Quote:
Originally Posted by Sonist
Actually, this is where much of your argument against PDF is grounded.
The current ereader hardware is at the horse carriage stage. Beyond 6", screens are still prohibitively expensive for mass adoption. There is no color, and the quality of the experience is still fairly marginal.
Screen sizes will increase and prices will drop, as the technology improves. Due to both manufacturing and market efficiencies, there will also be size standardization, just like there is for computer monitors, and for TV screens.
Frankly, I don't see ereaders becoming mainstream, until there is full color and larger screens, combined with affordability. More people read magazines and other periodicals, than books. When the technology supports those, then ereaders will be mainstream.
And magazines do not lend themselves well to reflowing.
What most "reflowers" are talking about, is not ebooks, it's simply documents, as others have pointed out. Yes, you can get the content, but it's like reading a manuscript. It's a different experience, and it's not new -- it's just not all that appealing to most.
And to boot, PDFs already reflow. And within a year, I would imagine Adobe will make such ability even more robust, to apease those who insist on reading on their watch.
Speaking of small screens: 3"-5" is not the market. It may appeal to more now because of price, but so did 13" TVs at one point. But people seem to gravitate to certain sizes - most don't buy printed "pocket" editions, even though these have been available since the dawn of publishing.
Yes, you read something on the iPhone for a few minutes, but most people would not enjoy reading on it for extended periods. Just like you can watch the fixed-format, widescreen LOTR on an iPhone, but most prefer to see it in the theater, or on a much larger screen.
Anyway, me thinks, larger screens will make these arguments pointless.
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I think alot of us dont think that large screen will win out like you and ahi seem to.
I do think we will see more of them then today as the cost goes down but there is something to be said about protablty.
people will still buy small devices even when the price goes down,
two cases in point.
protable tv people still buy them even now that big screens are cheep.
apple air. apple seem to think there is a market for high cost protable computers.
out of what we have now I think epub is better for ebooks.
what we need thou is a format that can do both types of formats in the same file.
with non fixed with file being reltive ez to set up and the fixed with taking about as much work as pdf does today.
that way you can buy a book and have the best of both worlds. cost to make would go up a bit(no to much I think).