Creative Shows Off MediaBook Zii E-book Reader

Creative, maker of the Zen mp3 player, is making noises in the e-reader space and may be the next to announce an electronic book reading device. The company showed off a working prototype e-reader at its annual general meeting, according to EpiZenter.net. The Creative MediaBook sports a touchscreen, text to speech conversion, interenet connectivity and runs on the companys proprietary Zii operating system on a chip.

Creative's vice president of strategic business Willie Png, trashtalked on the Kindle at the meeting, calling it "just another electronic device which displays books in text" (thank you Captain Obvious), and added that Creative's e-reader will exploit "videos, pictures, text, and services in one device that supports a media-rich experience." More of a CrunchPad style tablet device then, it sounds like.

Creative is said to be talking to 10 international and local publishers to provide content for the device. Fiction, newspaper, magazines, education materials, and textbooks all are fair game for the device. Singapore Press Holdings, publisher of 17 newspapers and more than 100 magazines, may be one local content provider. The publisher controls a range of multimedia content, such as videos, images and radio programs, which could be used for content on the device. But how will the MediaBook distinguish itself in this increasingly crowded niche?

Price and availability: unknown as of yet.