Sony’s Daily Edition e-book reader is Sony’s first 3G connected reader. It connects via AT&T’s cellular network — but no mention of WiFi connectivity. The Daily Edition has a seven-inch touch widescreen display that you can rotate to view books in landscape. It will be available in December for $399. The 3G connection will be free (like the Kindle), but the wireless access only gets you access to Sony’s book store.
Sony now has a family of three readers; The Reader Pocket Edition ($199) with a 5″ display, The Reader Touch Edition ($299) with a 6″ touch screen and the newly announced The Daily Edition ($399) with a 7″ screen and 3G connectivity.
In addition to the Sony eBook Store, consumers will be able to buy EPUB standard format books from Powell’s Books and more than 200 other bookstores.
All three models feature Sony’s eBook Library software 3.0, which now includes support for Adobe PDF (with reflow capability), EPUB, Microsoft Word, BBeB files, or other text file formats on the Reader.
Working with OverDrive (www.overdrive.com), Sony’s Library Finder application will now offer visitors to the eBook Store by Sony easy access to their local library’s collection of eBooks. Thousands of libraries in the OverDrive network offer eBooks optimized for the Sony Reader, and visitors can now find these libraries by typing their zip code into the Library Finder.
Here’s Gizmodo’s cheat sheet of the current e-book contenders:
Sony’s toughest competitor is the Amazon’s Kindle 2 ($299) and Amazon’s 9.7″ DX ($489). The upcoming Plastic Logic eReader will feature the largest screen in the industry, at a whopping 8.5 x 11 inches. Plastic Logic says their entry into the market will begin in the second half of 2009 with pilots and trials with key partners.
They may soon be joined by Asustek and MSI, reports Digitimes. Asustek Computer, under its Eee brand, could launch their e-book reader by the end of 2009 at the earliest, according to company president Jerry Shen. Meanwhile, Micro-Star International (MSI) is also evaluating the e-book reader market.
The requirements for entering the e-book reader market are even lower than for netbooks, but the key to success lies in establishing a content delivery platform. Currently, demand for e-book readers is mainly concentrated in North America and Europe, with penetration in Asia markets low due to differences in reading habits.
The Open Book Alliance — or “Sour Grapes Alliance,” as Google likes to call it — formally launched Wednesday afternoon, debuting a new Web site, as well as the manifesto with which it is challenging Google’s settlement with authors and publishers.
“The mass digitization of books promises to bring tremendous value to consumers, libraries, scholars, and students,” the Alliance says in its mission statement. The Open Book Alliance will counter Google, the Association of American Publishers and the Authors’ Guild’s scheme to monopolize the access, distribution and pricing of the largest digital database of books in the world.
Related Dailywireless articles include; New Sony E-Readers , Barnes & Noble Launches eBookstore, Kindle DX: $489, Shootout: Google Vrs Kindle, Sony Reader: 500,000 Free Books, Kindle’s Text to Speech Under Fire, Kindle 2: Slimmer, Smarter, Universal Access to All Human Knowledge – at 100Mbps – Free.
