5 Reasons You Don't Need an E-Book Reader - Debunked

[julieandrews]

Firstly, who calls it an 'e-book reader'? They're e-readers. Thanks.

Anyway, this article appeared on PC World entitled 5 Reasons You Don't Need an E-Book ReaderIt's been interesting to watch the debate rage. E-books versus Print books. Most interesting, I find, are the people defending print books. By saying they'll always be around, they're

Comments

[tomomi]

Now that I have an eReader I feel I can have more of an opinion on it. Not that I didn't before.

Most eBooks in their present incarnation are ephemeral -- full of DRM and tied to specific platforms. When the platform dies, I may not be able to read them anymore.

There's still just something about an eReader that I don't... like. First off, let me state that I love to read newspapers and magazine articles and blogs on my laptop. Books, no way. Talk about headache inducing. The e-ink screen is way better than an LCD for reading. But it just doesn't feel right. I still don't like the inherent delay in the page turning. It disturbs my eyes. Maybe I'll notice it less as I use the reader more. We'll see.

But until the publishers are willing to acknowledge that a copy of a book in a crippled format is worth less than a paper copy you can resell or save for decades... ebooks will never be real competition for -my- money.

However, all of those reasons in the PC mag article are stupid. There are tons of devices that are mostly just for one thing. All these arguments could have been used against the NES or PSX in favor of a PC, and I'm willing to bet most of these dudes owned both.