[zelda_pinwheel]

• When buying/searching for eBooks do you search by format or by eReader?
  
  i search by title or author most of the time ; when i find a book i am interested i will search for the best format for me (i prefer epub). if it's not available in epub i search for a format i can easily convert.
  
• Do you know what format/s your eReader can read when searching or do you expect all eBooks to be read by your eReader?
  
  yes, i know what formats i can read natively (without conversion), and more importantly i know which formats i can easily convert, since (alas) most books are still not available in all formats, and since not all formats will give the same results.
  
• Before you bought your eReader did you know about software to convert a format to your eReaders format? If you didn't would you have liked to have been informed by the retailer?
  
  before i bought my *first* reader i didn't know anything at all about ebooks, nor about formats. but i very quickly found mobileread and learned a lot here, and conversion was one of the first things i learned. i don't know whether we can expect a retailer to advise about conversion ; they may not want to run the risk of confusing their customers (not all people who read ebooks are necessarily comfortable with computers), and if they are selling books with drm that would require explaining how to remove the drm first, which would rather defeat the purpose (drm is completely pointless, but i don't expect the retailer to broadcast that or undermine it further ). however katti cat made a good point about announcing geographic restrictions clearly, and definitely it's important to explain very clearly which formats are available, whether or not they have drm, and ideally which devices can read which formats, for inexperienced users.
  
  
• Before you became a member of this forum and bought your eReader did you know anyhting about eBooks/eReaders?
  nope ! practically nothing at all.
  
• What reasons made you chose your eReader? Was it format or device based"?
  one of my first criteria is format support. i won't buy a device which doesn't support epub format.