This article reminded me of the NPR piece on e-books we mentioned the other day. In that piece, various talking heads suggested that e-books were changing the way in which we read, and hence the way in which authors would have to write from now on. On O’Reilly Radar, Sarah Milstein talks about the similar assumption that Twitter, email, and other instant, small-chunk communication methods are something entirely new and different and changing the way in which we communicate. Milstein reminds us that in the 19th century, the mail was delivered in Victorian England as many as...

We have already said plenty about the possible e-book reading potential of netbooks as opposed to dedicated e-book readers. Now here comes a whole new category of micro-laptop that might also be good for e-book reading, at a lower price point. In the last few years, we have had notebooks, powerbooks, macbooks, netbooks…and now “smartbooks” and “webbooks”. * It seems as though every time computer manufacturers decide to make a different size of machine, they have to come up with a new name for it. Remember when we only had “laptops”? Or even just “notebooks” and “subnotebooks”? How...

Erictric has an article about these two upcoming applications and a link for you to sign up to be notified when they are released. Unfortunately neither of them will display newspapers, magazines or blogs (and neither does the iPhone app) and the Blackberry application will be available in the US only. I'm waiting for the Mac application, myself. (via Resource Shelf)...

BookofJoe is reporting that the Morgan Library in New York, along with the New York Times, have made the manuscript of Dickens' work available on the web. The Times was allowed by the Morgan to photograph and display it. The Morgan displays the manuscript every year at this time but only one page is put on view. ...

According to Douglas Moran of Gear Diary this problem has been fixed. Douglas says that this is a result of something B&N did on the server end, not the app end, because a new app has not been issued yet. You can take a look at his article here, where he relates his conversation with B&N and his successfully opening large books....

Mian Mian, a Chinese author, has sued Google for scanning her latest book "Acid House", and is asking for 6,000 pounds and and a public apology. The court has postponed the matter, asking that the parties trie to settle. Google has removed her work, but her lawyer says: "We think even if they remove Mian Mian's work, their previous behaviour is a violation of her rights ... We demand an apology". More info here....

I previously reported on this app here and noted that it was not available in the US. Thanks to gc in Australia for telling me it is available there, so I checked and one can now download it from the US App Store for $3.99. I jumped at it and it is now on my phone. It is really a slick application and it is also fast, fast, fast. The other news application I have on my phone is from the BBC. ...

E-books have long been recognized as a reading format that is particularly friendly to the disabled—at least when DRM is not involved. Blind readers can pass these files directly to their braille readers or speech synthesizers and enjoy “reading” a good book much the same as the rest of us. Ars Technica has a most interesting article about the US government’s support of a proposed WIPO treaty that mandates copyright exemptions (otherwise known as “compulsory licensing”) and DRM-breaking permissions for organizations that provide reading material to the disabled. In other words, these organizations would be permitted to...

John's Blog has a review of this Astak unit and finds it disappointing and "... a poor substitute for a paper weight." _____ NPRs Morning Edition has a story on ereaders which you can listen to here. _____ Amazon is publishing its best-selling items for 2009 and you can find their bestselling books listed here. You can sort by year, month and week. ----- ComputerWorld UK publishes an excerpt from a “Reflection Document” from the European Commission entitled “Creative Content in a European Digital Single Market: Challenges for the Future” ...

Al DiGuido, who used to run Computer Shopper and who is now CEO of Zeta Interactive, thinks they can do it if a number of qualifications are met. In an article in Advertising Age, he says this is possible if prices come down and publishers take advantage of technology to provide advertisers with the proper analytics. Imagine the wealth of real-time information publishers could provide their advertisers on reader engagement with their brand -- what ads did readers view, for how long, what action did they take, what did they buy, what product categories are they interested in, what sections...

Long-time open source developer and spam fighter Chip Rosenthal chose to crunch some numbers for his research of whether or not to buy a Kindle this holiday season. After doing the math, Chip describes in his blog how, over a three year period, using a Kindle would cost $565 more than simply buying paper books. He attributes the difference largely to what he calls the "DRM Tax". "[...] maybe someday Amazon (and publishers) will realize how much harm they are doing with DRM. If the DRM tax was removed, not only would more people get e-readers, but also, thanks to the...

MobileTechReview has a first look at the Sony PRS-900. Lisa says the screen is quite similar to her PRS-600 and she really likes how the Wall Street Journal is formatted for the machine. Calibre 0.6.31 now has support for the PRS 900 and the Airis dBook. ...