[TadW]

Ok, let's face the bitter truth. In respect to hardware design, Sony did a much better job with the Reader (even with the first incarnation) than Amazon did with the Kindle. Of course who'd be really surprised given that Sony has been into the gadget business for how many years? Amazon, on the other hand, we know better as a service provider.

So... what do you think about the idea of Amazon licensing their Kindle service and software to other companies, including Sony? Imagine how many new e-readers would pop up, if (especially smaller) companies wouldn't have to worry about building e-book stores. And Amazon could be happy because even more people would purchase e-books from their store, no matter whether they own the Kindle or not.