[daveT]

Call me old-fashioned. I still want to own a library (a few thousand books) with an actual book-shelf. The books sitting there have a physical presence, and a reminder to re-read and share. That will not be possible with an e-book. Yes, you may have 100 "books" but you and only you can read it, and no one else will be able to borrow it or look through it at their own leisure.

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reduced production costs

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This is not true. Although reduced as in less paper and not having to pay free-lance artists, there will be an increase in marketing, research, and reformatting old books to fit this new device. It will be way more expensive than you foresee. It is not the physical as much as the mental work that will show an increase. You also cannot hire an illiterate monkey to retype and reformat all the books out there for minimum wages either.

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more profit for the publisher

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This is not true. People are not going to pay $30 for a book after they pay for these machines. People will pay $19 for a CD but pay $10 for an MP3 album. Why would the average consumer be willing to pay full price for a file?

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greater market share

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Probably not. People are going to buy books weather it is book or file format. Books aren't going to one day become uber-popular because they are more convenient to obtain. The files work for music because people did not want to pay full price for a CD containing 8 songs they didn't want to hear. It was buying the single that became popular. You can't buy chapter 10 and enjoy a book.

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easier to update and correct

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As in rewriting the story? Many authors are fine to write the next book and let the past be the past if it already published.

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quicker to market

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This would destroy the book business. A best seller only sells about 100k copies over it's lifetime. With all the noise even now, it is hard to garner any attention to the marketed books. An author still has to go to book signings and talk to promote a book. Unless the author is popular, the first few books of any author takes months, if not years to promote a book profitably.

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reach younger audience

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I don't think it matters here. The audience is there and not expandable. Certain people like to read, and certain others don't. How would you change that?

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interactive features (quizes, etc.)

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I would die if I couldn't play video slots on my cell phone.

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can display larger characters for visually disabled

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This is interesting. It is probably the best benefit to these books.

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multimedia features (video clips, etc.)

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We see how well the iPhone is doing. This is an interesting assertion, though, and I wonder what our world will be up to in a decade. I hope to have a piece of whatever it is.

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easy to store (for those of us with overflowing bookshelves)

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I stated above why I would like a library.