I’m seriously jonesin’ for a Nook Color. Can one “jones” for an e-reader? Friends, tell me why this is wrong or oh-so-right.
The facts are these:
- I work in a library so I can get free books everyday – we have 4 million of them and I have the ability to add things to the collection.
- I had access to an iPad for a month and fell in love with eBooks. I don’t want an iPad because I feel like it’s too locked down and want to stay Android. Plus it’s $$$.
- My iPod headphone jack broke so I can’t plug it into my car radio which means I can’t listen to music or podcasts when I’m driving. It still docks into my speakers at home though, so buying a new one just doesn’t feel right especially when its capabilities overlap with my other technology (like my phone, also I know I can plug my phone into my car stereo, but I don’t have a huge card in there, and I guess I could get a bigger one, but that’s moot if I get a Nook).
- I can use Overdrive (library lending) with a Nook, and, of course, get PD titles.
- It has web browsing, email, and apps – they’re not incredibly robust from what I hear, but functional as a tablet for many day-to-day tasks including docs and spreadsheets.
- It’s a decent chunk of money, and there is a possibility I may get a work-iPad this fall. If I have one of those it might be redundant to have the Nook too, but the iPad will be property of the University so if I ever leave they’ll take it back, and I won’t be able to access any of those eBooks because they’re proprietary to iThings which I don’t intend on purchasing.
- The folks on CNET love the Nook, and while they had great things to say about the Kindle and the iPad it really seems like the Nook is their pick for overall best bet – especially for someone with my needs and expectations.
- I might actually finish a book club book if I have it on my Nook. 🙂
- It cuts down on weight in my bag. I LOVED having the iPad at conference. I could take notes on it, check email and fb, tweet, check the TLA app, and update the ACRL blog.
- I can switch from Nook to my Android phone and pick up where I left off.
- Free eBooks while in a Barnes and Noble – which we actually have here in town. It’s limited to an hour a day, which isn’t really that much, but hanging out at the Starbucks and reading for an hour from time to time sounds nice. Plus even if I don’t read whole books that way, it would be a way to scan things, read select chapters, or get a more in depth preview before purchasing. I wonder what happens if I make notes on books that I access while in B&N.
- Nook Color doesn’t seem to have the highlighting and annotation features with PDFs that I’d like. iPad doesn’t either, BUT there are apps for that. There is one that is around $10 for iPad that I hear is great and worth the price. There may be a Nook app, but I didn’t find one. There might also be one in the works.
So many things to consider!
Thanks, friends!