OK, OK, I get it… it’s the Future of Reading. It will change the world. Yet it’s undeniably ugly.

“This isn’t a device, it’s a service.” True, this is a much more compelling package than the Sony Reader was, but at least that other, “dumber” device had style.

I can’t help but compare to the Seiko-Epson electronic paper display (see below) announced days ago: sheer elegance. Yes, I know, it’s not a complete product, just a display… but somehow I can’t see them turn this display into something that looks like a kitchen appliance.

Dan Farber says:

It’s enough to make Gutenberg stir in his grave and to make Steve Jobs envious

Well, certainly not for the design…

Aesthetics aside, Anne Zelenka makes a really good point:

Wouldn’t it have been cool if Amazon built an e-book reader so inexpensive they could almost give it away for free, then make money by selling e-books for people to read on it (or selling upscale versions of the reader later)? Instead, they stuffed it so full of technological wizardry that it costs $399.

Most people have no idea if they’d really like to use an e-book reader or not. It may be something you just have to experience to grasp. But who’s going to experiment with electronic book reading when the price of entry is so high?

Amazon’s Jeff Bezos says:

“This is the most important thing we’ve ever done..It’s so ambitious to take something as highly evolved as the book and improve on it. And maybe even change the way people read.”

Something tells me it will take a price-cut to pursue that ambition…

Update (11/4): Mea Culpa for missing the point. It’s ugly with a purpose 🙂