Why do I need a special (expensive) and limited device to read ebooks that I can only buy from Amazon? I already have a laptop, iPod, Palm PDA and scores of ebooks, many of them in DRM formats that are apparently incompatible with that used by Kindle (even though Amazon now own one of the ebook vendors I use - Mobipocket). And many of the non-DRM ebooks I already own are in eReader and PDF formats, which once again Kindle doesn't support...

My laptop, Palm PDA and iPod do much more than the Kindle, have colour screens, the laptop and Palm connect to the real web and charge nothing extra to view blogs or newspapers. They all allow me to sync my content with my laptop and use it as my main content repository, aside from the iPod they support WiFi and Bluetooth n/w (worldwide) instead of just one 3G system limited to the US only.

The problem with ebooks is NOT the readers, it's the DRM, multiple incompatible file formats, limited choice of titles and high cost of each title (the one's still in CR I mean). And the attempts by all the ebook vendors to lock customers into one online store for all their ebook purchases. Kindle doesn't really address any of these problems (aside maybe from the price of their new titles) and it tries to make several of them worse!

The solution: ONE file format (probably PDF) for all ebooks from all publishers. No DRM. Available from many online retailers, on many smart phones, music players, PDAs, PCs, etc. Available from many web-based stores at an average price of about 50% of a paperback.

Publishers - wake up or die (slowly) as your aging dead tree customers shuffle off this coil and are replaced by "generation screen" who won't buy anything printed on paper at any price.