrastructure provided by AT&T.
The Daily Edition also offers touchscreen capabilities, which lets users highlight words and paragraphs, and will allow consumers to “check out” books from libraries nationwide.
Discussion of E-Readers Could Lighten Students’ Load