Thanks everyone for all the enthusiastic and helpful replies to this post. It started with me being not sure if I should take the ebook plunge or not and somewhere in the middle of it I bought the Iliad. Harry was a big help and so was rlauzon and Vincent. We all have different requirements from our reading and that will lead I suppose to some heated exchanges. My main concern was, and still is to some extent, that I wont get a good immersive reading experience from an e reader. We will see.
Books are very expensive in South Africa and disposable income much lower than in the first world when measured in $ terms in which books are ultimately priced. I see lots of books available at what to me seem to be reasonable prices. variety online is also better than what is available locally. Amazon is not fast to our end of the world and we must go through a customs process and pay duties. So much for 'friction'. I cannot deny that a major push to purchase a reader is outside those issues and has more to do with curiosity and the desire to own a new cool thing. The heated exchanges also made me feel left out
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Thank you again everyone for your time and advice