Nook Hacked — can Kindle App be Far Behind?

Several weeks ago I wrote that Jeff Bezos has said the reading of Kindle books, and the hardware we know as the Kindle, are separate businesses.  In that post I posited the idea that in addition to having Kindle apps on the iPhone, the Mac and Windows platforms, they might expand into Android based platforms, including the Barnes and Noble Nook.

Well, it didn’t take long before the Nook was hacked, and the possibilities are, while not quite endless, quite broad.  Wired Magazine reports:

If you tear open a Nook (which the team has done) you’ll find that the Android operating system is contained on a microSD card (separate from the microSD expansion slot). From here, it’s a simple matter of using a card reader to mount this card on your computer and changing a single word in the init.rc file (the file that’s in charge of which services are begun at startup, similar to a Linux boot).

This single hack will let you plug the Nook into your computer (once you have reassembled it) and access the OS, using the freely available Google Android developers kit.

The short article goes on to point out that, while for now the possibilities are limited to only a few hackers, it does mean that you have a device, with a fully capable Android operating system, running (for free) on a wireless (cellphone) network.  Imagine the possibilities!

Well, I have.

Kindle, on the Nook.  Anyone want to predict when?