"Am I splitting hairs?"
You are, but let me split them further. Any expense can be classified as either a capital expense or a consumptive one. Expenses classified as one can usually, with a few logical contortions, also be classified as the other. For example, food is the classical consumptive expense, but one could also treat it as an investment as food keeps one alive (and healthy hopefully) and allows one to work in the future. I think that the same can be said about reading here. If you buy a book, it's an expense, and if you read it, you've "consumed" it. Sure you can read it again or someone else can read it, but it's still a consumer good.
I think what people mean here is that devices like this and the iPad are not generally geared to the production of works and more to their consumption. What I mean is, while reading a book on the Amazon Kindle might be an investment in your own mind and future, the Kindle doesn't enable one to author his own books. The web however, does enable one to put up his own webpage or blog (if you can figure it out.) I think this is what people are talking about here. It has to do with our place in the economics of the thing.