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WINDOWS CE POWER BOOK CLUB
Bringing today's best-sellers to the palm of your hand
By Clifford Brooks
As the end of the millennium approaches, 1999 may be remembered as the year of the electronic book. Portable, paperless books that provide the reader with an electronic alternative to the traditional paperbound book have finally arrived. I know what you're thinking -- it's been coming for a long, long, time. But this year, with the launch of NuvoMedia's Rocket eBook, SoftBook Press's SoftBook, and a slew of announcements from other manufacturers, the time is here.
The Rocket eBook
Back in latter half of 1998, I was lucky enough to attend a public demonstration of NuvoMedia's Rocket eBook, shown in Figure A. I found the Rocket eBook well-designed, easy to hold, and its slate grey screen very easy on the eyes.
FIGURE A
Here's a look at the Rocket eBook from NuvoMedia.
The Rocket eBook includes a stylus for tapping options and controls from a pop-up menu, a built-in dictionary for defining unknown words in the text being read, and an ever-growing selection of eBooks available from Barnes and Noble's Web site. All-in-all, a fine piece of workmanship. But at the time, I had a few concerns:
- Despite the comfortable grip of its curved "handle", it was a bit large.
- The selection was lacking in the fiction area.
Though they had a list of more than 100 books at the public demonstration, there were few, if any, that I was interested in. During the presentation, we were told that a lot of major authors, including Stephen King, were interested in the format. It was just a matter of working out contractual details with their publishers. In March, Stephen King's The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon was released simultaneously in Hardcover, Rocket eBook edition, and SoftBook edition. They've also published works by Bill Gates and Monica Lewinsky.
Yet another device in the age of portable devices
The portability factor was great, even necessary, but I already carried around a Palm-sized PC that was perfectly up to the task of reading electronic books. Why would I want to spend $500 for a device that, although major cool, only served a single function? I didn't want to carry both my Nino and an eBook with me. So you guessed it, I suggested that NuvoMedia look at Windows CE, Palm OS, or developing their own PIM software.
So there I was, holding this near perfect reading device, a device that brought me one step closer to the ability to carry around a personal library. But $500 was a lot to pay, and I definitely didn't want another device to carry around. So I did the next best thing. I went home that night and downloaded a couple of electronic book reader programs for my Palm-sized PC, and then I downloaded a few of the many classics available for free.
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