It’s true that, if the e-book is short, you can print it out on your printer and comfortably read it on the sofa that way, but you probably don't want to do that if it's 300 to 500 pages. And you'll probably find that reading an e-book in pdf format while it's still on your computer is uncomfortable after a few minutes.

     Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon Books, thinks descendants of his new $400 e-book reader, the KINDLE, will replace paper books, doing everything they do, only better. And he thinks people will go to AMAZON to buy every single book they read on these readers. And I’ve got news for you on that score, buddy.

     Eventually we should be able to fill our e-book readers with free library books. But the libraries will have one supreme weapon they don’t have now: when your book is overdue they will be able to simply make it disappear from your reader. Can you imagine being in the middle of an exciting book – only to have it evaporate before your eyes? Which could be the beginning of a new race of power-mad librarians. A sobering thought.

     For a review of the KINDLE, click below:

http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/11/19/kindle-first-impressions/

     FREE WAYS TO READ E-BOOKS. If you don't mind having the text backlit, go to E-BOOK CROSSROADS. Their offerings are not all free, but some are, and each has its good points.

http://www.ebookcrossroads.com/ebook-readers.html

     Students are the ones most likely to use these e-readers, once textbooks come out in e-book format, as an e-reader the size of one book can hold up to 200 e-books. I hear rumors that textbook manufacturers are starting to put texts into e-book form, so portable e-readers are definitely the coming thing.