Quote:
Originally Posted by barryem
I'm wondering about the future of ereaders. The ereader blogs have all but shut down and these forums don't seem nearly as active as they used to be. Ereaders have matured so that there aren't any very interesting changes anymore. Compare the change from the Voyage to the Oasis, the biggest change in a few years, to the change from the Kindle 4 to the Paperwhite, a huge change by comparison.
There just doesn't seem to be much interest in the technology as technology anymore. Of course the point of it is reading books and that doesn't seem to be waning so maybe none of this matters.
Barry
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Quite a few people just read on their smartphones or tablets. They don't seem to care about LCD vs LED vs eInk. Their phones work just fine, especially since the trend is toward larger phones these days.
Interest in eInk devices is definitely waning. Using Black Friday as a gauge for popularity, eInk took a big hit last year. Outside of Amazon, Kobo, and Nook, only a couple of retailers had any ereaders on sale and it was usually a 3rd Gen Paperwhite.
In the past, ereaders were quite popular and most stores that sold handheld devices (phones, tablets, etc), also had multiple ereaders on sale. Not so anymore. This Black Friday, I don't expect to see any 3rd party retailers selling ereaders. If you want one, go to the source.
Since I prefer audiobooks, I'm quite happy with the choices I have available these days - cheap Android no-contract phones and cheap Echo Dots. For reading, I'm satisfied using the cheapest Kindle Amazon has available. Currently, I'm using a 7th Gen basic Kindle from 2014.
For me, the future of books looks quite bright
