[This is a guest post by GURU 'Nook Expert', Jennifer Adams]
When Amazon’s Kindle debuted in 2007, I turned my nose up at it, because it wasn’t a “real book.” “Real books” have paper pages and smell like ink. You can peruse “real books” in brick & mortar stores where the smell of the pages envelopes you and the beautiful cover art draws you in and says, “Why don’t you stay awhile and read me?” You can borrow “real books” from your local library for free.
While I was busy thumbing my nose at Amazon’s Kindle, it began flying off warehouse shelves and into stockings, under holiday trees and into readers’ hands. Amazon’s digital library grew exponentially, drawing an even larger customer base, and other companies such as Sony, Barnes & Noble and Kobo began to take notice. And plan.
The Nook was born.
There are now several e-readers to choose from but the two major contenders are Barnes & Noble’s Nook and Amazon’s Kindle. The Kindle and Nook have comparable specifications in size, weight, display, & storage capacity, with the ability to adjust text and fonts for a more pleasurable reading experience, but what sets them apart is the availability of e-books on these platforms.
The Kindle reads proprietary file extensions, so readers are largely wed to Amazon’s library of e-books. The Barnes & Noble Nook is open-source, running an Android operating system and therefore reads a number of different file extensions, such as .epub, which is an open-standard format and available across a host of sources for purchasing and download. This truly wonderful feature is also used by thousands of libraries internationally, which means you can even borrow library books on your Nook!
When the Nook debuted last holiday season, I could thumb my nose at new technology no longer. I buckled down to do my research and find out which e-reader would best fit my needs. I eventually chose the Nook, based on the open-source platform, the ability to borrow e-books from libraries, and the beautiful touch-screen library navigation at the bottom. I’ve now had my Nook for almost 3 months and I’ve read nearly 20 books in that time. Having such a wonderful piece of hardware has increased my reading time by leaps and bounds; I don’t think I read that many new books all of last year, though I am avid reader.
I still go to the bookstores and run my fingers along the spines of books, leaf through them and browse, but my purchasing habits have changed. I now have my Nook in hand, and I can connect to a WiFi network, search for that book in the Barnes & Noble store and download it to my device instantly. E-books are less expensive, too, sometimes by a wide margin of over 50%. At nearly 20 books read (and many of those free), my Nook has already paid for itself a few times over.
But the best part? Being able to carry my entire library in the palm of my hand.
