07:00 AM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Week in Review

Here are the highlights from the past seven days of MobileRead:

E-books - News

• Best seller lists punish e-books
• Electronic Paper: Where do we go from here?

E-book Devices - Sony Portable Reader

• Sony eBook Library download link! (for PRS-500 users)

E-book Devices - Amazon Kindle

• Amazon Whispernet -- Trademark Information Discovered!

E-book Devices - Future E-Book Devices

• Ricavision Home E-Reader to launch in November?

05:11 AM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book General | News

Details are a bit hazy on this one, but there is a remote possibility that Ricavision is going to launch their "Home E-Reader" e-book device next month. Well, the only tidbit of information we got is a notice on Ricavision's homepage, indicating the launch of their new website, along "with new SideShow products", on the first week of November.

Since you probably won't fit all your memories on this device (right?): the Home E-Reader is equipped with an E Ink display and uses Windows SideShow to wirelessly connect to a PC running Windows Vista. For more, check out this discussion thread and this older brochure (PDF).

Thanks to eagle-eyed MobileReader Jason for the tip!

09:54 AM by jasonkchapman in E-Book General | News

The Future of Things has a good summary of the past, present, and future of electronic paper displays.

Much of it comes under the heading of "been there, talked about that" for MobileReaders, but it's great to have it all in one place. It also includes an interview with Nick Sheridan, inventor of the Gyricon e-paper, about the early developments at Xerox PARC.

09:32 AM by TadW in E-Book Readers | Sony Reader

eBook Library is the replacement software of the Sony Connect, and it is currently being shipped with the new Reader PRS-505. Sony promised that it would also be available for download for PRS-500 users soon, but so far no luck.

Well, until now.

Through some ingenious detective work I discovered the direct download URL of the setup program:

http://download.sony.com/prs/ebookli...0Installer.exe

No idea what's new, but I hope you can enjoy it.

11:52 PM by NatCh in E-Book Readers | Amazon Kindle

First off, a mea culpa is in order, I was trying to split off some posts into their own thread so that they could have the front page exposure they deserve, and managed to delete them instead.

So, I'm left with reproducing them as best I can from the cached pages in my browser (thank the powers that be for browser caches!)

This was originally posted by Nate the great, who is quickly living up to his moniker!

-- NatCh

Warning: the trademark queries won't work. Sorry
So I am a little bored, and have nothing better to do. I did a trademark search on "Whispernet" and "Kindle". I was inspired to do this by the manual.

Whispernet was trademarked back in May 2007. The process was begun, at least. There are actually seven entries for Whispernet. All may apply to the Amazon Kindle.I don't know. Six were filed for a guy named Mark Cheikhali of New Jersey - all on 22 May 2007. The other one was filed on 23 May by the corporation that holds the trademark to "Kindle". Does he work for them or did he beat them to the punch? I'm not telling.
http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield...h=Submit+Query
description of second from the top:

Wireless broadband communication services; text and numeric wireless digital messaging services; communication via wireless ebook reader
Kindle was trademarked in May 2006.

http://tarr.uspto.gov/servlet/tarr?r...entry=78874830
description:

Portable electronic device for receiving and reading text and images and sound through wireless Internet access and for displaying electronically published materials, namely, books, journals, newspapers, magazines, multimedia presentations; computer hardware and software in the field of text, image and sound transmission and display

The kindle trademark is owned by a corporation with an address just outside Seattle. It occurs to me that Amazon is based in Seattle. I'm sure that's just a coincidence.

P.S. The attached pictures are the actual trademarks.
P.P.S. If anyone from Amazon is reading this, yes I can be bribed to not reveal any more info. I want one of the first Kindles.

Here are the trademark records:

http://tarr.uspto.gov/servlet/tarr?r...entry=78874830
http://tarr.uspto.gov/servlet/tarr?r...entry=77188453

@Nate: I couldn't save the images you attached, if you wouldn't mind reattaching them to this thread, I'd appreciate it.

01:17 PM by Bob Russell in E-Book General | News

The lack of e-book publishing enthusiasm is a constant frustration to e-book readers. Everyone says that e-books are big in the future of publishing, yet it seems as if some publishers would rather drink castor oil.

Jane at Dear Author has shared information over the years about the situation, and has just recently brought additional focus to the issue of best seller lists. She points out that e-books are not counted in most major best seller lists. And, of course, it is essential to make a book a best-seller if you want to get people interested in buying it. "The major lists such as New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal and even Bookscan, do not take into account ebook sales. This provides a huge deterrent to authors and publishers to provide readers with a same release day, reasonably priced ebook." If e-book sales are going to cannibalize the paper sales that get you on the best seller list, it's a significant disincentive.

This is one more example of the chicken and egg problem that e-books struggle from. What will break the barrier? Will it be the arrival of inexpensive and easy to use book reading devices, will it be a push by publishers, or will it be customer outcry for more e-books?

07:00 AM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Week in Review

Ok kids, time for the weekly roundup of what we've covered this week:

E-books - News

• E Ink in 2009: Larger, colorful and flexible, says CEO
• Lulu allows users to optimise ebooks for iPhone, Sony Reader
• DRM does not hurt consumers
• Sony plans UK e-reader launch at London BookFair 2008
• By 2010: Samsung will power cell phones with water

E-books - Content

• One Day Sale - Text2Go converts text to iPod speech mp3s

E-book Devices - iRex iLiad

• iRex displays iLiad 2nd ed. at Frankfurt Book Fair

E-book Devices - Sony Portable Reader

• Engadget in love with Sony Reader PRS-505

E-book Devices - Bookeen Cybook Gen3

• Cybook Gen3: Latest about supported formats, price, etc.

E-book Devices - Amazon Kindle

• No sight of Amazon's Kindle reader at Frankfurt Book Fair

Mobile Devices - General Talk

• New use for e-ink in cell-phones

Miscellaneous - Announcements

• Latest forum changes: One comes... one goes

06:00 PM by Bob Russell in E-Book Readers | Sony Reader

What a difference a generation makes. The second generation PRS-505 (actually, if you include the Librie, it's a third generation e-ink device) is apparently enough to really impress the folks at Engadget. They even go so far as to make the comparison with early mp3 players from the 90's.

Some of the improvements mentioned are:
* Numerous display improvements, with no more ghosting and better contrast
* USB mass-storage mode
* Internal memory has increased from 64MB to 192MB
* Far thinner and flatter
* Better button locations
* New leather case (actually it's faux leather, but it's nice)

So why isn't it for everyone already? It's still a bit expensive at $300.