End of Sony consumer readers confirmed

[Salgueiros]

Originally Posted by HarryT

No, you misunderstand my question. You said that you thought that Sony devices were better than any other make. I was asking which other brands of reader you'd used as the basis for that comparison? I've owned Sony, Kindle, Bookeen, Onyx, Pocketbook, and probably others, too. With the exception of the Bookeen devices, which were extremely unreliable, I'd put them all on a par as far as reliability and build quality goes.

I used all you said plus the Kobo.

[Salgueiros]

..and Nook too. I thought you had included that on you post one but you didn't.

[Anthem]

Just saw the statement given by Sony to Good e-Reader today.

I'm not really surprised. This was a long time coming. But I do feel sort of sad about it. The Sony e-readers were the first ones that really caused me some serious coveting. I ended up getting Kobo readers first but did eventually get a Sony. It was awesome, but I never liked their store. It just didn't compete effectively with the alternatives. Felt good in the hand though.

These days I'm using the Kindle which I feel is superior to anything Sony ever really offered. But I still remain nostalgic for the Sonys.

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by AnotherCat

While probably hurried along by the other rationalisations going on in their empire, I suspect Sony have realised these things and those are the reasons for little recent development and exiting the to become increasingly niche E Ink reader market. It is something they are doing too late and that may be the only criticism of them. The market's writing was on the wall back when T1s were still on the shelves.

I don't think so. E-readers were always going to be a niche market simply because they only appeal to the 10-15% of people who read more than a couple of books a year.

What killed Sony were e-books readers with integrated bookstores; that this was a problem for Sony was obvious 5 years ago. Sony had the e-book market pretty much to itself for a couple of years, but despite Sony's first-mover advantage, Amazon quickly took 90% of the market because its reader made it easy to buy and read books. That this is the case is obvious from what happened to B&N - they took 30% of the market within the first year or year and a half of entering it. Again, because they had a reader integrated with a comprehensive bookstore.

Sony did a couple of smart things, like switching to e-pub and opening their own bookstore - but they still couldn't compete with actual bookstore companies. Particularly when those bookstore companies did not have to make much profit on their readers because they could rely on increased book sales. Sony was basically in the position of a razor company that didn't sell blades.
[/quote]

Last time I made mention of such things some E Ink fans got a little angry; perhaps such reactions are just another symptom of how niche the market is becoming.[/QUOTE]
The fact that people disagree with you isn't evidence that you are right.

[AnotherCat]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

I don't think so. E-readers were always going to be a niche market simply because they only appeal to the 10-15% of people who read more than a couple of books a year...

...The fact that people disagree with you isn't evidence that you are right...

You need to read my posts more diligently rather than just reacting from the hip.

I, in fact, said "...to become increasingly niche E Ink reader market." which to a diligent reader the "increasingly" makes it clear that I regarded it was niche in the first place.

With respect to the last point in the quote snip above I actually said "... perhaps such reactions are just another symptom..." the "perhaps" making it crystal clear to a diligent reader that I did not consider the reactions as being "evidence" but rather as being a potential point of view. However, your reaction reinforces my opinion that point of view is even more strongly perhaps correct.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by AlbertaCowboy

It's more becuase I'm a creature of habit, and changing from epub to mobi scares me ( :P ), as well as the fact that I have zero experience with Kindles. I'm relatively proficient with Kobo, having helped several co workers figure out the ins and outs of theirs, but no one I know has ever bought a Kindle.
Also, unless I'm mistaken, (which I likely am, not knowing about the newer Kindles) the Kindles have always had a lousy bookshelves or collections setup, which the Sony software excelled with. I'd rather not give up on my on device browsing via collections.
In all honesty, should I need to replace my 650 with another dedicated ereader, I'm sure I'll just find a T3 somewhere. They'll be kicking around in stores here in Canada for a while yet. I'm still seeing T1's here and there, so I'm not too too worried that they'll disappear overnight.

Kindles are dead simple to use. Some might say that's the problem.

Originally Posted by deddajay

[...] I've stuck with them since the 505 and would have continued to do so, even though I also have the Kindle PW2, which is nice, but has so many features I like on the Sony missing, in particular collections and the ability to display the cover of the book you are actually reading. I hate the Kindle's standby screen collection of pictures. [...]

Regarding collections, I have never had trouble with them. What it basically boils down to is managing them automatically via calibre, right? (Easy on the Kobo and Sony.) The collections themselves are just fine, but it can be a pain in the neck to manage hundreds of books into collections by hand on any device.

Fortunately, there is a lot of good stuff in the MobileRead Kindle Developers' Corner, like the Collections Manager Kindlet which can import a collections.json (created by a calibre plugin based on calibre metadata). Granted, it is more work than on the Kobo/Sony. On the other hand, I don't think Kobo/Sony can do nested collections (possible on pre-5.4.2 Kindle firmware).

And there is the screensavers hack, which does exactly what it sounds like. It has several modes, you can show shuffled pictures from the screensavers folder, or show the cover of the current book, or show the last stuff on the screen (confusing ). You can also toggle a personal info overlay.
NOTE: This requires that you don't have a Special Offers Kindle. There is nothing for circumventing something you paid less money in return for.

Point is, there's lots of things you can do with the Kindle beyond what Amazon put there.
For the really brave of heart, there is a terminal, notepad, IRC client, multiple browsers, flash, KOReader (improved PDF reader, EPUB reader), and other exotic stuff!

[4691mls]

My PRS-T1 is my first and only ereader. I haven't decided whether to get another Sony as a backup while I might still be able to find one. I do like the dictionaries and ability to get Overdrive library books directly on the reader. However, my PRS-T1 is only a couple years old so it will probably last a while longer, and by the time it needs to be replaced, maybe another manufacturer will come out with something new and exciting....... Decisions, decsions..........

[eschwartz]

That's another good point. You can get library books directly on the Kindle. (Assuming you have a US library.)

Much nicer than sideloading through ADE .

[Barty]

As the saying goes, bleep or get off the pot. Sony has barely bothered to compete in last few years. Even if they'd produced a top notch front lit reader, they would still have been a niche player in the niche ereader market and a minor player in the ebook market. They would've made many MR fans happy, which would be fine for a small business, but not a giant like Sony.

I never bought a sony reader, but they looked nice albeit a bit pricey (hey it's Sony). It's too bad, because we can always use more competitors for the kindle.

[AnotherCat]

@Barty, I agree.

I cannot really criticise Sony for getting into what has turned out to be a niche market inappropriate to a very large multinational, as they were selling eReaders around 4 years before tablets and smart phones appeared and then going on to be the threat those have become (even from Sony's own phones and tablets), but I perhaps could, if I was a shareholder, for perservering with eReaders for so long (and it is a general criticism by Sony shareholders that it has persevered too long down some other tracks too).

It always surprises me how some people react with anger and critical "advice" on how the business would have worked well with better management and marketing, better product development, etc. when a business decides to discontinue or sell some part of that business.

By way of example a few years back I was engaged by a privately owned holding company to recover one of its subsidiary companies which was unprofitable. We returned it to profitability and the options going forward were to keep the company or sell it; the services it provided were not a fit with their other businesses (which, among other things made it expensive to manage), so the decision was made to sell it as a going concern. It sold immediately and appropriately to a multinational that specialised in the type of business throughout the world.

So, the nub of this story is the anger and sense of exaggerated self entitlement from some customers over the sale was amazing, both myself and the private owners got many phone calls, some just plain abusive, and correspondence criticising the sale. I even took a call from the manager of a non-profit organisation to whom we always supplied all of the services they ever wanted from us free; if anything one would expect a thank you for those donated services, but instead I got a tirade of abuse for allowing the company to be sold.

The strange thing was that if we had been providing poor services the customers would have been phoning to say how glad they were that someone else was now going to better run the business. Abusing us for not continuing with the business ourselves we could only take as an indicator that we had been well liked.

I see the same sort of whining from some Sony users. From my own selfish point of view I too would have liked to see Sony continue with readers but recognise it would likely have be silly for them to do so regardless of how well that business was run.

[gmw]

Freedom of speech also means freedom to moan about things when they don't go my way.

I like my PRS-650 and I expect Sony to keep manufacturing e-readers so that every 5 years or so I can buy another one. If that means they have to run at a loss, well, that's their problem, not mine. My problem is the important one.

[Josieb1]

It's all very sad but at the end of the day Sony ereaders, however lovely, were too expensive for what they offered. I bought a RS 650 for around £200/250 I cantle remember the exact price, but then months later Amazon had the Kindle keyboard for £109, for basicly a similar device. That's when I switched to Kindle and I've never gone back to Sony. Whilst I now have a Kobo and a Nook the Kindle is still my main ereader.

Then refusing to provide a lighted screen, that was a death blow. Why would anyone pay as much for a T3 as they could get a Paperwhite or an Aura for. Yes there are people who prefer a non lighted ereader but I doubt they are the majority.

[meeera]

Originally Posted by frozennorth

Because they are too bright when reading in the dark. I find that harder on the eyes than a smart phone in night mode and dimmed. I wouldn't buy a sony front lit reader either.

Which frontlit readers have you tried? The Aura goes very, very low. I'm light-sensitive and nearsighted, and even I can handle reading it in blackness.

[imaredr]

I have bought every reader Sony came out with. I really like the style of the readers. The news doesn't surprise me, but it is still sad news for me.

[benham]

Still have my PRS 505 and downloaded every book I ever bought from Sony on it. I would need to replace the battery in it to use it extensively.I read most books on my Sony Experia Tablet Z anyway, but Kobo is a pretty poor substitute for Sony Reader Store.