Interesting piece on failure of Sony to market its ereaders

[Bic]

http://ireaderreview.com/2010/12/13/...rategy-review/

It says: "The Sony readers are, in my opinion, the best ‘electronic reading devices’ out of the Big 3 eReaders. The problem is - the Sony Readers are terrible when you consider the complete eReader ownership experience."

[SeaBookGuy]

"Sony gave up after making the eReader .... It assumed that once it sells a Sony Reader, it’s job is done."

DING! DING! DING!

We have a winner!!!

Most of us here have expressed great frustration in that regard. Moreover, I agree that they have to do something to grab the lead by next year's rollout season, or they won't be in the 2012 game, period.

It's the business model, stupid!

Where I disagree is the trashing of the poor Pocket. Folks listen to music on their players (or phones-as-players); they don't care about speakers, etc. I think the author missed the point that not everyone wants to be able to Whispersync books; he dismisses the library books, but many folks prefer free books to doling out to Amazon right-and-left! The lack of internet access as a "major" fail was overdone I thought.

[MasterGame]

Originally Posted by SeaBookGuy

The lack of internet access as a "major" fail was overdone I thought.

I'm still tryin' to get my dead-tree books to access the internet.

[elcreative]

Interesting, biased, self-admittedly US-centric and yet another reviewer telling me (us) what we want... Everyone I know who has a Sony (and I mean exactly that, not everyone who has a Sony), has a similar viewpoint to me.

We bought our eReader to read books, that's why we got it... we don't want to read on our computers, telephones, watches or any other damn gadget, we have an eReader to read on. We could care less about the Sony bookstore, there's a world of free and paid-for books out there without ever going near Sony and some of us actually like libraries and supporting them. We don't want Wi-Fi, 3G or any other wonderful connectivity and certainly don't intend to use a Web browser... we want to READ books, anything else we use a computer or other device for...

I appreciate that many other people do want lots of these things and don't look at things the same way, that's fine, everyone has their own needs and is entitled to their own opinion... but don't tell us that what you want is what we want... it isn't!

[starrlamia]

Originally Posted by elcreative

Interesting, biased, self-admittedly US-centric and yet another reviewer telling me (us) what we want... Everyone I know who has a Sony (and I mean exactly that, not everyone who has a Sony), has a similar viewpoint to me.

We bought our eReader to read books, that's why we got it... we don't want to read on our computers, telephones, watches or any other damn gadget, we have an eReader to read on. We could care less about the Sony bookstore, there's a world of free and paid-for books out there without ever going near Sony and some of us actually like libraries and supporting them. We don't want Wi-Fi, 3G or any other wonderful connectivity and certainly don't intend to use a Web browser... we want to READ books, anything else we use a computer or other device for...

I appreciate that many other people do want lots of these things and don't look at things the same way, that's fine, everyone has their own needs and is entitled to their own opinion... but don't tell us that what you want is what we want... it isn't!

I totally entertained the thought of a reader with net access and browsers and games and all that jazz, but when it comes down to it, I am almost always within range of a computer and if not it's for short periods of time. I was more interested in a reader that worked well for reading, had good reviews and expandable storage. My 650 has not disapointed me yet.
I have been entertaining the idea of a pocketbook IQ but not as a reader, just as a toy.

[Xanthe]

I've got the Aluratek and Sony to read ebooks. I have a smartphone that I can use for quick internet lookups. I got the Pandigital Novel to hack it into an Android tablet because I can't afford an iPad right now. The PDN is honking heavy compared to the Aluratek and the Sony and has a backlit LCD screen, so I can't see it becoming my preferred ebook reader.

The Sony PRS-350 is just a cool-looking ereader. It's small, thin, yet feels sturdy due to the aluminum frame. It's easy to carry in my pocketbook.

[astra]

I don't care whether Sony is taking any part in ebook selling. As long as they keep on producing excellent ebook readers, that is all I care about Their hardware is the best of the best

[gmw]

Originally Posted by elcreative

... I appreciate that many other people do want lots of these things and don't look at things the same way, that's fine, everyone has their own needs and is entitled to their own opinion... but don't tell us that what you want is what we want... it isn't!

Exactly. Well put.

I chose the Sony PRS-650 specifically because it was aimed at the free and library range of ebooks and not tied to a specific store. I accept that this means paying a premium for the device; if they can't extract the money off you via taxing book purchases then of course you need to pay up front. I consider it a desirable feature NOT to have Internet, it's one less thing to worry about. Who wants to start the anti-virus, anti-trojan, anti-rootkit, anti-spyware, anti-bad-guy fight on their e-reader? (I can see this coming, how about anti-anti-drm or some such nonsense?)

Of course Sony do have some after-sales stuff to get right if they hope to maintain customers. Some of their customer support tales are pretty interesting (in the interesting-times sense). They also need to do much better with their software development and user-interface-testing, we can only hope they are learning.

I'm fascinated by people that are so willing to assume they know so much about the internal business decisions of another organisation (I've seen the same assumptions in comments on these forums). Those inside Sony are the ones that know the facts and figures and company policies. Sure they may be making mistakes, but it takes a special kind of arrogance for an outsider to assume they know what those mistakes are.

[boxcorner]

Originally Posted by MasterGame

I'm still tryin' to get my dead-tree books to access the internet.

[boxcorner]

I concur with elcreative's post #4 and gmw's post #8.

[kartu]

I think situation is rather grave.
Sony Readers get next to no media coverage.

[rhadin]

You might find interesting my blog articles Will You be a Googler? and The Google Wars: Taking the First Step.

I think the natural fit would be the Google eBookstore and the Sony devices. Each would be complementary to the other and fill missing gaps.

[boxcorner]

Originally Posted by rhadin

You might find interesting my blog articles Will You be a Googler? and The Google Wars: Taking the First Step.

I think the natural fit would be the Google eBookstore and the Sony devices. Each would be complementary to the other and fill missing gaps.

Interesting, yes. Though my immediate thought was, in what way is this guy connected with Google (eg job applicant, employee, consultant, investor)? Natural born cynic, that's me.

[rhadin]

Originally Posted by boxcorner

Interesting, yes. Though my immediate thought was, in what way is this guy connected with Google (eg job applicant, employee, consultant, investor)? Natural born cynic, that's me.

Sorry to disappoint but I have absolutely no connection to Google. I don't own any stock in it, never applied for a job with it, and usually use Bing to do my searches. My only connection to Sony is that I own some Sony products that I like, including the Sony 505 and 950 Readers.

[boxcorner]

Originally Posted by rhadin

Sorry to disappoint but I have absolutely no connection to Google. I don't own any stock in it, never applied for a job with it, and usually use Bing to do my searches. My only connection to Sony is that I own some Sony products that I like, including the Sony 505 and 950 Readers.

No, not disappointed, actually rather encouraged. In fact, you might have gone some way towards restoring my faith in humanity. It's been at a low ebb, recently. It will certainly be very interesting watching Google's moves and it would be quite exciting if they were to team up with Sony. Interesting times ahead. I don't like monopolies and cartels, though, hence feel rather uncomfortable about Google's and Amazon's dominant positions. However, I shouldn't complain, as I've bought a lot of paper books from Amazon in the past and use Google frequently. Nevertheless, I think that competition is healthy, as it encourages innovation. Surely consumers have greater freedom when there's unfettered choice.