Reviewers knock Nook

When news broke that Barnes & Noble's Nook electronic reader had sold out in the midst of the holiday shopping season, Amazon was quick to crow that "Kindle manufacturing is humming" and Kindles are "in stock and available for immediate shipment." One can only imagine the glee at Amazon headquarters now that two of the nation's top tech reviewers have weighed in with stinging critiques of the Barnes & Noble e-reader that use words like "annoying" and "half-baked."

Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal writes that he "found the Nook slower, more cumbersome to use and less polished than the Kindle," and said Kindle's navigation system, while not perfect, "ran circles around the Nook's." Mossberg's conclusion: "The Nook may be wonderful one day, but, as of today, it’s no match for the Kindle, despite advantages such as lending, because it’s more annoying to use."

David Pogue of the New York Times, writes that "Every one of the Nook’s vaunted distinctions comes fraught with buzz kill footnotes" and proceeds to rattle off problems with the color touchscreen feature, speed and book selection. Pogue concludes that Barnes & Noble has a "bad case of Ship-at-All-Costs-itis" and knocks Nook's "half-baked software," calling it "slower than an anesthetized slug in winter." Ouch.

Kindle, of course, took plenty of hits when the first version of the device hit the market two years ago. Will Nook weather the negative reviews to give Kindle a run for its money?

Follow my updates on Twitter.

About Eric Engleman

ERIC ENGLEMAN is senior technology staff writer for TechFlash and the Puget Sound Business Journal, covering online retail giant Amazon.com. Engleman tracks Amazon's increasingly complex business, spanning ecommerce, Kindle, cloud computing, and more. He's been covering technology and other industries for the Business Journal since 2003.

READ FULL BIOGRAPHY

206-876-5430

@ericengleman

Recent Sponsor Posts

Seattle University Software Engineering

Chinwe Okeke (MSE’08) pursued her graduate degree while working as a developer and technical analyst for the Boeing Company. She picked the SU-MSE program for small class sizes and real world learning opportunities offered through the academic service-learning and capstone projects.

The MSE program at Seattle University is geared for working professionals with classes offered in the evenings. The program builds upon the computing experience of its students and offers courses in a variety of technical and management areas of software engineering, with an emphasis on teamwork and a disciplined approach to problem solving.

MORE INFORMATION

Marchex is Hiring!

Marchex is one of Seattle’s largest ad technology companies with 300+ employees providing call and click based performance marketing products, and managing over $100m in ad budget for tens of thousands of advertisers. Our customers range from local businesses to the Fortune 500.

Our talented and creative product engineering group is hiring.

If you are an innovative software design engineer interested in solving difficult problems at scale, across a wide array of technologies from Lucene to Hadoop to Asterisk and SIP then we’d love to hear from you!

Apply now.

MORE INFORMATION

Technology Tax Planning – Did You Take The Deduction?

Technology companies require professional advisors who can assist in all aspects of the business. The BDO Technology Practice provides a full range of services tailored to help address the changing needs of domestic and international companies. In addition to core audit and tax services, BDO professionals can assist technology companies with:

· Revenue recognition

· Business combination accounting

· R&D tax credits

· Compensation and benefits

· Business valuations

Backed by 38 national offices and an international network in 110 countries, we have the domestic and global footprint to serve growing technology companies. Contact sphilpott@bdo.com (audit partner), mreeves@bdo.com (audit partner), psmith@bdo.com (tax partner), tzambito@bdovaluation.us.com (valuation), tfiscus@bdo.com, Director, 206.624.2020

MORE INFORMATION