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Tag: Amazon

  • Kindle Fire Gaming Gets A Facelift

    The Kindle Fire, and its new HD iteration, want to be the gaming tablet of choice. For now, Apple’s iPad is the king of mobile gaming, but the Kindle Fire HD can easily catch up. To that end, Amazon is introducing a number of new aesthetic features that developers can take advantage of.

    The big change is that Amazon now prominently displays games in their own product category on the Kindle Fire. The game category even supersedes more traditionally popular products like Apps and Books. In fact, games are the first thing customers will see when they navigate through the store.

    Kindle Fire Gaming

    Aside from their prominence on the store, the Kindle Fire now has a games library. Here players can see all the games that they own, sorted by most recently played. Games that have Amazon GameCircle integration will also display friends, leaderboards and achievements next to each title.

    Kindle Fire Gaming

    Once a player navigates to a game’s page, they will be greeted by a summary page that details your friend’s ranking, player scores and the next achievement to earn.

    Kindle Fire Gaming

    The advent of Amazon GameCircle also brings some new features to social gaming on the Kindle Fire. It’s no longer just about comparing high scores or playing together, but comparing achievements. Kindle Fire gamers have the potential to become a slave to whatever sick and twisted achievements you as a developer can come up with.

    Kindle Fire Gaming

    Amazon points out that developers need only integrate GameCircle achievement and leaderboards to their games to take advantage of the new Kindle Fire gaming experience. Games that integrate GameCircle are also highlighted in the Amazon Appstore, thus increased visibility. Once again, Amazon makes a compelling argument for tailoring games to their platform. It will become apparent in the coming months if developers take them up on their offer.

    Interested developers can access the GameCircle and Whispersync APIs right now. Think up some really brutal achievements while your’e at it.

  • iFixit Tears Down The Kindle Fire HD, Finds It Easy To Repair

    iFixit is one of the greatest sites on the Internet today. There’s something euphoric about watching electronic devices being reduced to their core components. Of course, it was only a matter of time before they got their hands on the new Kindle Fire HD. How easy is it repair Amazon’s new wonder device? Let’s find out.

    The guys at iFixit found that the Kindle Fire HD has a repairability of seven out of 10. This puts it in the upper echelon of easily repaired devices. It’s good news for those who don’t want to spend money on an entirely new device if the current one were to break.

    Of course, you cam here to look at the innards of the device and iFixit provides the goods. Here’s the side-by-side comparison of the Kindle Fire HD (right) and the new SD Kindle Fire (left). They point out that the new non-HD Kindle Fire is almost identical to last year’s Fire albeit some slight changes to the motherboards design.

    iFixIt Kindle Fire HD

    As for the Kindle Fire HD, they praise the ease at which they can remove the battery. More and more electronics are beginning to glue the battery to their devices which makes removal almost impossible. Looking at you, Apple.

    The motherboard is also easily removed. They did have some trouble with the copper tape that covers the processor, but that’s to be expected with modern tablet computers. You’re going to need a razor blade to remove the copper tape, but be careful not to tear it.

    iFixIt Kindle Fire HD

    Just for fun, here’s the Kindle Fire HD’s motherboard all by itself. The model that iFixit has features 16GB of Flash Memory, 1GB of RAM, a TI OMAP 4460 processor, and the GPS receiver.

    iFixIt Kindle Fire HD

    So far, the Kindle Fire HD sounds like a pretty good tablet as far as repairability goes. Why did the device get a seven out of 10? The answer lies in the LCD and front glass panel. The Kindle Fire HD fuses them together which means you have to replace both if either breaks. It’s unfortunate, but not a deal breaker.

    iFixIt Kindle Fire HD

    Check out the rest of iFixit’s report to see all the nitty gritty details on repairing both the Kindle Fire HD and the redesigned Kindle Fire. Like always, it’s the most comprehensive breakdown you’ll find on the Internet. I personally can’t wait until they get their hands on the iPhone 5 next week. It will be interesting to see if Apple continues their course of making it hard for people to repair their own phones.

  • Amazon Takes Competition With Google Up A Notch

    A few months back, Amazon acquired 3D-mapping startup UpNext, signaling its plans to enter mapping territory, and now Amazon is encouraging those developing apps for its new Kindle Fire devices to move away from Google Maps and go full on Amazon.

    When Amazon announced the Kindle Fire HD, it also made the Amazon Maps API available to developers.

    “The Amazon Maps API makes it easy for you to integrate mapping functionality into apps that run on the all-new Kindle Fire and Kindle Fire HD,” says Amazon in a blog post. “These new devices will also support location-based services through the android.location API.”

    “The Amazon Maps API provides a simple migration path for developers who are already using the native Google Maps API on Android,” Amazon adds.

    With Amazon’s Maps API, developers can embed an interactive map view in their apps for customers to pan and zoom. They can optionally display users’ location and switch between standard maps and satellite view. They can also display locations of businesses, landmarks and other points of interest with customized markers and pins.

    The API is currently in beta.

    Amazon has also been said to be working with Nokia on maps (h/t: TNW).

    Here’s an UpNext Maps demo on an iPhone:

    Amazon and Google are establishing themselves as direct competitors more and more, and this is just the latest move in the competitive chess game. It also follows a report from The New York Times indicating that more people are beginning product searches on Amazon and less are beginning them on Google.

    In other words, Amazon is taking searches away from Google. What kind of effect will the Maps API move have on Amazon device users? That remains to be seen, but it can’t be good for Google, aside from helping the company’s argument against those calling it a monopoly.

    This is just in the search realm, and is not even taking into consideration other areas where these two companies compete, like web services and even browsers now (Amazon’s Silk browser got an upgrade with the new Kindle Fire devices).

    Obviously Amazon and Google are also both competing with Apple. Apple, as you probably know, recently dropped Google Maps from iOS devices, in favor of its own Maps offering, and it appears that even that is having a more widespread effect than originally thought. TechCrunch is reporting today that Russian Google competitor Yandex is now powering Apple’s iOS 6 mapping service in Russia, with a bigger deal apparently on the horizon for Yandex to become the default search on the mobile version of Apple’s Safari browser.

    Something else to think about – Apple and Facebook seem to be cozying up a bit lately, and Facebook has admitted plans to enter the search game, while at the same time dismissing the idea of offering its own hardware. Just saying.

  • Wii U Won’t Be Available For Pre-Order At Amazon

    The Wii U’s price and release date were announced yesterday. It’s launching on November 18 and will be available in two flavors – one for $299 and the other for $349. It’s now up for pre-order across the land with GameStop running some deals for those who trade in a Wii for the Wii U. One retailer, perhaps the biggest of all, is not stocking the Wii U for unknown reasons.

    According to Joystiq, Amazon just sent out this notice to customers who wanted to be updated on the Wii U:

    Dear Amazon.com Customer, Thank for you signing up to be notified when the Wii U is available. Unfortunately the Wii U console is not available at Amazon.com at this time but please check back in the future, as availability may change. We do have the latest Wii U games and accessories available now so check them out. Thank you for shopping with Amazon Video Games.

    This basically translate to Amazon saying that they won’t be taking pre-orders on the Wii U, nor will they be selling it. It’s actually kind of expected since Amazon doesn’t sell the Wii or the 3DS. Both consoles are sold by another store that sells through the Amazon marketplace.

    This has been going on for a while now and nobody knows why. It’s unclear if Amazon or Nintendo have a beef with the other or if they both just mutually hate each other. It’s just mind boggling that a major retailer like Amazon wouldn’t want to be in on the launch of a new console.

    We’ve reached out to Amazon for comment. We’ll update if we hear back.

  • Kindle Fire HD Shipments to Top 5 Million This Fall

    The Kindle Fire HD launches tomorrow, upping the stakes once again in what appears to be a competitive mini-tablet market. As a media retailer, Amazon is well-positioned to take advantage of their tablets as media consumption devices. Though the original Kindle Fire wasn’t the most powerful tablet and ran on a very limited OS, sales were good enough that millions of the devices were sold.

    This week, Digitimes Research analyst James Wang predicted that between the 7-inch Kindle Fire HD and the 8.9-inch Kindle Fire HD, Amazon will ship at least 5 million units this fall. Wang estimates that total shipments for the 7-inch model will top 2.9 million, while the 8.9-inch model will ship around 2.2 million units.

    Wang estimates that the 7-inch model will ship 500,000 units in September alone, and close to 1 million in October. He also said that he expects the 8.9-inch version to sell around 3.5 to 4 million units before being “phased out of the market.”

    This isn’t even counting sales of the upgraded original Kindle Fire at its new $160 price, or the new Kindle Paperwhite. Also, as Apple did not mention their upcoming iPad Mini at their big announcement celebration yesterday, the Kindle Fire HD will now get a head start on its competition. It seems Amazon might have done what no tech company in the past decade has been able to do: beat Apple to a new market (the mini-tablet, in this case) and establish a dominant foothold.

  • Amazon Details Kindle Fire HD Development Requirements

    The Kindle Fire HD is launching later this week. Amazon needs developers on board to make sure early adopters have plenty of apps to use once they get their hands on the device in the coming weeks. They already released the tools that developers will need, but they’re now just getting around to detailing the requirements.

    The Kindle Fire and Fire HD are a lot like the iPad 2 and “new iPad.” Apps can work on both devices, but developers are encouraged to create their apps with both devices in mind. That means making apps that take advantage of the higher screen resolution afforded by the better hardware. To that end, Amazon has released a few materials for developing HD apps.

    First and foremost, Amazon says that all apps should support the three resolutions across the Kindle Fire line – 1024×600, 1280×800 and 1920×1200. The first two resolutions will be available on Kindle Fire devices later this week. Developers have until November 20 to take advantage of the massive resolution afforded by the 8.9-inch Kindle Fire HD. They have also created the “User Experience Guidelines” that will show developers how to best make use of screen real estate.

    Developing for Kindle Fire HD also means that you will be developing for Android 4.0. It’s a highly modded version of the popular mobile OS, but it still contains a lot of the same code from ICS. Amazon has added their own software in the form of API 15. Developers should get used to both when developing for the Kindle Fire HD. Amazon has prepared a “Development Best Practices” guide for those who are now just starting to develop for ICS with Kindle Fire HD.

    Amazon also suggests that developers implement hardware acceleration, which is afforded by ICS, into their apps. To do this, you will need to add support for the Android 4.0.3 API 15 libraries. Hardware acceleration wil be especially important for apps that rely on video or animation for movement. It will create a much smoother experience for the end user.

    Developers wanting to hop on board the Kindle Fire HD gravy train need only join the Mobile App Distribution Portal. From there, you can download the Amazon Mobile App SDK and submit your apps for approval.

    The Kindle Fire HD has the potential to finally take on the iPad at its own game. Developers will want to jump on board before it really takes off. Getting the first big hit on the Kindle Fire HD will ensure success down the road as well.

  • Amazon Is Taking Searches Away From Google

    People are starting their product searches on Amazon.com more, and on Google.com (and other search engines) less, according to a report from the New York Times.

    That should bode well for Google in any arguments it may face against regulators, regarding antitrust, which is probably why one Googler shared the report on Twitter this morning:

    The Times reports:

    In 2009, nearly a quarter of shoppers started research for an online purchase on a search engine like Google and 18 percent started on Amazon, according to a Forrester Research study. By last year, almost a third started on Amazon and just 13 percent on a search engine. Product searches on Amazon have grown 73 percent over the last year while searches on Google Shopping have been flat, according to comScore.

    This is exactly the kind of threat that Google faces when it comes to diminishing search market share. While Microsoft’s Bing poses some threat, Google is likely more worried about losing market share piece by piece in different verticals – more product searches going to Amazon being a prime example. I wonder how many other searches are being lost to Amazon by way of IMDB.

    Amazon seems to be doing its part to reduce Google’s share of the search market in other ways as well. Last week, the company unveiled its new line of Kindle Fire devices, and its Silk browser, which comes on them, has Bing set as the default search engine.

  • Don’t Want Ads On Your Kindle Fire? That’ll Be $15

    From the moment they were revealed, Amazon has been calling the new Kindle Fire models a service. The tablet is an impressive piece of hardware, for sure, but it’s more than that for Amazon. It’s a way for the retailer to personally connect with its user base. To that end, ads will be displayed on the Kindle Fire HD’s lock screen.

    It was those very same ads that had users up in arms last week after the news was revealed. Why should they have to view ads when they already spent $199 on a tablet? Amazon was quick to point out that the ads in question would only be for special promotions and sales through Amazon. It’s not like they’re interrupting the user experience like so many Web sites do today. So what’s the big deal?

    People feel entitled to an ad-free experience when they buy a piece of hardware. It’s understandable, and Amazon will be happy to oblige… for a price. The company told CNET on Saturday that users will be able to pay a small one-time fee of $15 to remove ads from the lock screen. They were, however, quick to point out that most users “love [their] special offers and very few people choose to opt out.”

    It should be noted that the ads you loathe so much are the real reason why Amazon is able to offer their tablets for such low prices. It goes back to Amazon saying the Kindle line is more of a service than hardware. You pay for a service, but it’s still loaded with ads to offset the cost of said service. At least Amazon is offering consumers a choice. Other services, like television, don’t offer much choice in this regard.

    Amazon has been pioneering the idea of placing ads on the sleep and lock screens of their devices for a while now. It’s still a huge area of untapped potential for advertisers. It will be interesting to see if Apple or Google start selling ad space on the iPad or Nexus 7 home screen. Advertisers would buy in to it, but would consumers be welcome to the idea?

  • New Kindle Fire Devices Point Users To Trending Web Content

    It looks like Amazon has gone with Microsoft’s Bing as its default search engine on the new Kindle Fire devices’ Silk browser, but the browser also has some other new things in store, compared to the previous version.

    The latest version of Silk has improved page load speeds, improved HTML5 support, and some UI changes. Here’s what it looks like:

    New Silk browser

    It also comes with a new Trending Now feature, which will direct users to popular pages around the web.

    Amazon says it “alerts our customers to pages that have experienced an unusual increase in their level of traffic, usually a good indicator that the page or topic may be particularly noteworthy right now.”

    Here, you can see how it appears from the New Tab page:

    Trending Now

    It also has an additional new content discovery feature called “Selected Sites,” which simply shows other sites Amazon thinks you’ll find interesting.

    [h/t: TechCrunch]

  • Amazon’s Kindle Fire HD Is Set By Default To Bing It

    The Kindle Fire comes equipped with Amazon’s own Silk Web browser. By all accounts, it’s a decent Web browser that’s fast and fluid. In short, it’s the Web browser that most Kindle owners are going to stick with. Google used to be the default search engine in Silk, but it looks like Microsoft muscled their way into the Kindle Fire party.

    Ubergizmo was playing around with the Kindle Fire HD this week at Amazon’s press conference and found the device to be pretty great in just about every area. Of course, the interesting part came when they found that Bing was set as the default search engine on the Silk browser.

    Microsoft might have just landed a big deal with Amazon. Just by making Bing the default search engine in Internet Explorer, they were able to command 25.6 percent of the search market. They will also be leveraging the power of Xbox 360 users when Bing combined with Internet Explorer hits the console later this year. Having Bing on the Kindle Fire will only serve to expand the Bing user base as Microsoft takes on Google in mobile search.

    Interestingly enough, the move to Bing might have been Amazon’s idea. It could very well be the result of retail giant wanting to cut all ties with Google as they aggressively market the Kindle Fire as a service, rather than a tablet. It’s Amazon’s way of getting their store into the lives of every Kindle Fire owner while cutting product search middlemen like Google out of the equation.

    This doesn’t mean that you can’t switch search providers though. Amazon will most assuredly allow users to switch to Google, Yahoo or even DuckDuckGo. It does, hoever, raise questions of a possible new relationship between Microsoft and Google. We’ve been seeing it the past few years where Microsoft battles Google using proxies like Facebook.

    We’ve reached out to Microsoft for comment and we’ll update if we hear back.

    UPDATE: A Microsoft spokesperson gave us the all too familiar no comment.

  • Relive The Magic Of Amazon’s Kindle Announcements

    Surely, you all know about the new Kindle Fire HD and Paperwhite by now. Amazon unveiled them yesterday during its press event in Santa Monica. Unfortunately, we couldn’t watch the unveiling because Amazon wasn’t live streaming the event. Well, we now have the next best thing – a recording of the event.

    If you missed the event yesterday or just want to see the announcements being made live, the hour long Kindle announcement is for you. The highlights include all the major Kindle hardware announcements alongside all the amazing new software they have planned. Kindle Serials and X-Ray are both pretty exciting.

    You’ll be able to get your hands on the updated Kindle Fire and the Kindle Fire HD will be available next week on September 14. The Kindle Paperwhite will be available on October 1. The 8.9-inch version of the Kindle Fire HD will be available on November 20. The 4G LTE version of the Fire HD will also be available on that date.

  • Amazon Wants To Help You Make Kindle Fire HD Apps

    The Kindle Fire HD is pretty awesome, isn’t it? The new 7 and 8.9-inch tablets are likely to give Apple a run for their money. Like all hardware, however, the true strength of these new tablets are in the apps. To that end, Amazon is giving developers all the tools they need to start making Kindle Fire HD apps today.

    Amazon has released a number of development resources for developers interested in creating apps for the Kindle Fire HD. Some of these tools are similar to those used for the Kindle Fire so experienced developers should have no problem making the switch.

    If you’re new to Kindle Fire development, you’re going to want to check out the development resources section. I would also suggest that experienced developers take a look over the resources for a refresher. After that, you’ll want to grab the Amazon Mobile App SDK which includes the In-App Purchasing API, GameCircle API and Maps API.

    Before you get started on your app, you’ll want to figure out which device you’re targeting. Amazon allows developers to offering separate APKs for all of their devices alongside regular Android devices. While you’re at it, you can use Amazon’s resources to localize your app for other territories like the UK or Italy. Finally, you’ll want to integrated Amazon Web Services into your Kindle Fire app through the AWS Android SDK.

    Before you submit your app, you’ll need to test it on the Kindle Fire HD emulator that Amazon has just released. This will allow you to test and debug your apps without having to actually own a Kindle Fire HD.

    Once you have everything finished, you’ll be ready to submit the next great app to Amazon’s Appstore. Just hit up the Mobile App Distribution Panel and you’ll be ready to go.

    The Kindle Fire has already proven to be a great source of revenue for developers and the Kindle Fire HD will most assuredly continue that trend. Interested developers should try to get their apps out sooner rather than later. The Kindle Fire HD 7-inch and the retooled original Kindle Fire both launch next week.

  • Amazon Announces Whispersync For Voice and Gaming

    Amazon today announced the new Kindle Fire, two Kindle Fire HDs, and the Kindle Paperwhite, along with some amazing pricing that could seriously challenge Apple in the tablet space. However, if you weren’t paying close attention to the news coming out of Amazon’s press conference today, you may have missed that its Whispersync service has moved beyond books and movies, to audiobooks and games.

    Amazon’s Whispersync service has been around since the early days of the Kindle. Traditionally, it was the service that would sync the amount of text users had read in each book to the cloud, allowing readers to pick up where they left off on another device running the Kindle app. When the Amazon video app began appearing on many devices, Whispersync also began syncing movie playback in the cloud.

    Now, Whispersync for Games will save your games in the cloud, while Whispersync for Voice will sync audiobook playback with text. The Whispersync for Games service is similar to that of movie and books: your place is simply saved in the cloud so that it will be consistent across multiple platforms.

    Whispersync for Voice, however, is more remarkable. The service will now allow users to go from reading a book on the Kindle next to their bedstand, to listening to the Audible audiobook version of the same book through the Audible app on their smartphone, and then back to reading on a device with the Kindle app, all seamlessly, right where they left off.

    Amazon has not provided details on the service yet, so it is unknown whether customers will have to purchase both the Kindle version and the Audible version of a text to enjoy Whispersync for Voice. If that is the case, that would seem to be a large cost for a feature that is essentially a cool timesaver. It’s possible, instead, that the new Whispersync hints at Kindle ebook/Audible audiobook combo deals in the near future.

  • Kobo Announces A New Android Tablet To Take On Amazon

    Would anybody be so bold to announce a new line of eReaders and Android tablets the same day as Amazon’s big press event? The Kindle Fire HD and Paperwhite are immediately impressive, but is there an alternative? Kobo thinks they have just the thing.

    Kobo announced today that they will be bringing four new devices to market this year. Three of the devices are updates to their eReader line while the other is an entirely new direction for the company – a 7-inch Android tablet. Kobo’s eReaders are currently in the hands of more than 10 million people around the world, but they obviously want to expand that.

    Taking on the Paperwhite and the Nook is the Kobo Glo. It uses what they call ComfortLight technology to provide a superior reading experience. In reality, it uses the same frontlit screen technology that the Kindle Paperwhite and Nook use to replicate a realistic reading experience. The device will be available on October 1 for $129.99. For comparison, the Wi-Fi Paperwhite will only be $119.

    Kobo is also taking on the original Kindle with the Kobo Mini. The 5-inch tablet is reportedly the smallest and lightest eReader on the market. It uses the same E Ink screen that other eReaders feature but offers the convenience of being able to fit inside a pocket. It will hold up to 1,000 eBooks. The Kobo Mini will retail for $79.99 on October 1.

    The Kobo Touch is already available, but the company decided to give it a price cut to remain competitive. The eReader is now only $99.99. It features new software that Kobo says will help readers “personalize the reading experience, get recommendations and discover new content.”

    The major announcement from Kobo today, however, comes in the form of the Kobo Arc. It’s a 7-inch Android tablet that runs on a customized version of Ice Cream Sandwich. The UI is called Tapestries and it pins content on the homepage to recommend new content to users. One major advantage of the Kobo Arc is that it’s able to access the Google Play store for even more apps than what Amazon offers on their store. The Kobo Arc launches in November in two flavors – 8GB for $199.99 and 16GB for $249.99.

    While it lacks the killer presentation that Amazon put on, Kobo has a decent line up of devices for the holiday season. They cost more than Amazon’s offerings, but the Kobo brand has its loyal fans. They’re sure to eat up these new products, and they just might get some new fans this year as well.

  • New Kindle Fire Devices Get X-Ray For Books, Text Books And Movies

    Amazon, as you may know, had a lot of Kindle-related announcements. Go here for a rundown.

    Among the announcements is the launch of X-Ray for Moves and X-Ray for Textbooks, which are exclusively available on the new family of Kindle Fire devices. X-Ray for Books is also now extended to the Kindle Fire devices.

    “One year ago, Amazon introduced X-Ray on Kindle Touch, and customers loved it,” the company says. “Amazon is extending X-Ray to books on Kindle Fire, making it easier than ever for customers to learn more about the content they love by exploring the ‘bones of the book.’ With a single tap, readers can see all the passages across a book that mention ideas, fictional characters, historical figures, places or topics that interest them, as well as more detailed descriptions from Wikipedia and Shelfari, Amazon’s community-powered encyclopedia for book lovers.”

    Here’s Amazon’s demo from last year:

    “‘“X-Ray for Movies’ is a new feature that revolutionizes the movie experience by bringing the power of IMDb directly to movies on Kindle Fire HD, accessible with a simple tap,” says Amazon. “Without ever leaving the movie, customers can look up any actor in the scene or movie, see what other movies they have been in, and view photos, biographies and more. X-Ray is offered only by Amazon and is exclusive to the Amazon ecosystem. IMDb, an Amazon company for 14 years, is the #1 movie website in the world with more than 160 million monthly unique visitors worldwide.”

    “Glossaries in print textbooks contain the most important information for students, but they’re placed inconveniently in the back of the book,” says Amazon. “And glossaries don’t always contain enough information for students working to understand new concepts. X-Ray for Textbooks solves these problems by integrating the glossary directly into each textbook page and by algorithmically assembling related data from Wikipedia and YouTube.”

  • Kindle Fire HD Challenges Apple’s Dominance

    Amazon announced a lot of Kindles today at their press event. The Kindle Paperwhite is already looking pretty sweet and the cheaper standard Kindle is much appreciated. Despite all these great new Kindle announcements, the star of the show was the Kindle Fire HD. It’s an impressive device that should have Apple and Google concerned.

    First and foremost, let’s take a look at this things’s specs. The Kindle Fire HD comes in two flavors – 7-inch and 8.9-inch. Both of them will feature 16GB of onboard memory and a TI OMAP4470 processor that Amazon claims is more powerful than the Nvidia Tegra 3 that powers the Nexus 7. The new iPad’s A5X processor is clocked at 1GHz while the OMAP4470 can be clocked up to 1.8GHz. If used effectively, the Fire HD could easily outperform the new iPad.

    Apple’s iPad still holds a few key areas of dominance. Namely, the screen size on the iPad (10-inches) is still bigger than the biggest Kindle Fire HD. The new iPad also features the spectacular retina display that has a max resolution of 2048×1536. The Kindle Fire HD features a resolution of 1920×1200. Both displays are above 1080p, but the iPad is the clear winner here. The Nexus 7’s paltry 1280×800 resolution can’t even compete.

    The price is where things go directly to Amazon’s favor. The 7-inch Kindle Fire HD is priced at a very affordable $199 whereas the 8.9-inch model will retail for $299. The 16GB model of the new iPad is priced at $499. Beyond size and resolution, there’s not much difference between the two devices.

    Amazon sweetened the deal even more with an announcement of a 32GB Kindle Fire HD with 4G LTE connectivity for only $499. The iPad equivalent goes for $729. Even better, Amazon will be offering their own data plan that only costs $50 a year. Apple offers 4G LTE through either AT&T or Verizon. Both carriers aren’t as cheap when it comes to data.

    Is Apple suddenly in trouble with the announcement of new cheaper, and possibly superior, Kindles? Of course not. Apple has the brand recognition and power that drives people to forsake food for a month just to afford a new iPad or iPhone. What Apple should be concerned about is a quote from Amazon’s CEO Jeff Bezos on why they’re able to offer their devices for such a cheap price:

    “We want to make money when people use our devices, not when they buy our devices.”

    That sentence reaffirms Amazon’s commitment to content over everything else. It’s content that drives the Amazon App Store to be more profitable than Google Play. It’s that content that drives people to download Kindle exclusive books more than 100 million times. It’s that commitment to content that had the original Kindle Fire owning 22 percent of the tablet market.

    For their part, Apple has plenty of content as well. The combination of iTunes and the Appstore have been ridiculously profitable for Apple. The real difference is that Amazon has a strong retail background. They know how to best sell content and offer regular discounts and promotions to get content into people’s hands.

    The Kindle Fire HD is a challenge that Amazon is issuing to its competitors. As Bezos said today, the Kindle Fire HD is a “hardware device as a service.” Amazon offers some of the best service in both the physical and digital industries. Combining them into a single product is pretty awe inspiring.

  • Kindle Serials: A New (Old) Way To Read Books From Amazon

    Amazon had a number of new announcements today in the Kindle department. More on all of that here.

    One announcement that hasn’t gotten quite as much attention as Amazon’s new Kindle devices, however, may give people more of a reason to use the devices. Amazon announced Kindle Serials, which let users pay for a whole series of books up front, and then get future stories as they become available.

    This is a way to get a full story broken up into chunks, just like the old serial novel, only in this scenario, you’d just buy the first one, and the rest of them would come to your for free. And digitally, as opposed to in paper, obviously.

    CEO Jeff Bezos said Kindle Singles has been very successful, with the company having sold 3.5 million Singles, this is an interesting extension of that. As he outlined, with Serials, users can buy once, and receive all future episodes automatically and seamlessly. Users can also “join the discusson”.

    The offering is reportedly kicking off with works from Neal Pollack and Andrew Peterson, and will reportedly include Charles Dickens novels.

  • Amazon Announces Multiple New Kindle Devices

    Amazon has been leading up to something big over the past week. The Kindle Touch went out of stock last week and the Kindle Fire followed soon after. It was suspected that these devices would get a refresh at today’s Amazon event and they didn’t disappoint.

    Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos came out swinging with a new Kindle called the Kindle Paperwhite. The device is a replacement for the Kindle Touch, but it’s so much more. The device features what Amazon is calling the “Nanoimprinted light guide.” In essence, it’s a frontlit screen that shines a light down to the display for more natural lighting.

    As for specs, the device is 9.1mm thin and only weighs 7.5 ounces. The most amazing part of the Paperwhite, however, is its battery life. Amazon says that the Paperwhite can be left on for 8 weeks straight. It features a new UI that makes shopping for books even easier. Last but certainly not least, the Paperwhite can track your reading speed and let you know the average time it would take you to finish a book.

    The Kindle Paperwhite is available now for preorder for only $119. The 3G version will be available for $179. Both will ship on October 1.

    After the Paperwhite, Bezos announced an update to the original Kindle e-reader. The original was priced at $79, but the new one will only be $69. The only difference between the two is that the case is now black and it features a better screen. Still, it’s hard to beat an e-reader at $69. You’ll be able to get your hands on the new Kindle much sooner than the Paperwhite as it ships on September 14.

    After the new Kindle announcements, Bezos said that the Kindle Singles series has seen increible success. If you’re unaware, the Kindle Singles program is essentially a collection of short stories from prolific authors. To date, Amazon has sold 3.5 million Singles and they’re wanting to take it further. To that end, they announced Kindle Serials. It’s essentially an episodic book where readers will put down $2 for the first story in the serial and receive future stories as they become available.

    Bezos was obviously saving the best for last as he announced two new versions of the Kindle Fire. The original Kindle Fire will get more RAM and be 40 percent faster than the original Fire. Even with the improvements, the price of the original Fire will be reduced to $159. It will be available on September 14.

    The Kindle Fire HD is where it’s really at though. The device is sporting an 8.9-inch screen with a resolution of 1920×1200. The Fire HD is powered by an OMAP4470 processor from Texas Instruments. It can be clocked up to 1.8 GHz, but it’s unclear if the Fire HD will be set at that speed. The device also sports dual stereo speakers.

    The Kindle Fire HD will sport two wireless antennae to support dual-band Wi-Fi connections at 2.4Ghz and 5GHz. Bezos said this will allow people to download files at 40 percent faster rates than the competition.

    The Kindle Fire HD is also getting plenty of software support. Amazon has built an all new email app for the Fire HD that supports Gmail, Hotmal and Yahoo. Facebook and Skype will be building custom apps for the Fire HD. Skype’s app will take advantage of the front facing camera in the Fire HD.

    The Kindle Fire, both the regular and HD, will feature X-Ray for movies. It’s a pop-up that appears every time that you pause a movie. It will bring up bios and acting credits for all the actors in the film. It will also give recommendations based on the actors in the film.

    Amazon is also gunning for Apple’s dominance in the e-textbook field. They’re bringing X-ray to textbook and it’s pretty amazing. Students will be able to go from a textbook to Wikipedia articles and YouTube videos on the subject at hand. I wish I had something like that when I was in college.

    Bezos revealed that the Kindle Fire HD will actually be available in 7 and 8.9 inch versions. It will also feature an HDMI out for when you want to put something on the big screen.

    The 7-inch Kindle Fire HD will retail for $199 and be available on September 14. The 8.9 inch Kindle Fire HD will retail for $299 and be available much later on November 20. Both models will come equipped with 16GB of internal storage.

    Bezos said that they’re able to offer the Kindle at such low prices because they’ll make all that money back and then some from people purchasing products from Amazon. It’s a sound strategy and one that the video game industry has been using for years when underselling hardware.

    In a final surprise announcement, Bezos announced a 4G LTE model of the Kindle Fire HD that has 32GB of onboard memory. The 8.9-inch 4G model will retail for $499. It will also feature a new data plan that costs $50 a year. It offers 250 MB a month and 20GB of Cloud Storage. As a bonus, you’ll get $10 of Amazon Appstore Credit.

    In recap, Amazon pretty much nuked the competition in terms of pricing and features. Google had better come up with something fast. A 16GB 7-inch Kindle Fire HD for only $199 is far better than what the Nexus 7 offers. The 4G LTE $500 Kindle Fire should also have the iPad on notice. We’ll see how Apple responds next week during their event on September 12.

    [Image Credit: TechCrunch]

  • Amazon Announces The Kindle Paperwhite

    Amazon revealed a new Kindle device today called the Kindle Paperwhite, which comes with “patented Light Guide” frontlighting and a “Paperwhite” display, aimed at creating a more paper-like appearance for book pages.

    It has higher resolution, higher contrast, and perhaps best of all, an 8-week battery life, even with the light on. It is said to have 25% more contrast than Pearl screens in previous Kindle models, and 62% higher resolution.

    “Paperwhite is the Kindle we’ve always wanted to build — the technology didn’t exist to build a display with this level of contrast, resolution, brightness and battery life, so our engineers invented it,” said CEO Jeff Bezos. “62% more pixels, 25% higher contrast, built-in front light, perfect for bed, perfect for beach, even thinner, 8 weeks of battery life — this is a quantum leap forward and the best Kindle we’ve ever built by far.”

    Kindle Paperwhite

    Here’s what the company says about the battery life in the announcement:

    Kindle Paperwhite’s built-in front light is designed to be used at all times — both in daylight and in a dark room — for the clearest, crispest reading experience. In order to use the light at all times, Kindle Paperwhite requires exceptional power management to maintain the battery life that customers love about Kindle. Amazon’s light guide technology precisely diffuses the light across the screen and only requires four LEDs to light the entire screen (unlike LCD screens which can use up to 50 LEDs). The light guide is so efficient that Kindle Paperwhite has a remarkable 8 weeks of battery life, even with the light on at all times.

    It’s drawing comparisons to Barnes & Noble’s Nook SimpleTouch with GlowLight, thanks to the frontlighting.

    It will cost $119 for the WiFi version. 3G is $179.

    The company also announced that the $79 Kindle is dropping to the $69 Kindle. This will ship on September 14th.

    The Kindle Paperwhite will ship October 1.

    More news from Amazon here.

  • Amazon Adds Thousands of Titles to Prime Instant Video through EPIX Deal

    Amazon Adds Thousands of Titles to Prime Instant Video through EPIX Deal

    Another week, another announcement from Amazon that they’ve beefed up the content offerings on their Prime Instant video service.

    Today the company has announced an agreement with EPIX, the premium on-demand service that’s a joint venture between Viacom (Paramount), MGM, and Lionsgate. This deal will bring the total amount of movies and TV episodes available on the service to well over 25,000. Amazon says that’s double the titles available when they launched the Kindle Fire last September.

    Here are some of the movies that are coming along with the EPIX deal:

    The Avengers, Iron Man 2, The Hunger Games, Transformers Dark of the Moon, Thor, Rango, Kick Ass, Paranormal Activity 2, True Grit, The Lincoln Lawyer, and Justin Bieber Never Say Never. The EPIX deal will also bring original content like Kevin Smith: Burn in Hell and Usher: Live from London.

    “We are investing hundreds of millions of dollars to expand the Prime Instant Video library for our customers. We have now more than doubled this selection of movies and TV episodes to over 25,000 titles in just under a year,” said Bill Carr, Vice President of Video and Music at Amazon. “We are thrilled to be able to offer our customers such popular EPIX titles, many of which were just recently in theaters. We can tell from the data that our customers love watching movies on Prime Instant Video. We think customers will really enjoy watching new titles like The Avengers, Iron Man 2 and The Hunger Games on their Kindle Fire, PlayStation 3, Xbox, iPad or any of the other of the Amazon Instant Video compatible devices.”

    In the last couple of weeks, Amazon has announced deals with ESPN and NBCUniversal that will bring content like the 30 for 30 docu-series as well as TV dramas like Battlestar Galactica and Heroes to the streaming library.

    And just last week, Amazon dropped some promotional figures for the Prime Instant Video service. One of those statistics said that there we just over 22,000 Prime streaming titles available to subscribers. That means that this EPIX deal boosted the available content by at least a few thousand titles.

  • Amazon Says Their App Store Is Best For Developers

    Did you hear? The Kindle Fire is officially sold out for good. That must mean that a Kindle Fire 2 announcement is imminent. Amazon saw great success with the hardware, but they want you to know that the apps are where it’s really at.

    Amazon announced that the Amazon App Store has facilitated the purchase and download of hundreds of millions of apps. They also said that more developers keep coming to the App Store in hopes of striking it rich. They attribute the growth to their “industry-leading e-commerce features like 1-Click purchasing and In-App Purchasing.”

    “Amazon’s platform is a complete end-to-end solution for developers wanting to build, market and monetize their apps and games,” said Paul Ryder, Vice President of Apps and Games at Amazon. “Developers can build their apps and games using Amazon Web Services’ industry-leading infrastructure platform. For important audience engagement features like leaderboards, achievements, and syncing game state between devices, developers can use Amazon’s new GameCircle services. To gain exposure to tens of millions of customers, developers can list their apps in the Amazon Appstore and take advantage of awareness-building programs like Free App of the Day. And, to monetize their apps and games, customers can use Amazon’s industry-leading e-commerce and payment capabilities like In-App Purchasing and Subscriptions.”

    Developers are encouraged to use the in-app purchasing model on the Amazon App Store whenever they can. Amazon found that in-app purchasing brings in more than twice the revenue of traditional paid apps. It’s the same just about everywhere else as more games go free-to-play while supporting themselves on a massive number of in-app purchases.

    A number of developers from Spotify, Glu, Pocket Gems and more have joined the Amazon praise chorus. They say their apps have a kind of visibility that just isn’t available on other platforms. It’s hard to say whether or not the Amazon App Store has an app graveyard like Apple’s 400,000 still undiscovered apps.

    As fas as overall revenue goes, however, Amazon’s App Store is still in second place. Despite the majority of apps never even being downloaded, Apple’s App Store still commands most of the market. That’s not to say that Amazon is doing poorly. In fact, they’re doing much better than Google Play in terms of revenue.

    All of this is to say that Amazon will be pushing digital goods even more in the future. The Kindle Fire 2 launch is probably going to bring an update to the Amazon App Store. Developers can’t afford to stay on any platform these days. Amazon’s App Store is a major contender and developers would be wise to recognize that.