Computers
Elgan: 7 reasons why e-book readers make lousy gifts this year
(COMPUTER WORLD) - Two years ago, the best holiday gift was an Amazon Kindle — if you could get your hands on one. They were hot, new and sold out hours after going on sale. Last year, the Kindle made an awesome gift as well.
This year, all the e-book readers on the market, including the new Kindles, are better devices than last year’s Kindles. (Amazon announced this week that it has improved battery life by 85 percent, and has added a native PDF reader. These improvements are software-based, so most older readers will get them automatically over the wireless network.)
And there has never been more choice in e-readers. In addition to the Amazon Kindle, you could buy a Sony Reader, Barnes & Noble Nook, Hanvon N series, Bookeen Cybook Opus, Elonex eBook, Endless Ideas BeBook, Interead COOL-ER, Samsung Papyrus, Foxit Software eSlick, iRex Digital Reader, Jinke Hanlin or others.
The e-book market has never been better. But that doesn’t mean you should buy one as a gift. Here’s why e-book readers make lousy gifts this year:
1. We’re on the brink of radical change in how people read e-books
The elephant in the e-book living room is the rumored Apple Tablet. I believe the device will ship by summer. It will probably succeed wildly, and hammer both the e-book and netbook markets.
Copycat devices will also flood the market. What that means is that any old-and-busted e-book reader you give this year will seem horribly old and hideously busted when the new smartbook-style tablets (tablets that run cell phone, rather than desktop,
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They might seem old in the future but they do pretty well now. It’s a bit like the old mobile phones, I was completely happy with my Nokia 3210 and I now have an iPhone.