emPower wants to change the way that you use your reading glasses. Now they will need to be charged. The emPower glasses have tiny batteries inside, which power microchips that are capable of turning extra reading power on and off as needed.

The idea is that these would phase out bifocals, which older people often need. These glasses will use liquid crystals to simulate the lower part of the lens in a pair of bifocals. The crystals can change how the lenses refract or bend light, similar to how standard glasses do this with different levels of thickness.

In addition to announcing their new Amazon app for the new BlackBerry PlayBook, Amazon has also announced a new way to read its electronic books, Amazon Kindle for the Web.

Amazon Kindle for the Web lets you read samples of books online in your web browser, without having to download or install anything extra. You can also share samples of books with your friends through a variety of social networks as well. Amazon Kindle for the Web has been released in beta.

Barnes & Noble has announced the NOOKstudy online reading and study platform for students. The program allows students to manage eBooks and notes all in one place. Users will be able to access their textbooks, lecture notes, slides, images etc all from one place, which should make their college lives easier.

The best part is that students won’t have to carry those heavy textbooks around like they used to. It might save their aching backs. NOOKstudy is compatible with both Macs and Windows PCs, and is already being used in research institutions. Pretty nice.

According to a survey, when you compare the reading speed of a paper book with the Apple iPad and Amazon Kindle 2, those devices will slow you down by as much as 10.7%.

The participants took an average of 17 minutes and 20 seconds to read each story, but were found to read 6.2% slower than printed paper when using an iPad and 10.7% slower on the Kindle. The participants apparently complained about the iPad’s weight and the Kindle’s weak contrast.

Reading is awesome. It will expand your horizons, take you on amazing adventures etc. But sitting down to read isn’t helping you stay slim. These circular walking bookshelves can help you workout your body along with your brain.

Artist David Garcia has built a prototype. However this should be marketed for holding video games, not books. That’s where we need the exercise. You’ll need a large room for this thing, but it will keep you fit.

e-readers aren’t for everybody. Some people like enjoy a novel while turning actual physical pages. That’s where this invention comes in handy. Especially if you aren’t able to turn pages yourself. Book Time managed to get itself a Robot of the Year award over in Japan.

It holds down books and magazines and automatically flips pages and keeps them from flapping in the breeze. We aren’t sure if this it’s voice activated or not, but it should be. It would be great for the disabled as well as the lazy.

LeapFrog is all about children’s educational toys, and their latest stays true to what they are all about. The Tag Junior targets two to four year olds and improves on it’s predecessor’s Tag Reading System technology.

The Tag Junior will read downloaded MP3s and use an infrared camera to figure out letters and words on the page. It has enough memory to store up to five books’ worth of material. Some familiar characters include Winnie the Pooh and Dora the Explorer. The device will hit the shelves this summer for $34.99.

Some of us still read actual paper books at night in bed. If you are not alone in bed, that can be a problem. An overhead light just won’t work. Even a typical small lamp will keep your significant other awake.

So if you’re going to invest in a quality lamp to read by, consider something like this odd little lamp. It has the quirky design of a miniature man reading a book, and the book functions as a lampshade. He’s made from polished zinc, and could actually be considered a small piece of art as well. He’s only £28.50.