We’ve read lots of posts about whether or not to get an e-reader and we’ve seen lots of posts commenting on the various features each device offers but have we talked about what happens when the bookstore supporting it goes belly up? I mean, what would happen if B&N or Amazon ceased to exist?

The book group that I participate in meets in the community room of the public library. We are going through a bit of a transition now, because the city has decided to take over the library system. The transition period is expected to be about four months long and although there will be services available…how we get books, request books, and pick-up books is sort of unknown at this time.

In addition to that, our local Borders is closing, which was our back-up meeting place, and it’s left us feeling sort of insecure about the availability of books in general.

As I drove home, I was comforted by the fact that I can still download what I need to my Kindle. Yeah, there is security in that, but then I got to wondering what would happen if Amazon crashed and burned. My device would be useless, right? Even though you might have content on it, you wouldn’t have support for it and you wouldn’t be able to download anything.

With B&N, the Nook allows you to download other formats, so even if B&N went belly up, you could in theory still download other formats, but you wouldn’t have the support of B&N.

Am I right to think this, or would the device just not work anymore because of Wi-Fi/3G contracts being canceled? Both Amazon and B&N say they can suspend the service at any time. My guess is that the device would become a lovely paperweight at that point.

I’m curious if any of you who recently bought an e-reader considered the stability of the company before making your purchase. As most of you know I bought the Kindle for the design of the device, not so much for Amazon (as I am not a fan) but now that Amazon is screwing over the Kindle 2 owners by not providing the same software upgrades that they do for Kindle 3 owners, my feelings towards Amazon have soured even more. But, is Amazon more stable?  Not sure. What do you think?

Oh, and for those of you who say go with the iPad (and you will), I probably won’t only because I work on a computer all day long. I don’t think I could look at a computer screen to read, too.