Posts Tagged "Amazon.com"
Amazon Kindle App Store Download Terms Restrict Developers
Engadget and Daring Fireball point out the Amazon’s recently announced app active content store is going to make it nearly impossible for developers to add any sort of internet connectivity without incurring hefty download fees. So let’s see, 16 shades of gray, limited motion and no connectivity. Fuuuun.
We were wondering how Kindle’s impending active content (read: apps) would be harnessing that free Whispernet bandwidth. As it turns out, there’s just a smidgen allowed for gratis. According to the terms laid out by Amazon, there’s a 70 / 30 revenue split, with that smaller percentage going to Bezos and co. “net of delivery fees of $0.15 / MB.” The price tiers is a little simpler: apps can be free if their download over 3G is less than 1MB and they use less than 100KB per month, per user.
Read More...Amazon Kindle Changes Strategy in Apple’s Shadow
The Apple Blog has this nice analysis of Amazon’s recent changes to its royalty policy and some other moves they’ve been making in the impending buildup to Apple’s iPad. Will it be enough or has the ship already sailed?
I have heard it said, “If you can’t compete, sue.” Of course, I’m sure that’s not the case with Nokia’s recent complaint against Apple. Sure, it could have started litigation back in 2007 when the iPhone was first launched, but I guess the almost-three-year-delay was just how long it took getting its lawyers to agree on the wording. Or the letterhead. Or something.
Amazon, on the other hand, is doing the exact opposite and choosing to Compete with a capital C. This week it has floated a boat-load of announcements around its Kindle e-book reader device and platform. Now, stop being cynical, I’m sure the timing has nothing to do with the imminent unveiling of Apple’s mythical Tablet.
Read More...Kindle for iPhone – Gives Books and The Real Kindle a Run For Their Money
As we move into the Apple Tablet era I wanted to test drive what the experience might be like so I downloaded the Amazon Kindle for iPhone Reader [FREE AppStore] from the iTunes Store. Kindle for iPhone is meant as a standalone or companion to an Amazon Kindle eBook reader. You can shop for books online using your Amazon.com account, purchase, download and read all in this clever little application.
Kindle for iPhone is a very light download so you’ll be up and running in no time, you just need to enter your Amazon.com account details. Then you are taken into a Safari browser session to pick out books. Couple of nice features, you can download decent sized free samples of any book you’re interested in and if you have a Kindle it will automatically sync up so you have one copy on the Kindle and one for the iPhone. I chose a cookbook about making Japanese food.
Read More...Amazon Hedges Ahead of Pending Apple Event
In a sign that the party is coming to an end for Jeff Bezos, it was announced today that Amazon would be changing their royalty sharing model from the truly paltry 25-30% they were offering before to up to 70%. This comes with some strings as explained by Mashable:
Read More...To be able to get the 70 percent royalty deal, the list price for your title must be both between $2.99 to $9.99 and be 20 percent below the lowest physical book price; title also must be “offered at or below price parity with competition, including physical book prices”. The title also needs to be included in a broad set of features in the Kindle Store, e.g. text-to-speech. Finally, the title must be made available for sale “in all geographies for which the author or publisher has rights”
Apple Will Save Publishing and Redefine eBooks
Interesting article by Carly Z over at GearDiary in regards to the Apple Tablet as an ebook reader, which at this point is all but assumed. This piece is asking the question, Apple as a Bookstore: Savior of Reading or Doomsday Scenario?
Personally I have a feeling that it will be much more the former. That Apple will not only make huge strides toward saving traditional publishing but will also school all existing ebook efforts as to how its done. But first here are some of GearDiary’s points:
Amazon Kindle Blind-Sided by the Blind
Amazon and the U.S. Department of Justice recently settled a civil suit brought on by a number of blind person’s rights organizations over pilot projects to use the Kindle DX as a reader device in universities. The underlying issue for the blind is that although the Kindle has a text to speech feature which can read books aloud, the standard menu and navigation of the device is impossible for a non-sighted person to use. Also, that the universities intended to essentially replace traditional textbooks in the classrooms with the device. Did Amazon get caught in the middle?
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