After facing continued competitive pressure from Amazon’s new Kindle devices and a host of other new competitors, Sony has taken the covers off two new devices as previously rumoured: the PRS-300 (a.k.a. the Reader Pocket Edition) and the PRS-600 (a.k.a. the Reader Touch Edition). The PRS-300 provides a compact reader at a reasonable price of $199, whereas the PRS-600 is a larger touchscreen device that costs $299 (again, confirming prior pricing rumors).
The move signals that Sony is serious about competing against Amazon. Not only is it dropping the price of the devices, it’s also dropping the cost of new bestsellers to match Amazon.com’s price point of $9.99. This will undoubtedly worry publishers, as $9.99 seems to rapidly developing into the e-book equivalent of 99-cent MP3s.
Unfortunately, despite continuing the trend of a touchscreen interface pioneered by PRS-700, neither of these two devices feature any wireless capabilities. While this has allowed Sony to move faster into multiple markets by eliminating the need to negotiate with carriers in the each market, the lack of wireless adds friction to the process of purchasing a book: you need to buy the book, download it to your computer, plug in the e-reader, and then transfer the book to e-reader.
Sony has responded to this criticism by stating it intends to introduce a wireless device, but has yet to announce a specific device or timeframe.
