roarah - thanks for that link - interesting perspective. I also read another article about B&N transformation. It's a fascinating dilemma when a company has to cannibalize itself to survive - e-readers vs. print, printed checks vs. debit card, CDs vs. iTunes, etc. I'm actually part of a company that has been going through this. I work for what was a technology start-up that got acquired by a 100+ year old publisher. It's fascinating to be in the middle of the transformation.

just keep in mind that android tablets let you install the kindle app and the nook app so you can have all of those on one device. It really depends on your needs and wants as to what you get. the tablet with the best sound that I have owned was the vizio it had 3 speakers so no matter which direction you held it in you had stereo and the sound was fantastic. Wish more manufacturers would be more interested in the sound quality and take a lesson and put at least 3 or 4 speakers on them. I often struggle hearing with the one small speaker especially on my phone. I love love love my new Asus transformer tf300 10" tablet with dock but it too could use some improvement in the sound and speaker department. My husband still absolutely loves his lookbook in fact he now has his and mine and I am trying to make him transition over to my Vizio tablet so he has more options and can do other things on it. He is fighting me he wants to stick with his lookbook he is not a fan of the touch screen he keeps touching things by accident then I hear swearing lol. He is not a good student is all I have to say LOL That lookbook is extremely light weight you will not likely find any tablet that is that light.

Some tablets you can download books to your computer then just put them onto a memory card and insert card into tablet and read them from the memory card so in that case you would not need wifi. For a tablet to download right to the tablet you will need wifi to get the actual download then you can just have it on the tablet in memory and read it anytime. Some of the early Kindles you did not need wifi it had it's own built in that would connect only to the Amazon book store. I am not sure which ones still do that. My brother in law had one of the first Kindles and his was that way so he did not need wifi to get books. To do the memory card thing you must have a tablet that is able to use a memory card so has the slot for one. All of mine which are Android tablets do have memory card slots. I actually prefer to save the downloads to my pc and put them on memory cards so I have a back up copy. Now for the kindle books I get I download those from Amazon directly to my tablet and read using my Kindle app. So to answer your question it all depends on what you are getting and what features it has.

My 23 year old niece got a Kindle for Christmas from her parents, which is what DN23 asked for. She's single, working and reads in her spare time. She loves the thing. She gave me a quick demo, but I think before I would be able to master it myself I'd have to read/refer to 'the Kindle Book for Dummies aka JMToo'. Not hard just would take some time to discover and learn how to do what all it does. She got the Kindle and then also the 'jacket' for it, which is something I would also purchase if buying the kindle. They seem so fragile, well maybe exposed is a better word. DN23 uses her's often and has downloaded some great package deals (select x amount for x price). For me, I love the old tree books, can't begin to remember how many I've dropped in the bathtub though and the Kindle and I would have problems going together where I like to take my tree books. But that's just me. After seeing hers I've toyed with getting one for my DD10 but have decided not to just yet. My little one reads books on the computer from home that see accesses from our library online and for her right now that works. She can sit at her desk, read, I can see what she's doing/reading and so far she's happy enough . I think it will come rapidly though that a Kindle will be in her future, she loves to read and when we go into town her first place she wants to do is the book stores.