Barnes & Noble Unveils $259 Nook E-book Reader

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 20, 2009 - 9:59am.

New York - Bookseller Barnes & Noble (NYSE: BKS) on Tuesday introduced its own e-book reader device, the $259 Nook, which features both a six-inch reading display and a color touch-screen display with virtual keyboard, The New York Times reported. The Nook sports both Wi-Fi connectivity, and a link to AT&T's 3G wireless network for browsing and purchasing e-book titles.

In a first for the space, the Nook will also allow owners to lend out e-books to one another for 14 days at a time -- a feature not available on Amazon's (NASD: AMZN) Kindle or other competing e-book readers.

The Times noted that Nook owners will limited to sharing an individual e-book title just once, with one other user.

The Nook's touchscreen display will allow users to scroll through images of book covers with links for purchasing from Barnes & Noble's e-book store, which at launch offers 700,000 titles.

The Nook is currently available for pre-order online, and will begin shipping in late November.

Barnes & Noble will also feature the Nook in kiosk displays at 1,300 of its retail store locations.

Related Links:
http://snipurl.com/sm9zd (NYT live blog)

http://snipurl.com/sm9z3 (WSJ)