Electronic paper, also called e-paper or electronic ink display is a display technology designed to mimic the appearance of ordinary ink on paper. Unlike a conventional flat panel display, which uses a backlight to illuminate its pixels, electronic paper reflects light like ordinary paper and is capable of holding text and images indefinitely without drawing electricity, while allowing the image to be changed later.
To build e-paper, several different technologies exist, some using plastic substrate and electronics so that the display is flexible. E-paper is considered more comfortable to read than conventional displays. This is due to the stable image, which does not need to be refreshed constantly, the wider viewing angle, and the fact that it reflects ambient light rather than emitting its own light. An e-paper display can be read in direct sunlight without the image fading. Lightweight and durable, e-paper can currently provide only a monochrome display, e.g., black on white. The contrast ratio in available displays as of 2008 might be described as similar to that of newspaper, though newly-developed implementations are slightly better. There is ongoing competition among manufacturers to provide full-color capability.
Applications include e-book readers capable of displaying digital versions of books and e-paper magazines, electronic pricing labels in retail shops, and general signage time tables at bus stations, electronic billboards, the mobile phone Motorola FONE F3, and the e-book display device Amazon Kindle.
Electronic paper should not be confused with digital paper, which is a pad to create handwritten digital documents with a digital pen.
I love the kindle! I have only owned it for 2 weeks, but have already finished 4 rather large books on it.
Here is what I have noticed so far:
- I always used to loose my place when reading a real book, but the kindle makes it very hard for this to happen, it even
syncs the last page read between devices (if you find yourself reading a part of a book on an iphone for instance)
- I can read through books much faster than I used to be able to (since I have been working I have only read at most a book a month — never would I dream 2 books a week!) I attribute a lot of this to the ability to increase the font size (with my bad eyes I found my self squinting reading normal books)
- I learn more about what I’m reading. I used to come across words I didn’t know, and just try to figure out the meaning from the surrounding text. Nothing beats being able to quickly get a dictionary definition, wikipedia entry, or google search result on an unfamiliar word.
- Can read without interruption when its windy outside!
- Can carry huge 1000 page books that most people would feel silly hauling around.
- Great for reading through large work documents (with the ability to quickly search, highlight and add notes)
- Can send and receive email from anywhere in the United States (via gmail on the built-in browser)!
And all this from something that cost the same price as one high quality book shelf (which would never hold 1500 books).