Sony's E-Book Reader to Offer Lots More Reading Choices

Sony is going open source with its Reader Digital Book portable reading device ? sort of. The consumer electronics giant is throwing open the Reader to support an ebook format being used by major book publishers so it can offer more content to users.

This format, said Sony today, is called EPUB. It is known more technically as "the International Digital Publishing Forum?s XML-based standard format for reflowable digital books and publications." Many book publishers apparently are already publishing upcoming ebooks in this format and this is something Sony wants to capitalize on by making the Reader the first device of its type to support this.

The Reader model PRS-505, starting next month, will be able to let users access ebooks in the EPUB format. It will also support, said Sony, Adobe ebooks with DRM protection as well as "the capability to reflow standard text-based Portable Document Format (PDF) eBooks for improved flexibility and readability." These Adobe updates will be possible with the use of Adobe Digital Editions 1.5 software.

New PRS-505s will ship with the necessary software packages to transfer these ebooks to the readers. Existing owners will need to visit Sony's support Web site to download the software. If you'd rather wait for the updated model at retail, Sony added it will introduce a limited edition red PRS-505 unit next month.

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