Apparently Google is trying to open an online bookstore which will bring the eBook back into the attention of the public. I love the idea of eBooks, but I am not ready to go that way until a solid eInk based eBook reader is introduced to the American market. Sony introduce the Librie eBook Reader to the Japanese market over a year ago and it was received with a resounding thud. Sony imposed too many restrictions on the reader, used draconian DRM measures, and essentially tried to force readers to purchase eBooks that would self destruct through the Sony bookstore. The unfortunate part of it is that the reader was well built, had a good form factor, and the battery life and readability were amazing due to eInk. Hopefully since Google wants to get involved
this time the hardware companies involved will take into consideration what the public actually wants and needs in a reader, rather than what they can put in the device to allow it to line their pockets more heavily.

My eBook reader would have to have:

• A small form factor (the size of the Librie was perfect for me)
• Wi-Fi for downloading books on the fly
• The ability to read PDF, DOC, RTF, TXT, and various other common document files (including secured docs and pdfs)
• A formidable amount of upgradeable memory (4gb plus)
• Web Browsing
• RSS Aggregator
• Backlight
• The ability to use both rechargeable and standard batteries
• The ability to read multiple types of eBook formats with or without DRM
• The ability to be used in tangent with multiple eBook services

I think my needs are a little more advanced than the average reader so I don’t anticipate that all of them will be met by the first few readers to hit the market (especially not the ability to be used with multiple eBook services). At this point I don’t think I would be so concerned with price provided that the readers that came out could accommodate my needs. I would easily pay $500 for a tweaked Sony Librie just as long as I am not tied down by DRM and locked into shopping for new books at one store.

It seems like every blog author is talking about their experiences with Gmail. Right now I’m using gExodus 0.2 to archive a couple of years worth of mail and it is a most efficient program which I highly recommend. A lot of people are paranoid about their mail being scanned for targeted advertisements, others are freaking out because they think that their mail can never be deleted. Personally, I’m not all that paranoid. If you don’t think that your broadband provider has trails of everything you do and could dig up an e-mail you sent through their server in a heartbeat, you need to think about that too. Aside from one gigabyte of storage, Gmail is fast, the search features are excellent, and it’s bound to get even better once it’s released. Personally, I am happy to have somewhere to put my mail where I don’t have to worry about backing it up and burning it onto CD all the time. I wish this was around when I was an undergrad. It beats the hell out of Penn State’s Webmail.

Thanks to Chris Holland I have a Gmail account. He was nice enough to extend an invite to me and I thank him for that.

My first impression of Gmail is that the interface is so clean. The only image is the Gmail logo. It’s spartan, but that allows it to run fast. A webmail interface built mostly on CSS without the clutter of images and ads that’s UNHEARD OF! Yeah Gmail is currently running at lightning speeds. Let’s hope its infrastructure will be able to handle the influx of the rest of the world when it goes public. The other cool thing is the keyboard shortcuts. Ironically, I just started playing Legend of the Green Dragon (web based MUD) and that also uses keyboard shortcuts which I have become very fond of. At any rate, Gmail is definitely worth checking out. Yahoo and Hotmail will not be able to compete with 1GB of space. If they try to, their already slow interfaces full of ads will only get bogged to hell. Let’s hope Gmail takes out its competition swiftly.

So there’s all this madness about getting Gmail accounts right now because they are invite only. My boyfriend went begging for an invite last night and and got one. I woke up this morning to email from him - my first email from anyone on Gmail ironically. I’m jealous of course because by the time I get one, my email alias will be like 40 characters long (mostly numbers) reminiscent of my most recent Yahoo! endeavor. I’m sure I’ll eventually get a Gmail account and it will be wonderful, like I’ve died and gone to webmail heaven, but I can wait. There’s no point in prostrating myself in front of a bunch of geeks that will most likely berate me before they send me an invite. I’ll just be patient and wait.

I signed up for a Spymac account to see what all the buzz was about. They beat Google to the punch with the 1gb of storage, but they could’ve at least rolled it out slowly or made sure that their network could handle the load. First of all e-mail is busted (can’t send, have’t tried receiving), and I can’t publish my iCal. Yeah I know it’s because of all of the new accounts but still. I like the layout and the services (WebDAV, etc), and it’s very generous that they give you a blog and something like 350mb of additional storage, but it’s all moot if you can’t use it. I’ll stick with it for a couple of months and see if it eventually begins to work.

Mental Note: This is NOT the way to roll out new services.