Barnes and Noble Nook Color leaked by own site

Barnes & Noble tonight gave away its plans for its event on Tuesday with a product page (since pulled) for an accessory. Its own store made mention of a screen protector film for the Nook Color and showed an image of the device itself. CNET's view would be closer to a full tablet with a full touchscreen (likely LCD) in place of the split e-paper and mini-LCD on the existing Nooks.

The hardware as rumored so far would still run Android on its seven-inch display and may become indirect competition to the iPad and other reading-friendly slates, although the prior source had suggest that it would cost just $249 and likely carry a stripped-down feature set compared to either Apple's hardware or a full Android tablet like the Samsung Galaxy Tab. Multi-touch is known to be a feature as some enhanced books will support the features.

Alongside the reader itself, Barnes & Noble is also known through a update that it's producing a child-oriented book app known as Nook Kids (link active soon). The platform will provide about 12,000 children's books across 15 publishers that are designed specifically for the Nook Color, iPad and other color touchscreen devices: some books will have an embedded spoken version of the book, while others will have interactive elements or let users pinch to zoom photos or double-tap the text.

The project has the endorsement of major publishers like HarperCollins and Random House, and should launch before the end of the year, the WSJ learned. It will likely be available first on the Nook Color, although a specific Nook Kids app should be available for the iPad.

By Electronista Staff