An interesting thread was posted involving E-Books vs Paper Books which absolutely requires my aggressive, abrasive, not so humble, and probably off-topic ranting on this subject. Why? Because I have been patiently waiting (for more then 10 years....a lifetime in technical years) for a product to appear on the market to fill, what I view, as a pressing need........one that I also feel would be the next "killer app".
Most of the replies to the initial thread were in favor of paper books. I am too......HOWEVER........my opinion could certainly change given the right appliance to replace the paper book.
No computer screen (currently) can replace the tactile joy of sitting in a comfortable chair under a good reading lamp with one's feet propped up and reading a crisply printed paper book, flipping through the pages as the author's material unfolds.
However, if some nice computer company (cough....(Apple)...cough) would get busy, I am sure this experience could be closely replicated by a well thought out electronic device.
I now will specify WHAT I WANT!!!! I am THE CUSTOMER....the KING in the market!!! You should LISTEN to me, OBEY!!, and prostrate the resources of your companies before the power of my desires (and my almighty dollars which I will gladly part with should you produce an appliance to meet my specifications).
I want an appliance with:
a) Two 8.5x11 inch (normal paper sheet size) screens mounted on a hinge that acts as the book's spine
b) This should be covered in a leather binding for durability (remember this is the ONLY book I am planning to own and must last a lifetime......the binding should be replaceable if and when it ever wears out)
c) The binding should have a clasp to keep the book closed when I throw it into my book bag/back pack
d) The screens must be "magical"....i.e., they must display fonts as crisply as a laser printed page. This will be THE most daunting technical problem of producing this device. The pixels in this device must either be so infinitesimally small that no rounding is apparent between pixels at the font's edges, or the pixels can be controlled to produce perfectly straight edges where required and radii where required. Visually, this device must perfectly replicate a printed page.
e) The entire appliance must be electronically and acoustically inert. I do not want to be bombarded my radio frequencies or high pitched background noise while I read. Inert......just like a paper book.
f) Use flash memory chips. No hard disk drive whining allowed. More shock resistant, becoming very cheap and available, very fast access times. Stuff enough of it in the device to hold a huge LIBRARY of e-books.....like a few terabytes of it in each unit.
g) The book easily recharges and the battery (or possibly a capacitor if eeStor's inventions pan out) can be replaced if needed.
h) Single USB port for transferring e-books from desktop computer to the appliance using a cord or thumbnail type drive.
i) The software should organize the library according to the Dewey Decimal System. It's the standard in library science so why SCREW with it? Each book gets an index card when added to the memory's library. (All this information should be in the e-book file itself.)
j) The appliance will boot up in .5 seconds flat and give me the option of going to the memory library for a book or opening the last book I was reading.
k) There are numerous other specifications, but I am tired of ranting now.
In short, this appliance must allow me to sit in a chair with my feet up and give me a reading experience AS CLOSE AS POSSIBLE to reading a paper book. Then the entire library of the world's written material must be digitized and available for downloading into my private E-Book appliance's memory library.
Billions of these could be sold if this project was properly executed and resulted in a product of sufficient quality. It's the next "killer app". Why nothing major has of yet appeared on the market, I do not know. Dave