Jon Stokes over at Ars thinks Kindle eBook reader has “missed the mark by a mile” since it doesn’t display two pages side by side:
Design all e-book readers to display pairs of pages in the traditional, facing-page format in which books were designed to be read. Sure, it would cost more money, but there are those of us who would pay more to read books using new technology as opposed to flipping back and forth through mere multipage documents.
When I first read this I dismissed it as a lone oddball opinion, but John Gruber seems to agree. I might be crazy, but I don’t really want to see two pages side by side. I love typography too, but being twice the size and more expensive is the absolute last thing the $400 Kindle needs. Mind you, they’re out of stock until next year, so somebody’s buying them. The more I read and think about eBook readers, the more my initial “Don’t touch my books and get off my lawn!” reaction fades, and I can imagine a world where books go the way of CDs.