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David Pogue, the New York Times Personal Tech columnist, says the Kindle 2 is a better choice than the Sony Reader PRS-700.

Among Pogue’s reasons:

–The Sony PRS-700 screen lacks enough contrast between the background and the text and is otherwise flawed because of the layers added for the touch feature. Ironically, the cheaper PRS-505 has better contrast.

–Amazon’s store offers more titles. But, hey, this race isn’t over yet, and as Pogue acknowledges, the Sony can handle ePub and PDF—increasing the number of potential selections from various stores online.

–Books at Amazon are cheaper than at the Sony store. Hmm. What about nonSony stores, swhose books are readable on the PRS-700?

–The 700 lacks the wireless the Kindle uses for easier downloading of books. Of course, that’s on the way in a future Sony model.

Related: YouTube video of 700 demo—from Kuwaitvista.

Meanwhile another Kindle 3 rumor: Larger screen and touch functions supposedly coming, according to Digitimes (via MobileRead).

And some commonsense from writer Neil Gaiman: The Kindle 2′s text to speech capability doesn’t violate copyright law (via Tweet from Colleen Lindsay).

 
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