It's a good move for Sony, who is taking the populist approach here. Not only have they lowered the price on devices that use the easy-on-the-eyes but notoriously expensive E-Ink display, but they are also dropping the price of bestsellers and new-release books from $12 to $10 a pop, to get in line with Amazon.

Beyond that, they recently got Google to chip in 1 million public-domain books to their bookstore, available to you for the lovely price of $0.00, and continue to stress that you can sideload all kinds of stuff to a Sony Reader that you can't just copy over to most Kindles, such as PDFs and Word docs, not to mention "check out" digital books from libraries via OverDrive.

To top it all off, Sony is adding a Mac client, so that owners can load up purchased content via either computer platform. The new Readers themselves will load up either software automatically when connected to the computer—no pesky CD-ROM required. (Owners of the PRS-505 and the PRS-700 will be able to download the Mac client and a firmware update at the time of launch, late this month.)

Am I excited? Yes, for a couple of reasons. Not only does the openness, uncharacteristic of Sony in general, show good will, it ensures that the Sony Reader won't just go down in history as one of Sony's great but all-too-proprietary ideas. Forget even the Mac software and the free books—real proof of openness is that in addition to Memory Sticks, these Readers take SD cards!

The Pocket Edition (PRS-300) will come in pink, silver and blue, and have toggle buttons on the side. Five inches is kinda small for a screen, but presumably it's good for fans of pulp fiction.

The Touch Edition (PRS-600), is a bigger deal on many levels. You may recall I pretty much loathed the PRS-700, because its touchscreen was plagued with glare, and overly layered. I haven't seen the new touch model, but I am ensured that this was a chief concern during the development of the PRS-600, and that it's far easier to read than the PRS-700. The side lighting has been stripped out, so you still need a separate light source, but the side light was such a bad idea, I am happy to hear about this fix.

And as for wireless, I am glad Sony is up front about working on something that would truly rival the Kindle. It will be interesting to see how Sony rolls out a PC-free ebook platform. The word from Sony to us today: "As announced earlier, we will be bringing a wireless product to market. The particulars of 'when' and 'how much' will come later. Wireless is important and wireless is coming from Sony."

This isn't a review—we still need to check out the hardware, and some who have seen the touchscreen PRS-600 mention it's sluggish and "underwhelming." Presumably, the software kinks are still being worked out. We'll let you know the deal when we see final product. [Sony eBooks]

Seriously, this thing has a fatal design flaw. The translucent layer that adds both the touchscreen and sidelight functions picks up so much ambient light from every angle, it's impossible to read with even the most lowly of night-stand lamps turned on. I noticed it first in the bathroom, where there's lots of light, and then tried to read in bed, and ended up putting it aside, choosing instead the Kindle which, like the older Sony PRS-505, has minimal glare.

You can see it here, demonstrating the cover page of my test book, Why We Suck, by Dr. Denis Leary. The book was chosen arbitrarily (I wanted to read it), but somehow the title has become all too appropriate in the case of the 700:Even when I tried to minimize glare for a nice side-by-side shot, you can see how the limited light that does get through gives unpredictable texture to the Reader, while leaving the Kindle more or less unblemished:A year ago almost to the day, I showed you the Amazon Kindle and the Sony 500-series Reader in a face off that left a lot of readers caught in the middle. The Kindle had usability benefits—download direct to device; nice button array—that the Reader did not. Meanwhile, the Sony had a friendliness to third-party files that Amazon did not share. Clearly, in devising the 700, Sony believed it was adding in some killer advantages that could upset the $360 Kindle's popularity.

The new features are neat-ish, I will hand that to Sony. I particularly enjoyed flicking pages by running my finger to the right or left. It was intuitive enough that I simply guessed at the feature. The sidelight, too, can come in handy if you sleep with someone who's particularly photosensitive. I am fortunate enough to have a wife who doesn't mind me turning my light on after she's gone to sleep, but I can see how the sidelight could be huge for those in more oppressive domestic situations. The button array, too, makes a lot more sense. In addition to intuitive touch commands, you have the forward and back page turn buttons, plus the Back, Home, Search, Zoom and Option keys, all which come with more-or-less clear intentions. (I say "more or less" because the 700's zoom is the same as the Kindle's font sizer—that is, however you set it stays that way until you change it, rather than being some temporary state of magnification.)

Sony didn't make much improvement to the eBook Library app that you need to run, on PCs only, to load DRM books onto the Reader, but to be honest, it doesn't need a lot. Books aren't like music—you're not managing thousands of them all at once, so a simple interface is the best. I still prefer buying books right there on the Kindle, but again given the slow-moving nature of books, I am not certain that's a make-or-break attribute. (For additional interface-comparison issues, much of last year's report is still relevant.)

So props, I guess, to Sony for rethinking the physical interface and for charging into the new territories of sidelighting and touchscreen. But seriously—seriously—did anyone bother to try to read a book on this thing before you started manufacturing them by the thousands? If you like Sony, buy the $300 PRS-505. As for the PRS-700, to use Dr. Peter Venkman's clinical terminology, that chick is toast. [Sony Readers (good and bad)]