Also, I don’t understand the “slow connectivity” comment. It is WiFi enabled and for extra you can buy a 3G enabled iPad to connect to AT&T. There’s been no comment about its capability whenever 4G networks go online. Its connectivity should be as good as the WiFi or AT&T service is for any other device.

The iPad may not be the best option if you’re looking strictly for an e-reader but I think its much greater capabilities outweigh its slightly greater cost compared to the other e-readers. Of course, its not out yet, so its a little premature to say for sure. But I’m looking forward to checking it out and hopefully getting one eventually.

Thinking about buying an e-reader device? Which one should you buy? Kindle? Sony Reader? Or do you wait and get Apple’s new iPad? I’ve just spent 3 days attending sessions at the Publishing Business Conference in New York City about e-readers and the future of publishing. (See my posts about the current status and the future of the publishing industry.)

Modern e-readers provide a very nice experience in reading. E-paper devices are not backlit like a computer screens, so they are very easy on the eyes. It’s very similar to reading ink on paper. They are slim and lightweight and allow you to sit back and enjoy reading. And you can’t beat the average price of about $9 per book.

E-readers are still a bit clumsy for reading magazines, but they work great for reading text-based books. (It’ll only be a few years until larger, color, foldable e-paper readers will be available for a great magazine experience.)

So, back to the original question, which device should you buy?

• Kindle (Amazon): Is the most popular reader. It has lots of momentum, but you are limited to Kindle’s proprietary content format. (Although there are free tools that can convert standard ePub files to Kindle-compatible files.)
• Librie and Reader (Sony): I like my Sony Reader. It’s lightweight, easy to use, and easy to read. Books are available from the Sony library and other sources (see overdrive.com), since this reader accepts files in the standard ePub format, as well as PFD, RTF, Word documents, text documents, and Sony’s own .lrf, and .lrx formats.
• The iPad was introduced recently by Steve Jobs and is getting a lot of hype. It’s not yet available in the market. The iPad has a multi-touch color display, which will open great opportunities, especially for magazines. Hoever, the iPad has a backlit computer screen, not e-paper technology. Also, it will have slow connectivity until 4G networks are more broadly available. If you’re the type to buy the latest, greatest Apple product, this is definitely for you (if you have $499). But if that’s not you, it’s probably not worth buying.
• Finally, you may want to consider the PocketBook , which has 75-80% of the market share in Europe and is just starting in the USA. It is an open reader that reads all e-book formats, except Kindle. It holds 1,500 books, plus external memory available up to 32 G. It supports all languages (you can add your own fonts), has 6 font sizes, allows you to create your own folders and themes, and allows firmware upgrades. (This is important because the technology is changing so quickly.) You can also download games and new models have text to speech and handwriting to text functions.

If you’re not willing to pay a few hundred dollars to get an e-reader today, don’t write off the idea completely. In 3-5 years, the devices will come down in price to $100 or even $50. The devices will also become lighter, have better color, and roll up or fold up to fit in your shirt pocket.

Share on Facebook

Bookmark:

Aren’t there important differences between natural and artificial selection? One being the speed at which it happens. Another being what kinds of traits are being selected (helpful in the nature environment or not?).

One also wonders what points in our evolutionary history (or is that too anthropocentric?) God intervened? When, or if He stopped intervening, wouldn’t we simply evolve back to what nature had been selecting, sort of like dogs returned to the wild?

Although the idea of God’s creating us by “shepherding” our ancestors is fascinating.

My experience with Mormons is limited, having only be exposed to the religion through a sizeable portion of my extended family on my father’s side that’s Mormon, Adam, and a number of students that I’ve had over the years. My first real exposure was about seven years ago when my Aunt, who was Mormon, died of cancer. What I found really amazing was how the whole community got involved. And by this, I don’t just mean that they attended the service and funeral, but rather they were involved with the family at a very ground floor level, involving themselves in every aspect of the mourning and support for the family. It was then that I discovered that, at least in their particular sect, each of them would meet weekly with a partner to discuss moral and spiritual issues. I was extremely impressed with this level of involvement or community building.

Later on, when I met Adam and talked about these things more, he told me about how the church hierarchy is structured and how people basically rotate through various positions in the church, one year serving as treasurer, another teaching school (Adam’s a hoot and teaches the Jesus of the Gospels as a sort of Lacanian analyst), another conducting services, etc. The Negri and Hardt enthusiast of “multitudes” in me, coupled with the Badiousian/Sartrean enthusiast of subject-groups and truth procedures, is impressed by this sort of immanent, “flat”, “democratic” or egalitarian sort of organization. I have a similar fascination with the early Baptist church, prior to it becoming so dogmatic and hierchialized, where you had the congregation of the lay. And at the risk of making offensive generalizations, proposition 8 in California aside, all of the Mormons I’ve ever met have struck me as extremely happy, tolerant, generous people so something must be working here. Adam is one of the most free wheeling and adventurous metaphysicians I’ve ever encountered, and I seldom find anything he says objectionable, often finding him even more secular than myself in a way that is jarring next to his deep religious convictions. Perhaps this is his Derridean background, requiring as it does a post-ontotheological conception of God and theology, paradoxically enough, that might be described as an “a-theology”.

So I guess what I’m saying is that at the level of community building and activity, it seems to me that these sorts of practices make uneasy bedfellows with the deontological moral theory of Kant or the consequentialism of utilitarianism. Levinas I can see a bit, but it doesn’t seem to me that these practices are done simply out of a command of reason or a duty, nor that they are quite a matter of calculative utilitarian thought. But like I said, my experience is limited here.

Adam kindly gave me a copy of his book last year. I’ve discussed it with him a lot over on LDS-Herm. I didn’t realize you guys were colleagues. I think I nearly convinced him of the Derridean position against his critique but maybe he’d disagree with that characterization. I do agree with Adam (and I think everyone on LDS-Herm would agree) that true religiosity requires something “beyond” economy. I think this is one reason why so many LDS thinkers have adopted a more Levinasian view where responsibility is more important than economic based forms of Ethics. (Roughly both the Kantian and Utilitarian broad approaches) Of course there are plenty of Mormon Kantians and Utilitarians so I don’t want to paint with too broad a brush.