Modern eBooks use the e-ink technology. Because of the higher current draw of backlit screens internet tablets work like laptops and have a very limited power cycle… from 1 to 4 hours.

In comparison e-ink technology only uses power when it is changing page and current versions can do over 7000 page turns before they need charging. Big big difference.

There is a large format colour eReader though just being released through fujitsu. http://bit.ly/7035M. The issues with it are price and an 8 second page turn… but as the tech matures so will its issues.

At the moment e-Readers are primarily “novel” sized which is great for reading novels but would be too small for newspapers, magazines etc. In the past few months there has been A4 sized eReaders released including the Kindle DX which is aimed squarely at textbooks, newspapers and magazines. Amazon is even doing trials at some universities providing students with their all their textbooks in one simple eReader that would be about 1/5th of the size of just one textbook.

Novels only require black and white (actually it is greyscale) which is why they are the primary use so far but the last hurdle before mass takeup has just been overcome. In the last couple of weeks a colour e-ink reader has been released. This allows perfect representation of magazines, newspapers, comics, textbooks etc etc.

One of the huge features of the Kindle that made it so popular was its free wireless delivery. You could wake up every morning and your morning papers would be their waiting for you on your bedside table at only a fraction of the cost of a printed version. You dont even have to go out on a chilly winters morning and get them off the wet lawn. Wireless connections either through wifi or through mobile broadband are slowly becoming the norm.

eReaders with e-ink technology will be the future but int he case of novels and newspapers there is only one hurdle still to overcome and thats greed. You would think that they would have learnt from the lessons that the music industry got belt into them and the movie studios are currently fighting. Trying to hold onto old income streams in a digital environment is not going to work. But as the music industry has found out, if you embrace technology and price accordingly there is still massive amounts still to be made and business can continue as normal. Hollywood are slowly getting this belted into them as they see movie piracy running rampant. If they price digital downloads correctly and keep quality high then the masses would be prepared to pay for that rather than downloading an illegal and sometimes average quality versions.

Amazon at the moment are dramatically subsidising digital versions of books to Kindle owners. Kindle versions of the latest best sellers can be had for under half the printed price. Book publishers are up in arms over the tactic claiming that Amazon are trying to build up market share of the digital future so they can hold the industry to ransom and demand lower prices. These publishers claim that it only costs $3 or $4 to print a book and therefore that is the only discount they are prepared to give when selling ebooks. This means that in other eBook formats prices are much closer to the print variant and is why there is an ever increasing trade in pirated versions yet you cannot find a pirated Kindle copies anywhere and they are the number one eReader in the world, even though they are only sold in the US.

For my mind, Amazon are the ones who have got it right. They understand what it is going to take for digital delivery to work and they are just doing it inspite of the publishing industry who they are going to take kicking and screaming into the future. what the publishers dont understand is that if they dont embrace the situation authors might just go direct to Amazon and bypass publishers all together. Amazon could create print versions and digital versions for sale directly.

But what about newspapers? At the moment digital newspapers are available at various different price levels around the world ranging from full price to about half price. Newspapers on the Kindle are available at around half the newsstand price which is probably quite fair considering they are sans advertisements. For a newspaper if you consider the price covers printing and distribution and advertising revenues cover the other costs and profits it should stand to reason that if newspapers could deliver full replicas of the print version with all ads in place then the price should be free. In fact, a newspaper could offer two versions, one with ads for free, or one without for a subsciption price.

To do this large colour e-reader technology needs to become the norm which is still going to be a while off. Another hurdle I believe is that traditional circulation counts are only for print versions so for newspapers to justify revenues to advertisers the official circulation figures will need to include digital versions as well.

For my mind reading newspapers and magazines on computers screens, pda’s, phones blackberry’s will never take off. Either they are not portable or the screens are way too small. E-readers on that hand could hold all your magazine subscripitions, your newspaper subscriptions and thousands of novels in something portable yet with a big enough screen to still read large format items comfortably.

We are still a little way off from this scenario but its coming. Check this article out :- http://bit.ly/XuzT0

Whats interesting about the article is that the research company quoted admits they got the whole issue wrong in an earlier report that stated the Kindle would only attract a small number of book-loving early adopters. Each release now sells out in a matter of hours.

eReaders are going to explode as more features are added. Since I imported ours for my partners birthday present several people have fallen in love with the concept and ordered their own.

Of course one of the real indicators that ebooks will be a success is Google has entered the market and is positioning itself to take on Amazon.

http://bit.ly/kZd20 and http://bit.ly/Y5keE

Publishing companies and Newspapers can either get on board, or get trampled in the rush. Their choice.

I will start with where Peter Ricci ends, it is so nice to sit with a cappuccino and read the paper on a Sunday morning but that is about the only time that most people have time to do this. It is much more convenient to check the latest news on the internet on the office computer or on the Blackberry, or if like me you are a real estate agent making use of time while you are waiting for clients to turn up at a property inspection. I totally agree with Peter though, newspapers are trying to hold back on the unique and interesting articles, and in particular investigative journalism. It is a much poorer society when the public doesn

To look at the future of print, one of the greatest examples of how print has had to adapt to change over the past few years can been seen via the huge increase in On-Demand printing of books.

People can get a one-off or out-of-print book individually printed. There’s no need for warehouses of books kept in storage, etc.

But, because people don’t want to wait for Amazon, etc to post out the On-Demand books, one of the book suppliers has decided to instal a printing press within their store. They are calling it an ATM for books. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104644575

This got me thinking. I wonder if On-Demand printing could become the future of newspapers? Potentially, it could be set up like an RSS feed but in print. You could select the topics & journalists that you are interested in reading.

The newsagent could become an ATM for newspapers & print off your very own customised newspaper with only the news that you are interested in reading.

The paper boy would blow his whistle while wheeling around a little ink-jet printer. hehehe

I know this sounds far fetched at the moment, but a couple of years ago who’d have thought that a book store would have it’s own in-store printing press?