Sony Reader named Travel + Leisure's "Best Travel Gadget" in their 2007 Design Awards

[NatCh]

It seems that Travel + Leisure have given their 2007 Design Award for Best Travel Gadget to the Sony Reader.

They had this to say about it:

The astonishing, high-resolution Sony Reader can store a library's worth of books and documents in a device the size of a paperback, and is perfectly legible in bright daylight.

"The Sony Reader is going to save a lot of trees; it might even save the world, actually." —Yves Béhar

Also of potential interest to Reader ... um, readers (and iLiadites too!), is the runner up in the same category: The Solio solar charger.

I haven't seen that particular charger before, but it looks nice and robust. It's Tech Specs would seem to suggest that it can even be used to charge the Reader! We were looking for something like this a while ago, so this is a particularly welcome bonus tidbit.

[Alexander Turcic]

"The Sony Reader is going to save a lot of trees; it might even save the world, actually." —Yves Béhar

This might be true for the Sony Reader if you use it to read your book. What they forget is the resources you need to manufacture E Ink devices, the resources you need to go online and download the e-books, etc. The Institute for Future Studies and Technology Assessment (IZT) in Berlin, Germany, found that "electronic paper has a much greater environmental impact than conventional newspapers in the business models that companies and experts have been using up to now."

You can download the two German studies from here:

• E-Paper - Erste Abschätzung der Umweltauswirkungen
• Dematerialisierung durch E-Paper?

[RWood]

That is true if the resources were used only for newspaper reading. When you factor the other uses that the equipment is put to, the impact of the electronic newspaper is far less.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

This is actually great news for a thread on another site (don't be jealous! They mean nothing to me!) that I'm using to promote e-books. Anytime you have kudos from a mainstream source, it helps to convince the less timid of average readers out there to try it!

[NatCh]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

(don't be jealous! They mean nothing to me!)

Uh, huh.

If they mean nothing to you, why didn't you mention MobileRead in your post about "recommendations on particular e-books or helpful/related sites"? I feel like we don't even know you any more.

[Bob Russell]

Just in case Nathan's comedic scarcasm isn't obvious to all, let me just point it out. None of us are worried about "competing" sites because the competition is extremely friendly and cooperative. We all have our niche and jointly serve the community to the best of our abilities.

But still, if you left us, we would be heartbroken! ;-)

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

(Something tells me flowers aren't gonna get me out of this one...)

[NatCh]

Flowers wilt, chocolate really talks!

And just for the record, as Bob said, that last post was meant in jest.


Now ... about that chocolate ....

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

I told... the other site... about you. Forgive me...

I'm fixing pork chops for dinner... your favorite!

[NatCh]

Nah, my favorite would be sirloin, maybe hamsteak ... or my wife's baked ravioli, mmmmm.

You're making me hungry and I just got back from lunch!

[Bob Russell]

.... and I'm craving chocolates now!

[NatCh]

Good timing for it, all the leftover Valentine chocolates just went on sale!