[FilterJoe]

The Nook Color is an example of a $250 tablet with less functionality than an iPad. Though Barnes and Noble has not released any official sales figures, it is easily outselling all other tablets except for the iPad. This seems supportive of the authors assertions and I'm surprised this information was not included in the post.

http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20110708005437/en/Medi...

And the following is the first 2 paragraphs of a Q1 digitimes report:

Barnes & Noble already takes delivery of 3 million Nook Color e-book readers, say sources

Yenting Chen, Taipei; Steve Shen, DIGITIMES [Monday 28 March 2011]

Barnes & Noble has taken delivery of close to three million Nook Color e-book readers from its production partner, according to an estimate by sources from the Nook Color supply chain.

With a clear differentiation to Apple's iPads in display size, targeted market and pricing, the Nook Color, priced at US$249, has actually taken up over 50% of the iPad-like market in the North America market, indicated the sources.

EDIT: inserted (accidentally omitted) word

[drzaiusapelord]

But compared to an ipad or a Samsung Tab its terrible. I have one. Its VERY slow, it has no hardware buttons (annoying), no camera, no GPS, heavy for the size, underwhelming battery, etc. Using it as a tablet is a hack. I can get an Iconia for $399 right now that blows it away. Is an extra $150 worth it? Absolutely. Another $100 gets me an iPad2 or a Samsung.

I'm not sure what the magic price point is to get Joe Sixpack off his couch, but its probably around $200-$299. He just won't be happy with a Nook Color. I love this stuff, deal with its issues, and have a lot of patience with Android and I still find it annoying. He will just return it.

Of course, as an ebook its very nice, but an ebook is not a tablet. Half-assed tablets really is hurting Android's tablet image. Pre-Honeycomb junk on slow processors with no hardware buttons shouldn't be recommended.

[FilterJoe]

You're absolutely right that Nook Color is a far worse general purpose tablet, for all the reasons you mentioned. If the question though is how to carve out niches in the overall tablet market, then Color Nook answers with one possibility:

A sub $300 e-reader than can, in a pinch, work poorly as a tablet. The Color Nook can do quite a bit of what a typical person wants, right? Like consume news (Pulse), check and respond to e-mail, and browse text-heavy sites.

You can of course do so much more and so much better on an iPad or Galaxy Tab. But not everyone needs "so much more" enough to pay for it.

Surprising tidbit about the Color Nook: women love it for the women's magazines:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/23/business/media/23nook.html...

Not the profile of a typical hacker news member but hey - if there's a niche for a device you can stick in a purse to substitute for a handful of women's magazine's - what's wrong with that?

Maybe the market will bifurcate into iPads at Galaxy Tabs at the top, and a bunch of niches serviced with less expensive devices?

EDIT: reworded awkward sentence