readers

While the hype over e-readers has focused on Amazon's "Kindle" and other e-book devices--or lack thereof--some of the digerati in France are turning the page to a different print medium.

The "Read&Go," being developed by French telecom Orange, is aimed specifically at newspapers with hourly wireless updates by 3G and Wi-Fi connections, according to Electronista. The 1GB device, which will also come with 30 preloaded books, is already undergoing two-month public testing periods. We hope someone works on a dual-screen version so we can scan all the comics at once.

Sorry about that headline. It just seems that every medium is getting its own "what's hot" feed these days. Even Twitterheads are getting in the act, with the new Twitlinks (review), which I find of dubious value. I mean, really, we're talking about Twitter here, not the New York Times. But the newly relaunched ReadBurner looks like it could, possibly, become genuinely useful.

It's a simple service. It tracks the number of times items are shared in Google's RSS Reader, and puts the most-recently popular stories (assuming sharing means popularity) at the top of … Read more

Adobe Reader is monstrously large, slow to load, and includes many features most users will hardly ever need. Foxit PDF Reader pares down its PDF-reading code and comes up with some neat features, like annotation tools, to give you a PDF reader that's far more appropriate for the average PDF user.

PDFs open from the Internet in their own Foxit window, instead of sucking browser resources, and the interface mimics Adobe's so you won't have to change your reading habits. In our test, the text readability wasn't much inferior to Acrobat's. The 1.6MB program … Read more

RFID-manufacturer Alien Technology announced this week it has created new software for its tag readers. The software provides information on the velocity and position of tags, and can thereby distinguish between adjacent tagged objects such as luggage.

Not being able to distinguish between two tagged objects has been a big headache for the airline business. On one hand, RFID readers save labor because the tags don't need to be aligned with the reader. On the other hand, a device might read several tags at the same time, without knowing which specific piece of luggage the tags are tied to. … Read more

If you happened to have visited Amazon's Web site today, you might have noticed that a large message from Amazon's CEO, Jeff Bezos, was plastered across the home page of the site. Basically, it was a big fat apology for Amazon's inability to ship its Kindle electronic book reader in a timely fashion.

Ever since it quickly sold out at launch, a lot of folks have been speculating about just how many Kindles Amazon had sold and whether the long delays in shipping were a case of production problems or a PR ploy designed to make the Kindle appear … Read more

If readers are any indication, Microsoft's Windows Mobile has a better base of support than one might think, but all the winds are blowing toward Apple.

The results of our first annual (maybe) smartphone survey are in, and thanks to everyone who left comments on One More Thing or Crave and t o those who flooded my inbox with responses. Yes, I know we should have a survey tool, but we're working on other stuff right now that's more important. (You'll have to trust me on that one.)

Between the comments and the e-mails, we received … Read more

It seems as if the hype over the "Kindle" has barely subsided, and already we're getting a glimpse into the next generation of e-book readers from overseas.

The EB-100 from Taiwan-based Netronix is an e-ink reader that features a touch screen and Wi-Fi networking, according to Gizmodo. Other specs seem fairly standard, including a 6-inch display that's the same size as Amazon's version, though GizmoWatch and some other blogs have mentioned a model with a 9.7-inch screen.

We welcome any and all advances in these devices as long as stop short of reading minds.… Read more

I regularly visit tons of Web sites every day for the latest software updates, blog posts about cool gadgets, and other news sites. But instead of clicking through bookmarks in my Web Browser, I like the ease and convenience of a RSS reader. I recently put together a collection of RSS readers for Windows, but I just found out only a few days ago the developer of one of the best RSS readers for Mac decided to release its product for free.

NewsFire is a full-featured RSS reader with an easy-to-use interface so you can get your news just how … Read more

Whenever I'm setting up on a new computer or test machine at work, or even after I've downloaded my must-have programs on a new home machine, one of the first things I do is grab an RSS newsreader. Though you can use Web browser favorites to hit and save your most visited sites, newsreaders have a few advantages that make getting all the latest updates even easier.

With a good newsreader on your machine, anytime you see an available RSS feed at a Web site (usually with an orange RSS or XML label), you can have all the … Read more