Amazon has announced the Kindle DX, a new version of their e-book reader with a 9.7-inch screen. Unless I’ve got my numbers wrong, that makes it larger than the standard manga page, though not quite as big as the standard American comic book page. And it’s only 1/3 of an inch thick, comparable to a typical trade paperback.
This could be the first e-reader device suitable for simply taking comics formatted for the printed page and transferring them to a tablet. No need to break it down and show one panel at a time like most iPhone or Android comics. No need to zoom and pan. Just transfer the whole page.
Sure, it’s only black and white, but there are plenty of comics produced in B&W, or reformatted for printing in cheap collections like Marvel Essentials or DC’s Showcase Presents series.
Imagine 30 years of Justice League of America or Spider-Man in the space of the latest trade.
The only drawback is the steep price tag: at $489, I’m not picking one up anytime soon.
If I were DC, I’d release the entire Batman: Black and White series for this toot sweet. Even if the Kindle DX isn’t in color, it will be one day, and they might as well get people used to reading comics on these devices ahead of time.
Good idea – take material that’s already in B&W and get in on the ground floor.
With paper comics that one doesn’t like he can smash flies on a wall. With Kindle it would be expensive. Kidding…