Nook Color: Not a Game Changer but Definitely a Mover and Shaker
The rumors are true! (Imagine that.) Barnes & Noble (BKS) unveiled a much-anticipated, color, touchscreen version of its Nook e-reader today. Though priced competitively at $259 and set to roll out to B&N stores, Best Buy (BBY), Walmart (WMT), and Books-a-Million in late November, the Nook Color may not be a total game-changer for digital publishing. What it does deliver is a look at the next generation of e-readers. And a glimpse into the evolution of the publishing industry.
Even skeptics and naysayers have to admit Nook Color has some pretty compelling features.
- A 7-inch color touch screen with extra-wide viewing angle (think landscape or portrait for reading a la iPad) intended for sharing. 16 million colors on a special design that "reduces glare and provides optimum brightness for enjoyable reading indoors or outside."
- It weighs 15.8 ounces and comes in at 8.1 inches tall, 5 inches wide, and 0.48 inches deep.
- It has WiFi built in along with 8GB of storage (expandable up to 32GB with a microSD card). Nook can deliver up to eight hours of reading with the wireless turned off.
- A full Web browser, free word and chess games, a Pandora app that will stream music over WiFi, as well as the ability to create, edit, and view Microsoft Office files via QuickOffice.
- The LendMe app lets users loan or borrow for free for up to 14 days.
That LendMe function as well as the NookFriends (share and suggest reading as well as pass along favorite lines on Facebook or Twitter) is where Nook Color starts to tap the future by acknowledging the past. Reading may be a solitary activity, but let's not forget the importance of loaning a great book to a friend or discussing one over coffee. In this way, B&N is getting a half step ahead of Amazon's (AMZN) Kindle which won't begin lending until later this year.
As for the apps that are now available on Nook Color, they may just be add-ons as my BNET colleague Erik Sherman suggests. But they are serving to bridge the gap in the minds of devotees of paper books.
The laments from more Luddite bookworms continue to be loud and clear: they love everything about reading a real book. Yet they are coming around. According to Forrester Research, Kindle has already sold about 5 million devices since 2007, while Barnes & Noble has sold about one million Nooks since their launch last year. (And e-reader owners are far likelier to buy actual books than other Americans according to a Harris Interactive poll).
The Nook as a dedicated e-reader with a few extras has the potential to convert even more skeptics who want to use the device primarily to read, yet wouldn't mind having the ability to play a couple of games or surf the web, too.
Of course, there will be plenty of grousing from traditional reading's ranks about the uselessness of color. However, it's important to consider that novels and non-fiction aren't the only categories out there. Color opens the field to cookbooks, textbooks with graphics, magazines, and as I reported last month, children's books.
Finally, all that functionality with a $259 price tag may just thrust Nook Color into the spotlight when it takes its place among competitors in the holiday electronics display mash up at Walmart and Best Buy. Priced between $499 and $825 at Walmart, the iPad is a costly proposition despite all its nifty bells and whistles. Consumers are still being cautious and if they can get an e-reader with some web capability that may just be enough for them.
One thing's sure: this chapter in the e-reading (r)evolution isn't quite finished yet.
Image via bn.com
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