Right now, the best eBook readers are from the big guys—B&N and Amazon—in terms of both the hardware and the convenience of use. But what it someone else developed a killer feature, like multitouch? What then?

The Bookeen Orizon eBook reader, due this May for $250, features a 6-inch, 800×600 display, along with Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, 1GB of storage, microSD and an accelerometer. It can read both ePub and PDF.

But its standout feature, the reason anyone is talking about it, is multitouch support on the display. Unfortunately, I can’t come up with a single reason that’d be useful. On LCDs with instantaneous refresh rates, multitouch expands functionality exponentially, from button presses to realtime gestures. On electronic paper, you’re faced with a noticeable, inherent delay every time you’d just like to flip a page.

Pinch to zoom becomes pinch…screen flashes black…screen flashes white…oops I zoomed too much, but maybe you could make a game out of it or something. [E-reader-info via Electronista]

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