Monday, November 19, 2007

Sounding the death knell for print newspapers


The first reverbations from the long-feared death knell of mid-sized urban print newspapers now sound as mega-online retail king Amazon touts its new "Kindle," a book-sized electronic reader that now offers the New York Times, the Washington Post and, gasp, 88,000 best sellers in a take-anywhere, read anywhere format.

Buy a book for Kindle -- $9.99 for New York Times bestsellers -- and it's delivered in less than a minute.

I haven't seen it yet in person, but given Amazon's claim that its screen "looks and reads like real paper," I imagine that day is not long in coming.

Just think of all of the trees this will save. And the new museums it will create when the next generation of kids wants to see how great-grandpa read his morning paper.

Good grief.