After a trip to the new Borders in Ann Arbor yesterday, and another disgruntled look at their Sony ebook reader, I've come up with a wishlist for the perfect ebook reader.
- It folds up, into something the size of the iphone or smaller.
- It unfolds into a wide screen e-paper style display. Maybe 12 or 15" wide by 10" tall.
- It is vanishingly thin.
- The display is in full color.
- It has wifi and wireless (cellphone) capabilities.
- It has all the other capabilities of an iphone with the addition of the ability to use a pen on it and either use the onscreen touch keyboard (like on the iphone) or use a small, extremely thin, and foldable bluetooth keyboard.
- It should function in some way as a phone and music player and perhaps for video even when folded up. In other words there is still some display when folded up.
- It should have at least 12 hour battery life with an on-board solar panel or maybe a crank for charging.
- The cabling and cords should not be a bigger object to carry than the gadget itself.
- It should be able to read any format, DRM or not.
- 40+Gigs storage, minimum.
- The browser should be a standard Firefox or Safari style browser with all the usual capabilities including flash, and preferably addons for debugging and other functions.
- You should be able to purchase books and other media instantly similar to the Kindle, AND select from free, out of copyright, non-DRM and competitive media vendors in the same interface.
Amazon, Apple, Sony, Borders: are you listening? I'd buy this thing instantly if you were selling it.
Update 2-25-08: The prototype Readius roll-away screen is getting very close to what I want in a screen size. At least the concept is right!
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Posted by ellen at February 17, 2008 01:28 PM
