Kindle has gotten a lot of press lately, but one persistent complaint by geeks (and some others) is that it is almost a dedicated device. That is, except for its clunky web-browser, it has one purpose: to allow the user to easily purchase and read books and similar content. Geeks are big on multifunction things, like the iPhone, which can make calls, browse the web, display books, recognize songs, level a picture frame, etc., etc. Of course, it does some of those things better than others. The screen is too small to make a truly good book reader, and it's LCD, not e-ink.

A new entrant in the multifunction arena is the Pixel Qi which addresses both those shortcomings. It's basically a netbook (a.k.a. a sub-notebook) but while the screen is LCD, they have managed to come close to e-ink in appearance (and to improve battery usage somewhat) by creating an almost black-and-white mode with a very, very dim LCD. It's a cool idea, and one that could earn the Pixel Qi some geek love.

No info yet on eyestrain comparisons, which for Voracious Readers (as opposed to geeks) is still a prime consideration— that and the ease of buying books. An interesting point was that the Pixel Qi founder mentioned in the video that she loved “her Kindle.” She even uses her own Kindle 1 in her demo/comparison.