SonyDigitalPaperpSNYNA-DPTS1_alternate4_v500Good E-Reader has a piece announcing the imminent demise of the Sony Digital Paper notepad. The problem is, Sony’s current online store for the U.S. knows of no such plans. We talked to the store. The real news is that the e-commerce site is shutting down August 28—not the discontinuation of the reader.

Sony’s future online operations instead will send people to  authorized retailers, a complete list of which is here. Alas, the list isn’t geographically organized. But you’ll presumably see some familiar names and can find out if Sony Digital Paper notepad will be available. What’s more you might be able to order the reader online through eBay outlets.

The fact that the reader was even for sale was news to me, as I hadn’t been aware that Sony had been selling it. We last mentioned it in 2013 when Sony was developing it, but they actually started selling it in May of 2014—and sold out of their distribution channels so fast they had to start selling it directly in August.

It seems to be a specialty device—a $799 13.3” e-ink notepad (originally $1,100 when they started selling it last year), with an attached stylus pen for writing on documents, that seems to see most of its use by businesses. That makes sense; they’d be most interested in being able to see documents displayed at their original size and make notes on them, and would be able to afford to drop a grand on a device that could do it. Certainly it has never been never connected to Sony’s consumer-facing e-book store that  closed down in February, 2014.

The slate is a boutique gadget and sold without customer service support. Apparently Sony’s telephone hotline to order it is quizzing potential buyers on their level of technical expertise and is refusing to sell it to them if they don’t know enough.

(Revised to reflect an update in The Digital Reader.)

2 COMMENTS

  1. Lawyers, who often have to deal with thousands of pages of digital documents only available as PDFs, were one market for such devices. And they can afford that steep $800 price tag, particularly since in means avoiding print costs.

    Even if a mass market in speciality epaper readers isn’t viable, it’d be great to see a limited production market to exist even at higher prices.

  2. Chris, why did you have to repeat the clickbait?

    If you had bothered to click through to the source then you would see that the real story is that Sony is shutting down its direct retail operation. Sony won’t be selling anything after 28 August, but that in no way should be interpreted to mean that Sony will stop making the stuff.

    Check your facts, dude.

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