Back in July, I wrote a post entitled eReaders: Where did they all go?, where I took a look at some of the then "hot" eReading devices expected to make a big splash this year but which I hadn't yet seen a lot of.
Now, cnet has asked a similar question and reported the answer via a series of photos.
A bevy of new e-book readers made their debuts at CES 2010. A year later, here's a look back at how they fared as CES 2011 approaches.
In their feature, they look at such eReaders as the Aluratek Libre, Plastic Logic Que, Bookeen Orizon, and even the Demy digital recipe reader (talk about specialization).
It's interesting to see the initial price points (and how they dropped), as well as which readers actually went somewhere and which vanished from the face of the earth (or haven't been seen in the U.S. and probably never will). There's no doubt the iPad had a lot to do with this. Before Apple's tablet device, manufacturers were getting ready to ask a premium for new eReaders and Amazon was already charging $259 for their 3G only Kindle (there was no wi-fi option at that time). Since the release of the iPad, the Kindle, the dominant player in the market, has gone through several price cuts as has the nook. Some other eReaders that were scheduled for release were postponed or cancelled altogether.
I fully believe we are only at the beginning of this digital revolution in publishing. There will be winners, and there will be losers. Such is the nature of free market economics.
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