geekosystem

Well, it's about time. Barnes & Noble is finally following up its string of solid eReaders with a web interface appropriately called NOOK for Web. While they are certainly lagging behind Amazon, that eBook juggernaut, this now means that NOOK books can be read on any device.

While the rise of eBooks has been centered around Amazon's Kindle devices and the Apple iPad, the NOOK from the last big-box book seller Barnes & Noble has remained a noble, if distant, competitor. Now, B&N has announced that it has formed a strategic partnership with Microsoft, forming a subsidiary company comprised of its digital and college businesses combined with $300 million from the software giant.

Though analysts had been expecting it, Barnes & Noble booksellers announced a new addition to their eReader line today: The Nook Tablet. However, calling this device an eReader is something of a disservice, as this latest Nook aims to be the hand-held multimedia device that also lets you read books on it. Now where have I heard that before? Here's what you need to know about the new device.

Barnes & Noble unleashed a significant update to their Nook Color today, v1.2, which brought Android 2.2 along with it, essentially advancing Barnes & Noble's e-reader to the point where it now seems to be more of a tablet, including a mobile app store for the Nook, appropriately called Nook Apps.

The Nook Apps store launched with 125 apps, priced at $5.99 or less, with about half of them priced $2.99 or less, as well as some less impressive, though still functional, free apps, such as organizational tools. The update also brings Nook Email, a pre-loaded, basic email app that is ready to roll with Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and AOL. The update also brings Adobe AIR and Adobe Flash Player support, which, as anyone familiar with Flash can attest, allows for a multitude of interactive options within the Nook Color's apps, which is currently intelligently being utilized with children's books; for example, including learning games with the children's classics. If you're wondering, yes, Angry Birds is available on the Nook Color. The update is available now to download manually, or one can wait for the WiFi release sometime in the next week.

Yes, color e-readers have been done before -- see Pandigital's Novel e-reader or Barnes & Noble's Nook Color, available later this month -- but when E Ink, the pioneering Boston firm whose display technology is used in Amazon's Kindle, joins the fray, you pay attention. Today, E Ink will be unveiling its full-color "Triton" e-paper technology at Japan's FDP International trade show. E Ink  promises a full month of battery life with their new technology, as well as 20% faster performance than previous generations of E Ink. As anyone who's experienced the messy black-and-white artifacts that occasionally plague the Kindle can tell you, performance speed is one of the nagging little problems with e-ink as we know it today, so this is welcome news. At today's trade show, a Chinese company called Hanvon will be unveiling the first full-color e-reader powered by E Ink's new technology. The 9.68-inch color touchscreen tablet will go on sale in March for little less than the cost of an iPad -- starting at $440 as compared with the iPad's $590 sticker price in China -- and could migrate to the U.S. if successful. Press release and demo video below:

Barnes & Noble announced a major update to their Nook e-reader line yesterday: The Nook Color. The device has a 7 inch full color LCD touchscreen with a 1024x600 resolution with 16 million colors, has a film on the screen to help reduce glare, runs on Android, has 8 gigabytes of storage, and has built-in WiFi, as well as integration with Facebook and Twitter. It'll be launching at a $249 price point and will be shipped starting November 19. Barnes & Noble seems to be marketing the Nook Color as a hybrid e-reader and tablet computer, though from various impressions around the web, the device is being met with mixed reviews. Read on past the jump for a mini round-up of praise and criticism.

Amazon has dropped the price of a Kindle 2 by almost 30%, from $259 to $189.  This announcement comes so hot on the heels Barnes & Noble's more affordable Nook announcements that it may have left scorch marks.

In what could be seen as yet another step down the road towards complete digital distribution, GameStop is being investigated by the New York Attorney General's office on charges of linking its customers to shady discount people. GameStop is only one of almost two dozen online retailers on the AG's list, alongside  such hallowed edifices as Barnes & Noble, Buy.com, and... Pizza Hut?