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Originally Posted by leebase
I'd say it's because Amazon has the US market locked up and doesn't allow other eInk devices to work with it's content. I think the ebook/book store tie up makes a lot of sense to Americans. So Amazon has it's kindle line, B&N came out with it's Nook, and Borders teamed up with...was it Kobo?
Anyhow, there just isn't a demand for a "buy a device from company A, shop around to various sources B,C,D FOR your content" in light of the excellent/subsidized pricing that Amazon launched with it's Kindle and ebooks.
Unfortunately, the book stores did not do nearly as good a job as Amazon.
So to launch an ebook reader is to also launch an ebook store that has to be able to compete with Amazon who willingly takes a loss on every popular book it sells. Even Apple wouldn't touch the ebook market without the business model of Amazon being changed. And yeah, that turned out to be illegal.
So, there you have it. It's tough to foster new entrants into a market owned by a monopoly with the funds to use the product you hope to make money on as a loss leader for their other businesses.
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I agree with that. If the other stores had got together like Tolino in Germany, they could have offered an alternative.
But I'm not sure that explains why we are not seeing store-independent e-readers like Boyue and Onyx entering the US market, which include larger screens. There is clearly a demand for large e-ink readers that can be doubled as a monitor or a pdf-reader. Also what about e-ink monitors being developed like the Dasung?