But the Kindle already looks and feels outdated: Its black and gray screen brings to mind a black-and-white TV. Its controls can generously be described as clumsy.
The full-color iPad screen is almost twice as big as the Kindle’s. This makes a tremendous difference: If the Kindle screen is roughly the size of a single paperback page, the iPad, turned sideways, presents two pages side by side. Both enable readers to customize font size, but there will always be more words on the iPad page, more content to digest. The reading experience more closely resembles that of reading a physical book…
There are other book-like touches: turning a page on the iPad, as with several e-reader apps for the iPhone, features a touch-controlled animation of the page flipping, as quickly or slowly as your finger moves across the screen.
In addition, these pages look like pages — with (virtual) edges and a crease in the middle of any two-page spread. When you open the e-reader app, you see the image of a wood-grain bookshelf, on which your e-book library is kept. (In a charming touch, the bookshelf swings open like a secret door to access the ibookstore.)
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