Hi folks! I found this forum a couple of weeks ago (Google directed me to the fabulous post
iPhone 101: iPhone+Stanza+Calibre (the almost perfect solution)), although I have been reading ebooks for over a decade now. I started back with my US Robotics PalmPilot when somebody on usenet mentioned that Fictionwise was giving away free short stories and Baen was giving away an entire book (!). I thought I would never actually read them -- how could a tiny screen possibly compare the the entire aesthetic experience of a book?
(The texture of the paper! The scent of the binding!) But hey, free stuff, right? So I downloaded them and ignored them until the day I finished my paperback while sitting in my doctor's waiting room. By the time I finished reading that first short story, I had forgotten all that "tactile experience" nonsense. I could cart around a dozen books in something a lot smaller than a paperback!? WHOOOO yeah!
Flash forward to a couple of months ago, when my poor Palm TX was dying. I somehow seem to have bought around 1500 ebooks in the last 12 years (EEP!), so my major factor in choosing a PDA replacement was being able to migrate all my books. My thanks to this forum for helping make this a smooth and nearly painless upgrade. I look forward to being a member here.