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Originally Posted by airlik
It's remarkable to me how many people suggest that text search is a sorely lacking feature (including, recently, the Boston Globe reviewer), and yet each time it comes up Sony always says it wasn't something that made their priority list...???
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I think Sony was viewing the device as I do - a tool for reading fiction. Certainly their Connect store offerings and marketing seems to indicate that. How often do you wish for a tool to search fiction?
Now, a good reader for reference work is definitely a big niche waiting to be filled - there are all the college students, academic types, businesses, and programmers who would love such a device. That device would have a few key features that the Reader lacks: a large screen (8.5x11, ideally), indexes, page-selecting, searching, annotation, and others.
But think of the features of a device for reading fiction, and I think you'll come up with the Reader's feature list, basically. Some of the features of the two devices even conflict - a large screen is great for reference works but makes the device less portable than a paperback.
So maybe the tech reviewers really want a reference reader. So do I, for that matter. But the PRS isn't a reference reader, it's a fiction reader, and should be judged on those qualifications.
Here's a Penny Arcade comic along a similar vein, just for fun ;-)