When it was released in late 2007, Amazon.com Inc.’s original Kindle electronic book reader turned a lot of heads and, eventually, a whole lot of pages. The much- loved product redefined ebook readers, and was perpetually out of stock.

So what kind of revolutionary new product did Amazon produce as a follow-up? One that looks a lot like the first Kindle. The Kindle 2 is certainly a sleeker and faster version of the original device, but all in all, not much different.

A little background: The Kindle wasn’t the first ebook reader to feature an Eink screen (which uses tiny shape-shifting ink-like capsules to produce print-quality text without any of the eye strain of LCD screens). But it became a breakthrough product because its high-speed wireless connection (from Sprint Nextel Corp.) allowed users to quickly download new books directly to their device from anywhere in the U.S., without paying extra.

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