Sony unveils Reader Daily Edition in US

Sony has launched the third member of its new Reader family called the Reader Daily Edition, a wireless model with 3G connectivity. The Daily Edition caps its new line of Reader products, joining the Reader Pocket Edition and the Reader Touch Edition which were announced earlier this month. The Reader Daily Edition gives consumers wireless access via AT&T's 3G mobile broadband network to Sony's eBook store from anywhere in the US. There are no monthly fees or transaction charges for the basic wireless connectivity and users still have the option to side load personal documents or content from other compatible sites via USB. The seven-inch wide, touch screen display provides for intuitive navigation and layout of content, including newspapers and magazines, whether users are reading in portrait or landscape orientation. A high contrast ratio with sixteen levels of grayscale ensures that text and images are crisp and easy to read. All three models feature Sony's industrial design and an E Ink Vizplex electronic paper display. Sony's eBook Library software 3.0, which now includes support for many Apple Macintosh computers as well as PCs, makes it easy to transfer and read any Adobe PDF (with reflow capability), EPUB, Microsoft Word, BBeB files, or other text file formats on the Reader. The Daily Edition also boasts an aluminum body with an integrated cover for durability and has enough internal memory to hold more than 1,000 standard eBooks and expansion slots for memory cards. The Reader Daily Edition will be available this December in time for the holidays at SonyStyle stores and SonyStyle.com for about USD 399. Sony has also made several changes and improvements to its eBook Store. Earlier this summer, Sony announced the availability of more than one million free public domain books from Google, and the company made new releases and New York Times bestseller titles available for USD 9.99. Sony has also launched its Library Finder application. Sony, working with OverDrive, will now offer visitors to the eBook Store by Sony easy access to local library's collection of eBooks.