On Jan. 27, Steven P. Jobs was still standing on a stage in San Francisco, presenting Apple’s new iPad, when the phones started ringing. Senior managers from Amazon.com were calling newspaper, magazine and book publishers trying to glean any information possible about the deals Apple was offering them to supply content for its new reading device.
Amazon, which pioneered the e-reader category with its Kindle devices, is determined not to be out-priced by Apple or any other rival.
Since December, Amazon has been pushing publishers to sign a new round of legal agreements that would guarantee that the Kindle price for their content is always the same or lower than the price on other electronic reading devices, such as the iPad or the Sony Reader. The clause, a variation of a legal concept known as “most favored nation,” would guarantee that Amazon’s customers would always get the best price for electronic versions of magazines, newspapers and books.
NYTimes Bits.
Amazon’s Kindle is less advanced
In the article there is this line: the black-and-white E Ink screen on Amazon’s Kindle is less advanced than the color screen on the iPad.
Several readers at the NYT blog had a counter view on this.
For example:
My main problem with using an iPad rather than a Kindle is that the iPad is backlit. The e-ink is much easier on the eyes that constantly staring at a backlit screen. I’ll stick with my Kindle for now.
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The phrase “the black-and-white E Ink screen on Amazon’s Kindle is less advanced than the color screen on the iPad” is now really an unfortunate choice. Now if the iPad has e.g. a Pixel Qi display instead of the good old IPS TFT (developed by Hitachi 1996), that would be true.
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I also disagree that the iPad screen is “more advanced”. Not only do I prefer reading on a e-ink screen, I also prefer the dramatically increased battery life that goes along with it.
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Agree with other comments: the statement about Kindle having a “less advanced” screen requires some serious qualification. E-Ink technology is far more “advanced” technology from a reader’s perspective, while the iPad provides a brightly backlit screen and resolutions too low to hope to prevent long-term eye strain.
I have very serious doubts that iPad will show the same readership numbers that Amazon has been able to produce.