nook

We're not sure quite what to make of this rumor, but Engadget is reporting that Barnes & Noble is phasing out the Nook 3G.

Engadget doesn't cite a specific person or anonymous source, but says it, "Received hard evidence from within B&N that the Nook is being discontinued, with sales to seemingly continue until stock is exhausted." The "outfit" (we assume that means Barnes & Noble) is apparently "encouraging retail partners to not send out any 'bulk requests' for the Nook 3G, as there simply 'will not be sufficient quantities to fulfill those orders.'"

The article then goes on to say that "the company never actually received a huge amount of Nook 3G bulk orders to begin with, so maybe Wi-Fi really is everywhere these days."

As we said, it's a little hard to decipher what this means, but we should point out that Engadget's story about the Nook Color getting an update to Android 2.2 and possibly blowing up if you rooted it (installed custom Android firmware) ended up being just a tad off base. However, this latest story was written by veteran Engadget reporter Darren Murph, so we're taking it more seriously.

One thing worth pointing out is that it would seem odd for Barnes & Noble to discontinue the 3G/Wi-Fi version of the Nook and tell customers they could only get the Wi-Fi-only version.… Read more

If you hadn't noticed, Barnes & Noble has a bunch of new brands that go along with its ever expanding Nook brand. On the straight e-book front, there's Nookbooks. Then you have Nookkids for digital content aimed at younger readers. And Nookfriends encompasses the social networking side of the Nook universe.

This week the company has chosen to highlight its Nooknewsstand brand, which includes Nookmagazine and Nooknewspaper, that it began marketing more heavily with the launch of the Nook Color last Fall. In a press release, Barnes & Noble says, "Digital periodical sales are exceeding expectations with … Read more

Update September 29, 2011: Amazon has recently enabled library lending its Kindle products, both old and new. The author still has not bought a Kindle or other e-reader, however, mainly because he finds reading on his smartphone, via the Kindle and Overdrive apps, perfectly acceptable for now.

I normally write about TVs and related gear for CNET, but I figured some Crave readers might want to hear about my recent experiences as I considered getting an e-reader for myself. In particular, my good experience "borrowing" e-books from my local library--something I can do on a Barnes & Noble Nook … Read more

Both Amazon and Barnes & Noble don't report sales figures for their respective e-readers, the Nook and Kindle. But one company, Crimson Hexagon, has taken it upon itself to formulate some opinions about the e-reader market by charting and analyzing Twitter conversations for both the Nook and Kindle, as well as the iPad as an e-reader.

This is one of the studies you probably have to take with a grain of salt because there are some mixed messages in the report. For starters, the title of Crimson Hexagon's blog post for the study is, "Nook emerges as … Read more

Didn't get a Nook Color for the holidays? Well now's your chance to win one, as Barnes & Noble has offered to send one to a lucky Crave reader.

In awarding the product an Editors' Choice, we called it "a very capable color touch-screen e-book reader that delivers some notable extras for half the price of an iPad." (Read the full review here).

Normally, this "reader-centric" Android-powered tablet would cost you $250, but we're giving one away gratis. So, how do you try to win it? Let me enumerate the basic rules. Please … Read more

With the launch of the Nook Color, Barnes & Noble has been making a big push into color children's books, and now the company has launched a separate Nook Kids app for the iPad. Ostensibly, the app, which is also available for the iPhone, is designed for children, but it's really targeted toward parents with kids.

Barnes & Noble says that it currently has 100 new digital picture books available for sale with more on the way. These same books are available for the Nook Color and can be synced between the two devices. We assume a Nook … Read more

It's tit for tat in the world of e-readers these days.

After Amazon recently announced that the Kindle had become the company's best-selling product of all time, Barnes & Noble announced today that, "with millions of Nook eReading devices sold, the line has become the company's biggest bestseller ever in its nearly 40-year history."

The company also announced that even as its online sales of paper books continues to grow, it now sells more digital than physical books on its Web site, BN.com, which is not surprising. And while some consumers complained of being … Read more

As soon as Barnes & Noble released the Android-powered Nook Color, one question that many people were asking was would you be able to run the Kindle app for Android on the device. Of course, Barnes & Noble wasn't going to authorize it, but it was only a matter of time before people started "rooting" the Nook Color to run a customized flavor of Android that would allow you to download Android apps, including the Kindle app.

The rooting actually started not long after the $250 Nook Color was released, but the Blog Kindle has now posted … Read more

Over the last couple of weeks we've been writing about how all the e-reader manufacturers have been talking up their robust holiday sales.

Well, there can be some downsides to success, as Barnes & Noble's servers apparently couldn't handle the influx of new users on Christmas Day and continued to experience trouble into Sunday. This is the second year in a row that Barnes & Noble's server issues have kept new Nook owners from buying e-books on Christmas Day.

Across the Web and on Twitter, people were complaining about the problems. For instance, CNET user Ridermom … Read more