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Hi,
I live in Canada, So Yes, it is pretty much down to those 2 or using an Apple iPhone / iPod Touch.
The advantages of Kindle are generally lower prices (but not by much anymore) but some of the ebooks will be azw1 or topaz books that can only be read by Kindle. Kindle can read Mobipocket books but it is hard to navigate sometimes to other stores and use them.
The advantages of the Sony are that they support epub books which are an open standard (unlike Mobi or AZW - Kindle books). That said, DRM exists for epub too (but it can be removed). The new sony Store prices are much better, plus you can download classics and other books from feedbooks.net. manybooks.net, booksonboard.com and many other bookstores (I bought the new Bernard Cornwell book "The Burning Land " from Waterstones in the UK since it was not yet available in the US (and therefore not in any of the ebook stores) even though the book was available in print form in Canada. I can even buy from EReader.com and because of python scripts and Calibre, I can convert those books to epub and read them on my Sony PRS-600. So the range of bookstores to buy from is greater (IMHO) for the Sony ereader than the Kindle.
In addition, KOBO (the new version of ShortCovers) is supported by Canada's own Indigo and it supports EPUB versions as well (and they support Sony as well).
As for the iPod Touch / Kindle, there is the Kobo app (for epub), Stanza app (for eReader), Kindle app (now available in canada for Kindle azw files), and many others.
So it would work as well but it's screen is just too small for my eyes now (too much reading!).
I don't think you could go far wrong with either. The only one to stay away from is Barnes and Noble's Nook since the damn B&N store will not sell anything to anyone not in the US (like the Kindle was previously).
I chose the Sony PRS-600 myself since Kindle in Canada was not an option yet, and I wanted to support the epub open standard format.
Hope something here helps,
KevinH
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