Books on Cell Phones
Books can now be read on cell phones.
Both Google and Amazon have plans to expand books offered for mobile reading devices such as smart cell phones like the iPhone and the T-Mobile G1 as well as other mobile devices such as Lexcycle’s Stanza and Frictiowize’s eReader.
• Google will offer its 1.5 million scanned public domain books. These are older, many out of print, books with expired copyrights. Google plans to expand to current books with the permission of book publishers.
• Amazon will offer its 230,000 titles from its Kindle e-book collection. This collection, intended for its Kindle e-reader (a device made for electronic book reading) includes today’s best sellers. Unlike mobile gadgets, Kindle’s reading screen is the size of a paperback and needs no backlighting, making it very conducive for reading. Sony offers a similar product called the Reader.
This mobile version of e-books will display text only and be able to be downloaded quickly over wireless networks. Although the mobile gadgets, which require backlighting and have small screens, are hard on the eyes for reading, the convenience may outweigh this.
