Introducing Nook, the most advanced ebook reader • Hacker News Board

Re: Introducing Nook, the most advanced ebook reader

#21

Post by mattmcknight » Wed, Oct 21, 2009, 4:46 AM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #4

The responsive color screen has a lot of potential. If one could have a "Cover Flow" style browsing mode, this would make the Nook a 10X better device for browsing reference material and other kinds of not-purely-linear reading. Others on HN have lamented the lack of "flippability" in other e-readers. This could be used to provide exactly that! (The other thing: will B&N allow it to happen?)

Do you mean having the nearby pages in your current book show at the bottom of the screen? That would be nice, since e-ink is a bit slow to refresh. I don't see much in point in the way it's pictured on the site though and in the video, shopping for books by flipping through book covers is highly inefficient! Overall, I lament the lack of a keyboard. Searching for books using the Kindle is probably better.

Re: Introducing Nook, the most advanced ebook reader

#22

Post by makmanalp » Wed, Oct 21, 2009, 6:43 AM UTC

compared to the kindle, pros: + native PDF support (how dumb are you, amazon?) + micro SD slot + ebook lending (probably DRM'd) + wifi + based on android cons: - amazon likely has a larger selection of books than BN. - no browser -> no free wikipedia, gmail. maybe hacking one on works? - no keyboard. on screen one maybe? This makes sense from the initial design perspective though, people don't often use keyboards while reading. - 10 days vs 14 days of power, which is not that big an issue.

I think the two separate screens idea is brilliant. I wonder if they'll release the source code for the software like amazon did. Though I still applaud the kindle for good effort, the Kindle 2 / DX should have been as good as this. This looks like a much more well thought out and complete product. They even have different covers and rechargeable batteries for it. Damnit, I was about to get the kindle with the newer reduced price (with international wireless) but now I have to wait and decide. If there is a browser and is usable, I'd go for it without thinking further.

Re: Introducing Nook, the most advanced ebook reader

#23

Post by sh1mmer » Wed, Oct 21, 2009, 7:35 AM UTC

makmanalp wrote: post #22

compared to the kindle, pros: + native PDF support (how dumb are you, amazon?) + micro SD slot + ebook lending (probably DRM'd) + wifi + based on android cons: - amazon likely has a larger selection of books than BN. - no browser -> no free wikipedia, gmail. maybe hacking one on works? - no keyboard. on screen one maybe? This makes sense from the initial design perspective though, people don't often use keyboards whi…

According to the comparison page on BN (http://www.barnesandnoble.com/nook/compare/)

BN have a larger selection of ebooks 1m+ titles and more free ebooks 500k+ than Amazon.

Main downside for me is I want something like the DX to read technical books on as well. BN aren't even suggesting they'll compete there and I haven't heard any rumours of Amazon reving the DX yet. :(

Re: Introducing Nook, the most advanced ebook reader

#24

Post by sh1mmer » Wed, Oct 21, 2009, 7:37 AM UTC

cppppp wrote: post #16

lanaer wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That seems to contradict the wording on B&N. “Browse eBooks, magazines and newspapers on AT&T's 3G Wireless Network or on Wi-Fi. And every Barnes & Noble has free Wi-Fi, so you can connect at lightning fast speeds.” Sounds like B&N is just marketing their Wi-Fi hotspots as a convenience, but it doesn’t need to be their hotspots; any Wi-Fi connection should do.

Yes they even sell this as an advantage over the Kindle - you can connect anywhere in the world that has wifi. It doesn't seem to do WEP/WPA so you are a bit limited to connect everywhere

If it's built on Android it would be surprising if it doesn't handle WEP/WPA

Re: Introducing Nook, the most advanced ebook reader

#25

Post by ez77 » Wed, Oct 21, 2009, 7:57 AM UTC

Do you know whether plain text and html files are supported? I'm thinking Project Gutenberg...

Re: Introducing Nook, the most advanced ebook reader

#26

Post by hiroaki » Wed, Oct 21, 2009, 8:24 AM UTC

ez77 wrote: post #25

Do you know whether plain text and html files are supported? I'm thinking Project Gutenberg...

Afaict, Nook has access to Google Books, which should have a good number of public domain ebooks including the ones on Project Gutenberg.

Re: Introducing Nook, the most advanced ebook reader

#27

Post by roundsquare » Wed, Oct 21, 2009, 10:18 AM UTC

nook retains important reading rituals like bookmarking, making notes, and highlighting passages.

Bookmarkings seems easy enough.

Even highlighting I can imagine an approach.

But note taking? How are they planning to do this? Notes in books are usually in the margins and have a line drawn to where the person is taking notes. I'm really curious to see how this works.

Edit: Spelling

Re: Introducing Nook, the most advanced ebook reader

#28

Post by mapleoin » Wed, Oct 21, 2009, 11:30 AM UTC

roundsquare wrote: post #27

nook retains important reading rituals like bookmarking, making notes, and highlighting passages. Bookmarkings seems easy enough. Even highlighting I can imagine an approach. But note taking? How are they planning to do this? Notes in books are usually in the margins and have a line drawn to where the person is taking notes. I'm really curious to see how this works. Edit: Spelling

with sony's prs600 which seems similar you have a stylus with which you can draw on top of the text.

Re: Introducing Nook, the most advanced ebook reader

#29

Post by jsz0 » Wed, Oct 21, 2009, 11:45 AM UTC

The color screen on the bottom looks ridiculous to me. What's its purpose? Only to show other e-books covers? It feels like they just wanted to make it look different than the Kindle.

Re: Introducing Nook, the most advanced ebook reader

#30

Post by swombat » Wed, Oct 21, 2009, 11:51 AM UTC

martingordon wrote: post #12

I bought a refurb Kindle 2 29 days ago and am a click away from returning it and pre-ordering a Nook. I haven't bought any books on the Kindle yet (I'm working through a copy of Atlas Shrugged I downloaded, a book I own and isn't available in Kindle format), but it struck me that if I had, those books would be completely useless on the new reader and not only that, I can't sell them or give them away. The publishers…

This makes the book publishers' dilemna much simpler than the music publishers'. 99.99% of people don't read more than 30 books a month - though people might sample more different books and be more willing to drop books they didn't like, on a flat fee.

So what they should do is offer a $30/m for 30 books a month subscription. I'd be perfectly willing to pay that for access to their entire library, with the ability to at most read through 30 books per month. Another way to do it would be per page, so that you can sample many different books... e.g. 10000 pages for $30/m (assuming about 300 pages per book on average).

I would buy that in a heartbeat. I'd still buy physical books, but only those I want to own. Meanwhile, whoever's pulled this thing together gets a solid yearly income of $360 from me - much more than they get from all but the heaviest readers today.