Two separate developments in the eBooks/digital books world, reported by NYT:
—Amazon.com (NSDQ: AMZN) is launching an eBook device called The Kindle, in October, and will be priced at $400-$500 and will wirelessly (over EVDO connection) connect to Amazon’s site. The story says Amazon has been showing the Kindle to book publishers for the last year and has delayed its introduction several times. The screen is B&W, and and has no video capability, but has a keyboard to take take notes when reading or navigate the Web. Also, Amazon will pack some free reference books, and offer feeds from NYT, WSJ and others. One bummer for the industry: Amazon is using a proprietary eBook format from Mobipocket, a French company that Amazon bought in 2005, instead of supporting the open e-book standard backed by most major publishers and companies like Adobe.

SEE ALSO: Sony Reader Reviewed; Ebooks Still Hard To Cozy Up To

—Then Google, (NSDQ: GOOG) which has been digitizing books for some years now amidst various controversies on copyright issues, plans to start charging users for full online access to the digital copies of some books in its database, starting this Fall. Publishers will set the prices for their own books and share the revenue with Google. This will be separate from an effort called the Google Book Search Library Project, which is digitizing the collections of some libraries.

One thought: With Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) iPod Touch launch today (and even iPhone previously), the screen sizes and resolutions have gotten much better, even as battery life still sucks. But with Wi-Fi syncing with iPod Touch, what’s to prevent iTunes from offering eBooks? Or better still, for Amazon.com and other companies to offer such books downloaded through the browser for future read? Why develop a separate device?