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Today, Amazon.com released the new Kindle eBook Reader. While anyone that reads tech blogs knew it was coming, it’s still an exciting announcement. The reader uses the same eInk technology that powers the Sony ebook reader, which basically consists of little balls that have a black side and a white side. Magnets inside the machine control the balls and flip them depending on the text. Apparently, the eInk process looks amazing and is much closer to reading a book than the last generation of eBook readers.

If I lived in a city with decent public transportation, I would be all over the Kindle. Not only are books available, but a lot of newspapers as well. The New York Times and Wall Street Journal are available for $10/mo. Most NYT bestsellers are $9.99. The web search could use a little help. Searching for “bible” brings up 13 books before the first version of the actual Bible shows up (including “The Atheist’s Bible” and “Bad Girls of the Bible”). I couldn’t even find a NIV translation (the most widely used) in the first four pages of results.

The machine itself doesn’t need a computer to function. The Kindle has a built in EV-DO modem which connects to the Sprint cell network for downloading or shopping. You can literally shop anywhere that has a Sprint signal. The Kindle lasts for days on a single two hour charge because the eInk technology only uses energy when changing pages.

Engadget, who broke the initial story on the Kindle a year ago, has a hands on and more information (like you can link 6 Kindles to each account and there are no reading locks, so two people can read the same thing at the same time). They seemed to be impressed with the final device.

One thing that does bug me is that Amazon is charging for blog feeds. It doesn’t have a generic RSS feed reader, but you can subscribe to Amazon-approved blogs for a monthly fee. Also, the device uses a proprietary format, but does support both Audible and the mp3 format for audiobooks. Apparently, you can e-mail the device (each one has an e-mail account) other file formats that Amazon will convert for the Kindle. Plus, all purchases are backed up by Amazon and can be redownloaded free of charge (a nice touch for anyone that has an iPod and knows what it’s like to lose everything).

Overall, it looks like a pretty sweet device. The $399 cost may put some people off, but I expect that price to drop in the future. Once it does, I may seriously look at it as a replacement for paper books.