It has WiFi, but no 3G, and 512MB on board, with an SD slot for more expansion. I can’t find any info on their site about formats, but other websites are reporting it reads Epub and PDF. It will retail, in the US for $299 and be available on Feburary 25. There is a series of YouTube videos about it here.

A BeBook at CES apparently didn’t use working Liquavista display tech. The screen seems to have been a mockup despite a report that we and other sites mentioned. I caught up with Liquavista about a skeptical item in MobileRead. The company’s Anthony Slack e-mailed me:

“This posting is largely correct. Liquavista is a display technology developer, and we had a number of monochrome and colour demos on our booth at CES. We had 3” handheld demos as well as 6.2” demos. The latter not being handheld. The demos are development samples, but the contributor below [actually MR] is mistaken in the release date. We aim to release system development samples to customers late Q1 this year. The 2011 forecast is for products retailing with our technology. We also showed a development platform in collaboration with TI. Please find YouTube link. I hope this clears up any misunderstandings.”

There’s always the possibility that BeBook somehow kidnapped a sample, unknown to Anthony Slack, but I doubt it. To my knowledge, BeBook hasn’t responded to my query.

The video you see is the one that the Liquavista e-mail mentioned.

Most of these names are flat out horrible. What were the marketers thinking? These manufacturers are not only trying to build their brands in a crowded marketplace, they are trying to create a new market for a new generation of devices against a well established device that does not require electricity to operate, has a long history of appealing to consumers, and a brand known and recognized by millions of consumers. The book. Perhaps it should be referred to now as “POBs” (plain old books) the way landline telephones are called “POTs” to distinguish them from all the modern alternatives).

What were these manufacturers thinking? How about hiring someone who specializes in modern product naming instead of asking your grandmother or your nephew to come up with something “cool.” Even relatively poor naming choices in other technology fields and consumer products are better than these pathetic nominees. It’s difficult to get consumers to lay down hard cash for new technology when their current tech products work pretty well. Since POBs work really well for most people, and they have tremendous psychological attachments built into them (not to mention sentiment and practicality), e-reading devices are fighting an uphill battle for consumer acceptance.

When they have great names, as well as great features, products become more than devices, they can become objects of desire, objects if status, in short, they become meaningful brands. Who in our country has not heard of the iPod, even if they don’t care for Apple and will never buy one? Who has not heard of Google? They beat Yahoo on more than their name, but there is no doubt that the name contributed to their ascendency.

I think “Nook” has to take the cake as just the worst consumer product name ever. It’s stupid and makes me think of hiding in a corner of a church or a basement room. And generates the typically stupid jokes about “getting some” as in “nookie,” which is really great considering that more than 70% of books are purchased by women.

OK, Barnes & Noble has never been a consumer product manufacturer before, but come on, if you are going to play in a new business sector, why wouldn’t you learn the rules of their game? And granted, the book business has never paid much attention to consumer marketing, I’d expect more from a smart retailer like B & N. And hint to whomever there is in charge of this project – just because it sold out its first shipment, that does not mean you named it well. For the inevitable “Version 2” please consider a name change!

I have to say that the “Kindle” is not much better. When Amazon first announced it, there was a lot of snickering about this moniker too. Kindle, of course, evokes kindling, which we use to build a fire, which is maybe OK as it implies getting something off the ground, though a fire that burns widely is not something good, and kills a lot of trees (maybe that was the idea here—Kindle will kill trees so print books can’t be made anymore?) But of course, kindling is itself made of wood, so who knows? Either way, the name Kindle suggests nothing to do with books, or reading, or imaginative experience of any kind, and it doesn’t exactly spur us to want the device, so I continue to wonder, what were they thinking?

“Blio” sounds like a cartoon character and a failure at that. I can’t even think of a good joke related to how it sounds, which is pretty sad. “iRex” sounds like what a five year old kid tells his parents he has done to his room.

Que might actually be an OK name, but of course it’s not for sale yet. iRiver has created an intriguing machine called the “Story” but it’s not for sale in the USA yet. And there are any number of Korean and other obscure machines out there with equally obscure names.

What were they thinking?

People do like their gadgets these days, and more people than one might have imagined seem ready for an electronic device that allows them to stop killing their shoulders and backs carrying heavy bags full of books. I know that the target market for e-readers is not the hip youth of America, they’re reading on laptops, desktops and cell phones at a rate that boggles the mind. It’s the baby boomers who are flocking to e-readers everywhere, at least initially selling out Barnes & Noble’s buggy and slow Nook and enabling Amazon to claim that they are now selling nobody-knows-how-many-but-a-whole-lot of e-books (according to the ever effervescent Jeff Bezos.)

Imagine how many more devices could be sold if someone came up with a really cool name. OK, “iPhone” is taken and so is “Droid,” but there has got to be a great technology with an equally great name on the horizon. I hope someone is thinking of it now. My money is on Apple and Google, two companies who live and breathe technology and its applications to real people’s lives.

Oh, and while you’re at it, how about making the device we’ve all been waiting for too?

Image credit: CC-licensed image from Schnaars.

David Pogue’s review is in the Personal Tech section of the New York Times, and here are just a few of the comments Pogue makes:

"And in the electronics business, Greed-Borne Insanity is contagious…”

After talking about some of the Nook special features Pogue says that buyers who believe the ballyhoo are afflicted with "Sucker Syndrome."

“…touch screen is balky and nonresponsive," and the main screen is even slower.

Of the one million titles offered, he says "… over half are junky Google scans of free, obscure, pre-1923 out-of-copyright books filled with typos."

"… missing features are symptoms of B&N’s bad case of Ship-at-All-Costs-itis.”

The software is "half-baked."

"Navigating the Nook makes the 1040 tax form seem like a breeze…. the Nook is a mess…."

Pogue almost seems angry about the product. The review is worth reading, if only for his colorful phrases.

* Crain’s New York Business has a short piece on September 2009 e-book sales at Random House seeing a dramatic 700 perent increase over the same period in 2008—largely due to Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol. Just imagine how much sales might go up if they actually sold their e-books at reasonable prices!

* PC World Magazine has a review of the bebook Mini e-book reader. They like it, on the whole, but note it has some interface issues.

* Buzzmachine writes about Rupert Murdoch’s nose-cutting face-spiting decision to start blocking Google. A German research group has analyzed how much damage Google would take from such publisher search-blocking, and come to about the same conclusion as the bulldozer operator from the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: almost none at all.

* While this is not related directly to e-books, Wired has a piece looking at a “copyright time bomb” that will soon be giving the music industry more headaches. A 1976 copyright law had provisions that will allow recording artists to reclaim the copyright to their works from the record labels that currently hold them.

The article claims that this applies to all forms of copyrighted material, not just music, but does not go into any details as to how this could apply to non-musical works.

Given the earlier KPMG survey that says that about 4% of 1,000 British consumers surveyed have read an ebook in the past month, it makes sense for the independents to get into this market.

You can read more at The Bookseller.

Don’t you love the way DRM enhances the quality of life? To hell with the future. Let’s treat books like driftwood.

At least in the past and perhaps even now, Mobipocket has frowned on competing DRM-capable readers being simultaneously present on the same devices that display holy Mobi. Nothing like the benevolence of Amazon lawyers. Amazon, of course, owns Mobipocket and, perhaps to help the Kindle, won’t even release a reader for the iPhone/Touch that can display Mobi.

With so many people excited about the spread of Adobe firmware—despite the accompanying proprietary DRM—it can’t hurt to remind consumers of the perils of “protection” no matter which companies are involved. There’s always a gotcha. Best for publishers and others either to drop DRM, my choice, or if need rely on social DRM.

Related: Random House, other pubs miserly toward IDPF/ePub, but new e-readers and Sigil editor show there’s hope.

Hey Paul,

Johannes

And for around $30, you’ll be able to buy a wireless add-on. Kindle-level ease ahead for other e-book-shoppers?

Scroll down for these and other BEA posts from Paul.

Speaking of E Ink: Check out Chris Meadows’ continuing series on his Sony PRS-700 review unit.

The first is the BE Book 2. It is a standard size reader, but it has a touch screen and wireless that will work anywhere in the world. It will read all the standard BE Book formats including EPUB. This is the first direct competitor to the Kindle. It can do everything the Kindle can do, but is not restricted to a proprietary format. It will use the same type of data model as the Kindle, that is the user will not pay anything to download his books. It betters the Kindle in that news feeds will be free, not a premium as on the Kindle. Here are a couple of shots taken on the show floor:

It will be cheaper than the Kindle and will be available sometime at the end of September.

The also have another product that we’re announcing for the first time. This is a small 5″ reader that can fit in your pocket. The exciting thing about this is that it should retail for about $199. In addition the reader will have an SD card slot and a wireless SD card will be available for it and be priced at about $30. Here’s a shot and then another shot of all three together:

Things are getting more and more exciting in the ereader space! The guys had to go and I’ll try to get some more details later.

The company mentions it has “easily” sold more than 25,000 units of the Bebook, and that the countries it sells the most units in are the UK, Germany, France and the Netherlands.

Introducing the ‘mini’ BeBook (5″)

The BeBook mini, all the features of the large version and more, but a slightly smaller screen (1″ / 2,5cm smaller). Perfect for travelling, this reader fits in any pocket. Full specs and a very competitave price level will follow shortly.