Last week information on a patent application filed by Discovery Communications -- the company behind TV stations like BBC America, Discovery Channel, and others -- turned up. The patent application was for more than a Kindle fighting eBook reader.

Also tucked away in the application was a method that would allow public libraries to loan out digital readers with electronic copies of books installed. The readers themselves have line in and line out jacks along with coaxial in and out jacks.

That fact suggests multimedia capability, which is no surprise. The application describes the system as, "The distribution network may be an electronic book store, an Internet web site, a wired or wireless telecommunications network, an intranet, a radio program delivery system, a television program delivery system, including cable television, satellite television broadcast, and over-the-air broadcast, for example. The electronic book distribution network could include direct delivery through a mail delivery system of electronic books on a fixed media, such as a CD-ROM, for example."