The next wave of ePaper may be losing some of that old fashioned appeal. Current ePaper readers such as the Kindle need light in order to be read, just like when you’re looking over an actual newspaper.  With an increasing amount of eReaders (tablets) boasting backlight displays, most of us like to keep eInk a bit more traditional; like having to read with the aid of other light.  Reading without backlighting is also easier on the eyes.

Flex Lighting has a technology that could change ePaper as we know it. They make a very thin layer that distributes light evenly from hidden LEDs over the devices’s surface. Light is aimed toward the screen, and battery draw is low as only one or two LEDs are used. This extremely thin, flexible technology allows this to be practical for almost any display.  Based on existing technology, this method is said to be better than current lighting based on the same technology.

There is no word on how this technology will actually turn out when implemented with next generation eReaders.While it sounds great in theory, it seems that no one outside of Flex Lighting has gotten their hands on any prototypes yet.

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Hanvon chairman Yingjian Liu Photo: Michael Kwan

Chinese company Hanvon, makers of the Touchpad B10 tablet, are also known as Hanwang.  Chairman Yingjian Liu during a keynote speech at Computex 2010,  discussed the increasing popularity and evolution of the e-book reader. He proclaimed the strengths of the e-ink format and how his company was leading the way in his home country of China.  Then, his declarations got very bold. He called the e-book reader the “fourth screen,” referring to TV, PC, and cell phone as the other three screens. He observed that some people say the mobile phone will replace the e-reader, but he responded by saying that the e-ink book reader will replace cell phones instead.

It’s possible that something was lost in translation (he was speaking in Chinese and I was listening to the English interpreter), but I don’t think this Hanvon prediction will hold.  Everyone brings a phone with them everywhere, but I don’t foresee people carrying around their Kindles in the same way… and it’s not like people are going to use an iPad-like device to make quick phone calls in lieu of using an iPhone, right?

e-Reader e-ink displays are the "4th screen" Photo: Michael Kwan

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No color Kindle anytime soon. Photo: Gizmodo

It’s probably not completely fair to compare Amazon’s Jeff Bezos with the Soup Nazi from Seinfeld, but he is withholding something from us that we may have otherwise desired. According to the Amazon head honcho himself, we should not be expecting a color version of the Kindle any time soon.

The guys at Amazon on working on something, but a color Kindle is “still some ways out,” according to Bezos. That’s too bad, because I’m sure the launch of the Apple iPad has done nothing but harm sales numbers on the Kindle.

People like color. People like the faster refresh rates. People enjoy the all day battery life. Of the three, the Kindle can only offer the last one. Yes, I know that a regular LCD and an e-ink display are different beasts altogether, but the marketplace has spoken.

So, what is Amazon doing to fight back? There are signs that they are “beefing up” the Kindle team and we should probably expect some sort of update at some point, but that’s about it. If color is “some ways out,” what could the next Kindle bring to the e-book reading desk?

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