Yesterday, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos announced the Kindle 2, the second generation of the company's surprisingly successful electronic reader. Like the first-generation Kindle, the new device can download newspapers, magazines, blogs and any of the 230,000 books available in Amazon's Kindle store, all via wireless technology that uses a free-of-charge cellular phone network. Special features of the Kindle 2 include a longer batter life, faster loading, more storage, a slimmer design and a text-to-speech function. The price is still high—$359, at present—and some aspects of the device's design remain clunky. Also, the Kindle 2's screen is still in black-and-white, not color—although anyone who's used a Kindle can attest to how vivid and print-like that black-and-white screen looks.