According to Bright.nl, Dutch quality daily NRC Handelsblad sold 500 Iliad + subscription combos last week. The Iliad is Irex’ E Ink based, A5-sized reading device with touch screen. Last week, NRC Handelsblad was the first Dutch newspaper to start selling Iliads combined with subscriptions. An Iliad with subscription costs 700 euro, but if you already have a subscription NRC will sell you an Iliad for 500 euro (Irex’ price: 650 without the newspaper subscription). A year’s subscription on the electronic paper costs 190 euro.
NRC had expected to sell the first 500 devices in a month, and delivery may be slowed down because of this unexpected success.
Six months after the introduction there are still many defects in the NRC ePaper. Many articles are unreadable because they are scrambled. Quite frequently a part of the paper is missing (for example. last Saterday about 50% percent of the supplement was missing) . The front page of the Saterday issue is almost always lacking. Colums with many short articles appear as one paragraph without any layout. Aticles end abruptely and continu 20 pages later without any sign that the one is a continuation of the other. The iliad needs a direct connection with a router to download the newspaper and does not work together with hotspots and with most companynetworks. The NRC does not answer the complaints on the user forum and make, again and again, promises they do not keep.