Should one of your particularly crass friends boast about getting an e-book reader this holiday season, don't fret--your iPhone or iPod touch can be a perfectly fine reading tool with the help of some third-party apps. took home our App Gem award for our favorite e-book app, but we're also quite smitten with . As for that crass friend who wants to flaunt his Kindle 2 or Kindle DX, simply show him the app; you might also subtly mention that Amazon's mobile app is a free download. (For more on iPhone reading apps, check out Ben Boychuk's .)

We can't talk about reading things on the iPhone without also mentioning the terrific , which lets you save Web articles for reading later at your leisure.

I certainly wouldn't want to step on the toes of my colleague, Glenn Fleishman, who wrote what has to be the definitive round-up of . (Spoiler alert: and took the top ratings in Glenn's comparative review.)