Kobo revs up its line of e-readers, unveils Kobo Arc 10 HD tablet

[Ripplinger]

I think the finish will actually have more glare than the current readers, but less than typical tablets or phones. From the mashable.com review, it refers to "while the matte casing is sleek and feels nice to the touch". And a lot of Kobo info refers to "low glare" screen.

At least it sounds they got rid of the rough texture of the glass that's on the Kobo Glo, which I still can't get used to.

[soulfuldog]

That doesn't sound too good. If it has a any kind of glare, that will be a backward step though, won't it?

[Ripplinger]

Definitely to me, yes. Nothing about the new Aura is tempting to me over the current Glo.

[e-leigh]

Originally Posted by JD Gumby

Kobo ereaders cannot process the .acsm files to download books from libraries.

Thanks. I had assumed that wifi readers would have that capability, since the Sony lets me download from virtually any website, including the library, which is how I do most of my reading.

Oh, well. That's a deal breaker for me. Guess I'll go back to sniffling over Sony's decision not to make a front-lit reader....

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by e-leigh

Thanks. I had assumed that wifi readers would have that capability, since the Sony lets me download from virtually any website, including the library, which is how I do most of my reading.

Oh, well. That's a deal breaker for me. Guess I'll go back to sniffling over Sony's decision not to make a front-lit reader....

It won't help you as you are interested in library book, but, the Kobo devices you can download DRM free books with no problems.

[Lynx-lynx]

Why oh why Kobo have you diffused the workload of your staff by putting out so many darn ereaders et al at once .... sheesh

Concentrate on a few quality products Kobo, that is - quality hardware (firmware) and software.

There's no prizes for having so many choices of the same/similar product on the market that the ordinary ebook consumer can't really understand the differences and therefore choice they make.

Sure - someone who understands all the gumph in the specs may be able to work it out (after they've spreadsheeted it) but not the ordinary Joanna and Jo Blogs.

[taming]

Originally Posted by Lynx-lynx

Why oh why Kobo have you diffused the workload of your staff by putting out so many darn ereaders et al at once .... sheesh (

It remains to be seen how different the actual FW is from one device to another.

[taming]

Originally Posted by Lynx-lynx

Why oh why Kobo have you diffused the workload of your staff by putting out so many darn ereaders et al at once .... sheesh (

It remains to be seen how different the actual FW is from one device to another. I know, for example, that Pocket, which was recently announced in conjunction with the new devices is supposed to be available on them all.

http://getpocket.com/blog/

Pocket will be available on Kobo e-readers starting Sept. 13 as part of Kobo’s enhanced Reading Life platform, in the Articles from Pocket section on the Kobo 6” Aura and on all previous e-readers with their over-the-air software update.

Pocket will also soon be available on the Kobo Arc 10HD, Kobo Arc 7 and 7HD tablets.

My question will be if they make the Sept 13 release date across all devices.

[Man Eating Duck]

Originally Posted by taming

It remains to be seen how different the actual FW is from one device to another. I know, for example, that Pocket, which was recently announced in conjunction with the new devices is supposed to be available on them all.

What amazes me is that an (admittedly very clever) guy with a hex-editor can fix long-standing bugs and add basic functionality that should've been in the FW from the start. That indicates that Kobo really don't care about listening to feedback from their customers. Neither do Sony, of course, but their FW is very solid as-is. I understand that Kobo are no longer present (at least not visibly) on these forums either.

That, along with the fact that they seem hell-bent on foisting their social gamification of reading on customers with no vendor-provided opt-out, makes me a bit wary of comitting to one of their devices. That said, I'll probably buy the new Aura anyway, as the HW seems very nice

[robko]

Originally Posted by Man Eating Duck

That, along with the fact that they seem hell-bent on foisting their social gamification of reading on customers with no vendor-provided opt-out, makes me a bit wary of comitting to one of their devices.

What part of "their social gamification" can you not opt out of without a hack?

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Man Eating Duck

What amazes me is that an (admittedly very clever) guy with a hex-editor can fix long-standing bugs and add basic functionality that should've been in the FW from the start. That indicates that Kobo really don't care about listening to feedback from their customers. Neither do Sony, of course, but their FW is very solid as-is. I understand that Kobo are no longer present (at least not visibly) on these forums either.

Sorry, that isn't what he is doing. What he is doing is hacking at the settings that Kobo has hard-coded into the reader application. Effectively, what he is doing is changing from one set of hard-coded values, to another. If Kobo were to make the same changes, then there would be an equal number of complaint about loss of page heading, footings or whatever. What is really desired is options built into the reader application to turn these things on and off. Adding those is not as easy as it might seem.

The fix for the long-paragraph bug is something else. It solves that problem, but it apparently breaks the widows/orphans handling. I assume the fix he has implemented is to replace a page feed character with a non-display character that doesn't cause a page feed. While it solves the problem for most people, it isn't a real fix. It definitely isn't something that should be put into the applications code base.

[anacreon]

Originally Posted by Man Eating Duck

they seem hell-bent on foisting their social gamification of reading on customers with no vendor-provided opt-out, makes me a bit wary of comitting to one of their devices.)

I got the impression from the video that it is an opt-in and not opt-out (you have to click on the new pic on the bottom line to have the information and the underlined words).

[Man Eating Duck]

Originally Posted by robko

What part of "their social gamification" can you not opt out of without a hack?

I might be misinformed, I don't (yet) have a Kobo reader. If that's the case I'm sorry. That information came from a review I read a while ago which claimed that you couldn't (it was the only part they strongly disliked about the Glo, so it stuck in my mind). Since I'm comfortable with technical stuff I will use the sqlite no-register hack, nuke the gamification and Google Analytics stuff from orbit (hosts), and use some of the modifications provided by Mr. Metazoa.

All that should be provided from the factory as options, however. I pay Kobo cash, I shouldn't have to provide them with info about my personal reading habits as well, nor use an executable from a Russian hacker (no disrespect to Metazoa, but that's what it is) to set sensible defaults. Also, it would be relatively simple for Kobo to obfuscate or even encrypt their firmware to the point where hacking/sideloading FW is impossible. Since the mentioned info is valuable to them the opt-out can possibly be removed in a future FW. So, the important thing is whether Kobo have a customer-friendly approach to how they develop their FW. From what I've read on the forums it seems they don't.

And it seems like I'll still buy it

[taming]

I think it is helpful when people say negative things about a brand of device for the person also to disclose it when they have no personal experience with them. That being said, I have always thought that it was pretty great that Kobo has NOT obfuscated or encrypted their firmware thus allowing hacking.

Yesterday I took a call at work from someone who was angry that our website (which I maintain) did not have anything about October programs on it. When we spoke for a bit, she told me that she had looked at it about a month or so ago, and when she did not see what she was after, she decided not to "waste her time looking at that useless website."

The Internet has a long memory. I always look at the date a comment or review was written before deciding whether it is likely to be valid. And of course, I try to figure out how likely the source is to be accurate and objective, though that is not always easy to do.

[Man Eating Duck]

Originally Posted by davidfor

What is really desired is options built into the reader application to turn these things on and off. Adding those is not as easy as it might seem.

Sure, but it is still something that should be done by a customer-oriented hardware maker as long as it is of importance to users. If this is very hard to do, it seems that Kobo should have designed those parts of their UI to be more flexible (the hacks themselves modify css, it appears, so adding options to modify those values shouldn't be impossible), but that should be of no concern for the users.

Originally Posted by davidfor

The fix for the long-paragraph bug is something else. It solves that problem, but it apparently breaks the widows/orphans handling. I assume the fix he has implemented is to replace a page feed character with a non-display character that doesn't cause a page feed. While it solves the problem for most people, it isn't a real fix. It definitely isn't something that should be put into the applications code base.

Yes, that sounds like a hack-ish workaround all right

Still, same thing goes. This appears to be a serious bug in their display engine, and should be fixed as such. As a (probable) customer I don't really care about the difficulty of fixing the bug, but I find it hard to believe that it can't be done. What also worries me as a potential customer is that they haven't actually fixed it by now.