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It's only natural this discussion has taken off into a 16x9 VS 4x3 debate.
People have extreme preferences on this subject. The web is loaded with debates about this subject. There's even a few forums focused on it (The official 16:9 screen protest thread, etc.) Facebook groups have formed around it.
This is nothing new... goes back centuries. German physics professor Georg Christoph Lichtenberg wrote about it back in 1786, and he stated it went back centuries before his time.
Film studios, electronics companies, tv stations, publishing companies, camera manufacturers, and many more have spent tons of money researching... sometimes churning out a product which might have sold better if it had made a couple changes to view-ability.
If you study the aspect ratio of various products, paper as well as electronic or film, you will see a pattern unfold. This is not a mistake from the product's manufacturer.
That said, I will come to the defense of the Xoom...
Even though it is designed as an overall good, effective media device with an emphasis on gaming and video taking preference over book-reading, the wide 16x9 screen does offer one superb e-book advantage... the wide screen makes it great to have two book pages open at once! Side-by-side pages are where the wide ratio really shines! Perhaps Motorola also took this into account in their screen-size decision.
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