Sneak peak at the Amazon Kindle 2 e-book

Amazon has developed the successor to its hugely popular e-book reader, though the makers had denied any claims of sending another into the market any soon. We know the sneaky geeks really give anyone a chance to cook beneath the hood - the lads at Boy Genius Report have leaked images of a Kindle that seems to be the number 2. The Kindle 2 looks good and is easy to use, and apart from having a larger screen, the buttons have been kept smaller than the previous version to avoid accidental page flipping. And the reader can be controlled with a joystick, which replaces the scroll wheel. The Kindle 2 doesn’t need a charger, as it can directly be charged through a miniUSB cable.

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Price and Availability: There is no information on either the dates of availability or pricing yet.

Watch This: The battery doesn't seem great and the SD card has been done away with. The reader uses EV-DO for downloads and comes with a leather pouch. Though it may have its shortcomings, the Kindle 2 definitely looks good and also seems promising.

Word around the Web:

Rob Beschizza on BBG says:

It's markedly uglier than Sony's reader, and more of a blandification than an improvement over the original.