Kindle app for iPad - it's June 30. Hulu has removed its "Buy" button

The Bookseller has reported that while the world (well, the interested-world) wonders what Amazon and B&N will do about its e-reader apps for iPad and other Apple devices, it is now June 30, and the last day that Apple has indicated it wants "compliance with Apple's strict new rules for in-app payment and subscription links."

Apple has said that e-reader Apps are expected to remove from the app any Buy buttons that link to an external store via a web browser, as Kindle for iPad does. Otherwise, Apple wants an option programmed in to buy it in-App from Apple, which would be easier for iPad customers.

Apple rep Trudy Muller had explained, February 1, re Apple's rejection of the Sony e-reader app:

' "We have not changed our developer terms or guidelines," Apple spokesperson Trudy Muller told Ars. "We are now requiring that if an app offers customers the ability to purchase books outside of the app, that the same option is also available to customers from within the app with in-app purchase." '

  It's been assumed that Apple's demand would be a 30% cut, which would mean 100% of the Amazon or B&N share of any Big6 publisher book.  However, in connection with that percentage, the only quotes of 30% from an Apple rep were from Steve Jobs during the Subscriptions announcement and then Apple's Internet Services boss Eddy Cue, who said that the announcement applied only to Subscriptions.

  While then it could be possible that Amazon and B&N might agree on something more like 3-5% in order to have a Buy button that would allow iPad owners the option to buy from Apple, it's also possible they wouldn't go for paying Apple whatever fee might be asked, since Apple benefits as much as the other bookstores from having those books readable on its own device and has used that availability in its marketing.  Since iBooks can be read only on Apple devices, the iPad could definitely look less appealing to prospective book-loving buyers, especially those who shop a lot at Amazon and B&N.

  In the meantime, the bookstores could just decide to make their Apple apps read-only and not try to sell books from the Apple apps, since just who does not know how to get to Amazon or B&N these days?

  I had said that Amazon should be able to add wording that the book could be found at their website and do an UN-linked URL to Amazon on the page.

  CNNMoney has an interesting quote from Richard Stephenson of YUDU Media, which has developed mobile apps for magazines including Reader's Digest, who goes further.

' [Stephenson] says he's "pretty certain" that Apple wouldn't block a link that simply says "visit our website."

  "[The problem] is really when you say, 'buy subscriptions from us direct' and there is a clear button to click," Stephenson said in an e-mail to Fortune. "If it's 'visit our website,' then [Apple] will not be able nor wish to block that." '

CNNMoney adds that "Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr said he could confirm only that the App Store terms were recently updated, and wouldn't comment on specific apps or whether a "visit our website" link would be blocked."

  Maybe the online bookstores are sending Apple updated apps that are rejected :-).  Those bookstore apps will be on every tablet EXCEPT Apple if apple makes the wrong decision.  Guess who would lose there.

  In the meantime, CNNMoney said yesterday that:

' Hulu updated its iPad app last week to remove a link to its website. The app's opening screen used to feature the line: "Not a Hulu Plus subscriber?  Visit hulu.com/plus to learn more and sign up."  That line -- and the website link -- are now gone, bringing Hulu into compliance with Apple's rules. '

That's a bit of an indication that a linked "Visit us" may not be acceptable :-)

CNN Money's Julianne Pepitone points out that "...digital booksellers rely on customers buying a steady stream of new e-books to read.  Removing all links from within their apps to make new purchases is pretty user-unfriendly."

Maybe they'll compromise on a small fee.  Apple may actually admit to themselves that iPad sales (and retention) will benefit from certain other bookstore books being readable on their devices, since that's been touted as a feature.

 We should know by tomorrow, I imagine.  I'd think the simplest solution, to keep peace in the bookstore universe, would be for everyone to be on a no-Buy button but I suppose if the price is right we could see one.

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For daily free ebooks, check the following links:

Temporarily-free books - Non-classics - USA: by: NEW:  Apr  May  June 2011    Publication Date   Late-listed    Bestselling   High-ratings UK: PubDate   Popular What is 3G? and "WiFi"?       Battery Care Highly-rated under $1,  Newest: $1-$2, $2-$3

Most Popular Free K-Books U.S. & Int'l (NOT UK):    Top 100 free UK-Only:    Top 100 free USEFUL for your Kindle (U.S. only, currently):   99c Notepad 1.1,   99c Calculator,   99c Calendar,   99c Converter

Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's)   K3 Special ($114)   K3-3G Special ($164)   DX Graphite

The free CK-12 Foundation Math/Science books. Free eBookMaps books - UPDATES

The CK12-FOUNDATION

With so many-books that are free for awhile, I thought it'd be good to remind people that the currently eight CK12-Foundation Kindle books at Amazon are always free.  They're "customizable, standards-aligned, free digital textbooks for K-12" and the subjects include Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.

  UPDATE - Note that there are 11 books rather than 8.  In the comments section, AthenaAtDelphi found that doing a search on "ck-12" with the quote marks specifying just that, three more CK-12 books were found than when using Amazon's own Author's Link for CK-12 Foundation

  That's because those three books did not include "Foundation" in the author name.  The three more that he found that way are:
  1. CK-12 Engineering: An Introduction for High School , by Dale Baker
  2. CK-12 21st Century Physics: A Compilation of Contemporary and Emerging Technologies , by Andrew Jackson and James Batterson
  3. CK-12 People's Physics Book Version 2 , by James H. Dann

The CK-12 Foundation's "About" statement explains: "CK-12 Foundation is a non-profit organization with a mission to reduce the cost of textbook materials for the K-12 market both in the U.S. and worldwide.  Using an open-content, web-based collaborative model termed the 'FlexBook,' CK-12 intends to pioneer the generation and distribution of high quality educational content that will serve both as core text as well as provide an adaptive environment for learning through the FlexBook Platform™."

The ones at their site are in PDF format, not in best-reading format, so get the Kindle versions where available.

  UPDATE2 - a CAUTION - Stay with the Kindle copies when those are available of course.  More reason: Besides the fact that the PDF versions on the CK-12 site would be barely readable on a 6" e-ink screen, with headers, footers and many originally full-color illustratrions, Commenter Tom Semple found that some of the PDF books are huge, one of them 150 megs and another 500 megs (which is half a gig).

  We have about 3.2 Gigs (3,000+ Megs) of room on the Kindle 3's (and DX's), as the rest is for the operating system.   An average novel takes about 800K or just under 1MB.  That's quite a bit of room, but not when you're faced with loading extremely bloated PDFs of textbooks.  Those would be very slow on an e-Ink reader at the least, so if you need a CK-12 PDF book because no Kindle one is available for that one, just load the one PDF you need.  They can be backed up on your computer and moved to the Kindle as needed. &nbpsp;In the meantime, now we have 11 of the CK-12 books in the much more readable and lighter-weight Kindle editions.

  Thanks to both AthenaAtDelphi and Tom Semple for the added information.

  UPDATE3   I once mentioned you could get the often very useful Comments from this blog if you enjoy RSS feeds.  Using Google reader, for one example, (at http://reader.google.com to "Add a subscription" (there's a field at top left of that page for this), the following will work to add a subscription to comments-only with Google Reader and other readers:
http://kindleworld.blogspot.com/feeds/comments/default


Back to CK-12:  CK-12’s FlexBooks earned perfect scores in Phase Two of former California Gov. Schwarzenegger’s Free Digital Textbook Initiative.

As ZDNet's Christopher Dawson wrote in 2009

' ... the efforts of the Foundation seem to have paid off, as they provided electronic textbooks through a California initiative that were clearly more aligned with state standards than any electronic texts from major publishers. According to a report from the California government,

Of the 16 free digital textbooks for high school math and science reviewed, ten meet at least 90 percent of California’s standards. Four meet 100 percent of standards, including the CK-12 Foundation’s CK-12 Single Variable Calculus, CK-12 Trigonometry, CK-12 Chemistry and Dr. H. Jerome Keisler’s Elementary Calculus: An Infinitesimal Approach. '

And eight of these are free at Amazon, for the Kindle.


eBookMaps.com
Paul Biba announced this new website's offerings the other day, quoting its press release, which I'll add here also (all emphases mine):

' Free maps for readers of electronic books are now available on the new eBookMaps.com website.  The website, which presents itself in many languages, lets users download eBooks with maps in both popular formats, i.e., mobi (for Kindle reader from Amazon) and epub (for most other readers).

eBookMaps website offers free downloadable e-books with maps of major cities of the whole world.  Currently there are more than 200 eBooks, each in two formats – epub and mobi, among which are not lacking those of big US cities, cities of Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia and South America.

All the maps are optimized for e-book readers.  They are thus divided into many smaller parts that can easily be displayed on a small monochrome display with eInk technology.  To switch between different parts of the map users can use the buttons Next page/Previous page and they can also use index of streets, which is included in every e-book.

Maps from eBookMaps offer another choice of content for owners of e-book readers.  They can be useful as a good alternative to online maps, which may be expensive to download in many countries (due to telco fees).

Maps of some of the cities represented at eBookMaps are not yet common and are not available even on Google maps.  eBookMaps use data from Openstreetmap.org project licensed by CC-BY-SA and are distributed in accordance with this license. '

Here are their Tips and tricks for maps and e-books
Tips: How to load e-books with maps to your reader (there is a how-to video which displays the Kindle on the screenshot) and Help: How to use maps from eBookMaps.

The easiest method described is for the Kindle, which has a web browser.  With images as the main focus for these books, downloads to the Kindle could be expensive for Amazon (they pay the 3G cost) if 3G is your only method for direct download to the Kindle (true for Kindle 1, 2, DX, DXG).  The size of the Cairo book is only about twice the size of an average novel, but the size of the London file is 8 megs, 8 times the average novel.  It's a long download and costs can add up for Amazon, so it's better to encourage Amazon to keep the free 3G feature as they've done for 4 years, by using your home or local WiFi instead where you can, if you have the Kindle 3, OR download it to your computer and then move it to your Kindle's "documents" folder with the USB cord.

 They'll always be free, apparently, and most of us would usually download a book only as needed, so it shouldn't be a problem if done infrequently.

The books can also be placed in "My Kindle Content" subfolder of "My Documents" (on a Windows computer) and then can be read on your free Kindle for PC app as well, and the same, with different details, for Kindle for Mac.  But the Amazon versions are optimized by eBookMaps for the Kindle.


Things are really picking up in the e-reader world!


Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's)   K3 Special ($114)   K3-3G Special ($164)   DX Graphite

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Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.  Liked-books under $1
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or £5 Max ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

National Academies: all PDF books free to download. Also, Darwin's Notes & Comments. made available.

The National Academies - National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, Institute of Medicine, and National Research Council - have been offering, since 1994, "free downloads of most of our titles and of all titles to readers in the developing world."

But effective June 2, they started offering, free of charge to all Web visitors, "PDFs of reports that are currently for sale on the National Academies Press (NAP) Website and PDFs associated with future reports*.

' NAP produces more than 200 books a year on a wide range of topics in science, engineering, and health, capturing the best-informed views on important issues.

  We invite you to visit the NAP homepage [www.nap.edu] and experience the new opportunities available to access our publications.  There you can sign up for MyNAP, a new way for us to deliver all of our content for free to loyal subscribers like you and to reward you with exclusive offers and discounts on our printed books. '

  * There are a small number of reports that never had PDF files and, therefore, those reports are not available for download.  In addition, part of the series, “Nutrient Requirements of Domestic Animals” are not be [sic] available in PDF and future titles in this series will also not have PDFs associated with them. '

  Despite the "loyal subscribers" wording, their NAP website's wording is this:

' All PDF Books Free to Download
  As of June 2, 2011, all PDF versions of books published by the National Acadmies Press (NAP) will be downloadable to anyone free of charge.

  That's more than 4,000 books plus future reports produced by NAP -- publisher for the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, Institute of Medicine, and National Research Council. Please share this news with your friends. '

That's impressive.  The International Business Times's Business and Books column by Edward B. Colby points out that only 65% of the PDFs were available for free overall, earlier, but with the few exceptions mentioned above, all PDFs in their catalog will now be downloadable at no cost although printed books will still be sold.  They say that The NAP expects the change to increase its PDF downloads from about 700,000 per year to more than 3 million by 2013.


DARWIN'S NOTES
Here's the Darwin Manuscripts Project at the American History of Natural History, which is "a historical and textual edition of Charles Darwin's scientific manuscripts, designed from its inception as an online project.  The database at its core—DARBASE—catalogues some 45,000 Darwin scientific manuscripts.

  These are currently represented by 15,125 high resolution digital images.  Thus far 7,428 manuscript pages have been transcribed to exacting standards and all are presented in easy to read format."
They'll be constantly adding new material to it.

Cambridge University Library announced June 23:

' Notes and comments scribbled by Charles Darwin on the pages and margins of his own personal library have been made available online for the first time.

Darwin’s personal scientific library, the majority of which is held at Cambridge University Library, has been digitised in a collaborative effort involving Cambridge, the Darwin Manuscripts Project at the American Museum of Natural History (see below), and the Biodiversity Heritage Library. '

  730 of the 1,480 books in Darwin's personal scientific library "contain abundant notes in the their margins" and are being digitalized."

  The first phase is completed, "with 330 of the most heavily annotated books launched online at the Biodiversity Heritage Library for all to read.
...
  "Although the majority of the books are scientific, some are humanities texts on subjects that Darwin transformed into scientific topics.

  "The series of transcriptions accompanying each page allows everyone to see which passages Darwin found relevant to his work, stimulated his thinking, or just annoyed him as he read the work of others."
...
  "...the information is fully indexed so that people can search for topics and ideas relevant to their interests or work."

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For daily free ebooks, check the following links:

Temporarily-free books - Non-classics - USA: by: NEW:  Apr  May  June 2011    Publication Date   Late-listed    Bestselling   High-ratings UK: PubDate   Popular What is 3G? and "WiFi"?       Battery Care Highly-rated under $1,  Newest: $1-$2, $2-$3

Most Popular Free K-Books U.S. & Int'l (NOT UK):    Top 100 free UK-Only:    Top 100 free USEFUL for your Kindle (U.S. only, currently):   99c Notepad 1.1,   99c Calculator,   99c Calendar,   99c Converter

Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's)   K3 Special ($114)   K3-3G Special ($164)   DX Graphite

Amazon's Best Kindle books of 2011, so far

Amazon's Editors' Picks for "Best Kindle Books of 2011... So Far... between January and June."

Half of their favorite books to date, they say, "were written by debut authors. All books were released for the first time between January 1 and June 30.

 If curious, click for their picks


Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's)   K3 Special ($114)   K3-3G Special ($164)   DX Graphite

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Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.  Liked-books under $1
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or £5 Max ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

NISO's Quarterly on Views of the e-Book Renissance - Free download

I received an alert from Island Librarian (Nancy Picchi) about a special issue of The National Information Standards Organization [NISO], Spring Quarterly 2011, on Views of the e-Book Renaissance, which will be of special interest to publishers, educators, librarians, and anyone interested in the e-publishing scene today.

The NISO publication, Information Standards Quarterly (ISQ) Spring 2011, Volume 23, Issue 2, is described here and the entire issue in PDF (only 15MB) is downloadable, as are individual articles..

The Table of Contents includes:

. EPUB 3: Not Your Father's EPUB, by Bill Kasdorf

. Ten Questions and Tentative Answers about the State of E-book Publishing for University Presses, by Marlie Wasserman

. E-books and the Public Library: the Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library Experience, by Mollie Pharo and Marcia Learned Au

. Drinking the E-book Kool-Aid in a Large Academic Library, by Wendy Allen Shelburne

. Standard Spotlight: The Challenge for Standards in the E-book Supply Chain, by Mark Bide

. Member Spotlight: E-books on EBSCOhost®: Combining NetLibrary™ E-books with the EBSCOhost Platform, by Michael Gorrel

From the announcement by Cynthia Hodgson, ISQ Managing Editor, more:

' In NISO reports, Matt Garrish and Markus Gylling (DAISY Consortium) reveal the evolution of accessible publishing that occurred with the revision of
the Z39.86 DAISY standard.  Todd Carpenter follows with an announcement of a
new NISO Ebook Special Interest Group that is in the process of formation.

As always, our issue concludes with Noteworthy news items such as JSTOR's
foray into e-books, ProQuest's acquisition of Ebrary, the Project Muse and
UPeC partnership to offer e-books, the trial use issuance of the Journal
Article Tag Suite standard (Z39.96), and several others....

You can find the complete Table of Contents to the Spring issue of ISQ, with
links to the articles and PDF downloads here. '

Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's)   K3 Special ($114)   K3-3G Special ($164)   DX Graphite

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Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.  Liked-books under $1
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or £5 Max ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

The Various Kindle Models - Names and 'Generation' - What Each Does - UPDATED 3/20/12

UPDATED August 13, 2010 to correct UK info, reorganize, and add common Kindle titles.  (Original posting Aug 5)

UPDATED June 24, 2011 to add serial number and other information.

UPDATED March 20, 2012 to add more serial numbers for latest models

NOTE that the webpage titles for the images on the left (click on them to show page titles) display:
"slate-shasta-main-3g" and "slate-shasta-main-3g-white" and that they're both placed (as seen in the URL) under the Amazon subfolders "kindle/shasta\"

The gadget-news rumor was accurate about the coming "Shasta" model. (on May 31).

WHAT DO ALL THE KINDLE MODEL NAMES AND DESCRIPTORS MEAN?

  While showing the Amazon listing of the Kindle devices for which the two new word games work, it occurred to me that the listing is probably confusing to those new to the Kindle scene.

I tried to clarify what each model 'is' in an update to the Word Games posting.

While doing that, I felt I should put that section in a post of its own, so this is it.
Re the two Kindle-3 photos at the top.  Amazon likes to call the latest Kindle just "Kindle" but that is just not going to work very well these days.

FIRST, SERIAL NUMBERS FOR EACH MODELS (This section was updated in Yr 2011.)
You can find the serial number on the back of your Kindle.  If it starts with:

B001... it's a 6" Kindle 1, US-only, using Sprint
B002... it's a 6" Kindle 2, U.S. version, using Sprint's, released February 2009
B003... it's a 6" Kindle 2, Global version, using AT&T - released October 19, 2009
B004... it's a 9.7" Kindle DX, U.S. version (Sprint)
B005... it's a 9.7" Kindle DX, Global version (AT&T) - released January 6, 2010.
B006... it's a 6" Kindle-3 3G (Free 3G/WiFi) - US/Canadian/some Int'l version (Aug. 2010)
B007...       - Not assigned, that we've ever seen -
B008... it's a 6" Kindle-3 WiFi-Only - U.S./Int'l version
B00A... it's a 6" Kindle-3 3G/WiFi - European only version
    (Kindle-3's are grouped together instead of in B00_ order.]
B009... it's a 9.7" Kindle DX, Graphite, Pearl Screen model
B00E... it's a Basic Kindle No-Touch No-Keyboard model (Kindle-4)
B00F... it's a Kindle Touch, 3G/WiFi (Kindle-5)
B010... it's a Kindle Touch, WiFi-only
D01E... it's a Kindle Fire color tablet, WiFi-Only (the only model)

Another way to get the serial number is to have Wireless On, press Menu button, click on Settings and it should be near the bottom of that page.  Or, you can input the numbers 411 there to that and more info.
  BUT for Kindle Fire, press top gear/wheel icon (Settings), choose "More" and then go below "Kindle Keyboard" to bring up on that list "Device"...Press on that to get the Device Serial Number.

I'd like to get the beginning 5 characters in the serial numbers for the Special Offers Kindles (with screensaver ads and offers), both WiFi-Only and the 3G/WiFi models.  If you can help, let me know what the first 5 letters of the serial number are, in the comments area if you can. (Solved)

Amazon may have made a mistake in refusing to recognize former models, in a way, by almost immediately calling the later Kindle-2 just "Kindle" as if Kindle 1 no longer existed, but it certainly does, as a great many stayed with that model and still read on it the many books they currently buy from Amazon.

  The Kindles are more like Cablevision receivers.  They exist so we can order media for them.  It's too bad there's no upgrade path to a later Kindle the way there is with cable receivers that exist to receive and help display the media content in which we're interested.

  Also, it's easier when there are model numbers for receivers, rather than spelling out the "generations,"  Apple started this -- StarTrek must have been the inspiration for that? -- but Apple doesn't call the latest iPod just "iPod" - they identify the latest model with an alpha-character combo so people have a better fix on what they have, and the same with the iPad and iPad 2.


AMAZON'S IDENTIFICATION OF KINDLES,
PLUS CUSTOMERS' NAMES FOR THE KINDLES)
I add -- after the Amazon title & description -- the more common identifer (in italics) that customers use.

Kindle 1
"Kindle, 1st Generation [etc, etc]" is a mouthful.
We did and many of us still do have a Kindle 1, which some dubbed "Kindle Klassic."

  In the small picture of the Kindle 1 (at right), which you can click on to see the enlarged photo, the original Kindle (released in 2007) was displaying, in 2008, some Google search results, via its slow but free 3G web browser.

  Its storage capacity is very low and its screen speed capability is so slow that a cursor could not be placed by the programmers IN the screen and we have to use the vertical column silver cursor to go to the ROW for a given word and then choose one of the words from all the words on that row when we want the Kindle to perform an action.

 These are reasons that software updates will not easily work with the Kindle
 My Kindle 1 continues to work very well as an e-book reader.  But Kindle-1 owners shouldn't expect complex updates to that, as this older device requires different programming and this is usually considered economically not feasible for a company.  I noticed other customers putting 1-star reviews on the word games product-review page just because they weren't re-programmed to also work with the Kindle 1.

Kindle 2 - 2nd Generation
Kindle (2nd Generation) International  and  Kindle (2nd Generation) U.S. - These are Kindle-2  6"-screen models and were the latest 6" versions in-hand until Aug 27, 2010 or so.  The International model uses wireless (AT&T/partners), globally, when accessible.  The U.S. version uses U.S. wireless only (Sprint).

Kindle 3 - 3rd Generation
  1. Kindle (Free 3G + WiFi, 6")  - (Kindle 3  6" with 3G/WiFi)
      {UK:  3G/WiFi}

  2. Kindle (Wi-Fi, 6")  - (Kindle 3  6" with WiFi Only)  
      {UK: Kindle-3 WiFi-Only}

Kindle DX International and also U.S.-only - 2nd Generation
Kindle DX (Free 3G, 9.7", White) International  and  Kindle DX (Free 3G, 9.7" White) U.S.

Kindle DX Graphite, with Pearl Screen - Latest Generation
Kindle DX (Free 3G, 9.7", Graphite) - the Kindle DXG with higher contrast screen
   Released after the two devices just above, which are able to run the games as well.

The Latest Generation DXG with Pearl screen and higher contrast comes only in the Graphite color.  (I've wondered if some may not have noticed that there is a White Kindle 3 as well ... the Graphite model is the one heavily featured.

Kindle WiFi-Only with Special Offers (and screensaver ads + 1 ad in the last line of the Home page) but not seen when you're reading.
Kindle3 SO, WiFi-Only

Kindle 3G/WiFi with Special Offers (and screensaver ads + 1 ad in the last line of the Home page) but not seen when you're reading.
Kindle 3G SO, 3G/Wifi

  With the "Special Offers" Kindle, the ads, not active while you're reading, will always be there.  So that's something you should consider.  On the forums, some are sorry they chose that while others wish they had chosen that because they like the special deals offered (while others say it just encourages them to spend more at Amazon).  It's only a $25 savings in return for seeing ads when you first open your Kindle or are inactive (not doing a page turn, say) for about 10-20 minutes -- but others feel they're saving enough on some Amazon product deals to almost pay for the Kindle.

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UPDATES
    . UPDATED Aug 6, 2010 to include that the UK Amazon store offers the Kindle 3 only in the Graphite color and doesn't sell the Kindle DX.

    . UPDATED June 24, 2011 to include "Special Offers" versions of Kindle 3 and to update serial number start-numbers for Kindle 3 models.

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WHAT'S "3G" AND WHAT'S "WiFi" ?
  ( See the updated blog article on how WiFi and 3G wireless access differ.

  There is also some information on that in the first half of E-Readers with Web Browsers, WiFi vs 3G cellular access, which should give a basic idea of the situations
    in which each type of wireless is used and what's involved.)

Basically, and in the least words (for once):
1. 3G - cellular or mobile networks -- this type is, as with cellphones, accessible over the air almost anywhere.  You can be on a bus or at the beach and it can work there.
  If your country has the free 3G web-browser enabled, you'll be able to use that feature and in other 3G-browsing enabled countries (about 60).

  Personally, I wouldn't give up this free access for a one-time $50 cost when it normally costs $30-$60/month for this type of unlimted feature on a smart phone.
  As I've mentioned before, I often use the 3G-access when I need step-by-step directions from Google maps/text page when going to a hard-to-find place.

2. WiFi - wireless local area networks (WLAN) -- You need to be near a 'local' area network in this case, so these are usually set up in homes or offices and you can find "hotspots" at places like Starbucks, McDonald's and other cafes though some require a per-hour charge and/or a password/passkey.

  While the Wifi is about $50 less (U.S.), you give up Free 3G cell-phone-type wireless access for the life of the unit.  Note that Apple charges $130 additional for the 3G model of its iPad and then monthly data charges to use 3G.



Kindle Touch 3G, US-only   Kindle Touch WiFi (US)   Kindle Touch WiFi-Only, outside US    Kindle Basic   (UK: KBasic)   Kindle Fire
Kindle Keybd 3G   (UK: Kindle Keybd 3G)   K3 Special Offers   K3-3G Special Offers   DX

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Check often: Temporarily-free recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.  Liked-books under $1
UK-Only: recently published free books, bestsellers, or £5 Max ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

  *Click* to Return to the HOME PAGE.  Or click on the web browser's BACK button

New Kindle CALENDAR with Recurring Events, by 7 Dragons - Update

A KINDLE CALENDAR WITH RECURRING EVENTS

For now, Amazon Kindle apps like this are U.S. only, still, although they have said on the forums that they intend them to be international at some point.

7 Dragons has done it again.  There are several Kindle calendar apps now but no other with Recurring Events (apparently quite difficult to do) or some of the other features included.

From the product description: (All emphases mine)
"Calendar is a user friendly scheduling tool and daily planner for Kindle.

Calendar lets you see events and to-do lists quickly and easily with day, month and week views.  It lets you create events (including recurring events) and daily to-do lists.  You can set reminders that show up when you start Calendar; and copy/paste, sort and search tools make working with your data a breeze.  US Holidays are included, but you can turn them off if you want to do so.

A Go-to-Date and Go-to-Today feature helps you move around quickly, and fast typing speed with word-wrap helps you work quickly too. You get 6 font sizes and 9 backgrounds or a simple full-screen mode from which to choose, and you can use the built-in Backup and Restore feature to save your calendar data to a PC or Mac."

Abhi Singh replies to customer questions about Kindle Calendar at this Amazon Kindle Forum message thread.

---

For daily free ebooks, check the following links:

Temporarily-free books - Non-classics - USA: by: NEW:  Apr  May  June 2011    Publication Date   Late-listed    Bestselling   High-ratings UK: PubDate   Popular What is 3G? and "WiFi"?       Battery Care Highly-rated under $1,  Newest: $1-$2, $2-$3

Most Popular Free K-Books U.S. & Int'l (NOT UK):    Top 100 free UK-Only:    Top 100 free USEFUL for your Kindle (U.S. only, currently):   99c Notepad 1.1,   99c Calculator,   99c Calendar,   99c Converter

Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's)   K3 Special ($114)   K3-3G Special ($164)   DX Graphite

Overdrive to handle Harry Potter e-books - UPDATE

HARRY POTTER GOES DIGITAL, VIA OVERDRIVE

You can skip to the update.

Bookseller.com's Philip Jones and Charlotte Williams confirm that "J K Rowling to sell Harry Potter e-books exclusively from Pottermore website."

That's a longish, very detailed article, and Kindle-edition readers of this blog will find the linked Bookseller page not a pain to load because it's mainly text.

  Kindle 3 users: When you click on the link to the story and get the page, it will be sized to screen width and so the words will be tiny.

  You will, though, be placed right ON the article, which means that you can press MENU button and then select Article Mode to get just the body of the text to read on your Kindle and the size of the text will be normal and in good screen contrast.

A few points from the article:

' J K Rowling has confirmed that she will release paid-for e-book versions of her incredibly successful Harry Potter books from her new website Pottermore "in partnership with J K Rowling’s publishers worldwide".  The news was unveiled via YouTube and at a press conference held today (23rd June).  Her UK publisher Bloomsbury will receive a share of the revenues, which put out a Stock Exchange announcement to make clear the revenue was already in its forecasts.

The e-books will be released in October, and will be available only on the Pottermore website, but will be compatible across a range of devices, including Amazon's Kindle.  The facility is being provided by the e-book vendor OverDrive, which also serves the Waterstone's and W H Smith's e-book stores, as well as being a major player in the library e-book lending market.

Rowling has written extensive new material - 18,000 words - about the characters, places and objects in the much-loved stories, which will inform, inspire and entertain readers as they journey through the storylines for the books.  The website itself has been built in partnership with Sony. It is ultimately intended to become an online reading experience, "extending the relevance of Harry Potter to new generations of readers, while still appealing to existing fans".

On the decision to sell direct to the reader, not through another e-tailer, J K Rowling said today: "It was quite straightforward for me . . . It means we can guarantee people everywhere are getting the same experience and at the same time. I am personally lucky to have the resources to do it myself and I could do it, I think, right. I could find the right people and take my time. There was no other option for the fans or for me.  Potter fandom was probably one of the first with an online community . . . so this felt like an extension of JKRowling.com." Neil Blair, her agent at Christopher Little, added that another motivation was that they did not want to restrict the content to a particular device. '

Pottermore CEO Rod Henwood also mentioned they'll set the pricing.

Rowling has a rather amazing statement there, since she had long resisted putting the series in e-book format.

' "It is my view that you can't hold back progress.  I love printed paper . . . This year for the first time I have downloaded e-books and it's miraculous . . . I feel good about bringing it into this world."  She added that she did come up with the name "Pottermore". '

She talks about the back stories of characters and not knowing if the additional material will ever appear in a printed version, adds that there might 'possibly' be a Harry Potter encyclopaedia and if so, the proceeds would go to charity.

Also included is her description of how this all came about.

While the site won't open until October, 1 million winners of a competition will get exclusive access to the site from the end of July.  They really know how to market all this.

MORE DETAILS
Metro (UK)'s Tom Phillips adds considerably more detail.

The Potter e-books will be DRM-free.  The article's headline says the news is sparking Twitter confusion.  Phillips' story states that the website will actually carry "the full text of the books, plus what appears to be a combination of a social network and a game, letting readers explore other previously unpublished material and submit their own additions to the site.

' The website will allows fans to access material cut from the original books and read insights from the author along the way, and will include a game-style mechanism based on the contents of the boosk - where readers gain house points for completing tasks, and use an in-game currency of galleons.

But the announcement left some on Twitter confused by what exactly the website added to the Harry Potter experience. The BBC's technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones tweeted: 'So Pottermore is an interactive website with some nice touches - but main aim seems to be platform to sell ebooks.
...
Fans will be able to register from today for an online challenge on the website on July 31 - which happens to be Harry Potter's birthday... [ to be among the first million successful challengers to see the full site 2 months earlier ].
...
The site immediately experienced some problems from the early flood of people applying, with some unable to register - the Pottermore Twitter account tweeted: 'We know a lot of people are unable to submit their email address right now. Please be patient with us and try again in a few minutes.'   '

Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's)   K3 Special ($114)   K3-3G Special ($164)   DX Graphite

---

Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.  Liked-books under $1
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or £5 Max ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

NOTEPAD v 1.1 Upgrade - Free. Copy/Paste, WordWrap, Sticky Shift-key - Updated 6/23

NOTEPAD UPGRADE AVAILABLE (FREE)

This is about my own favorite Kindle utility, and I've been looking forward to this.
  Unfortunately, it's still, at this time, U.S. only.

FIRST, BACK-UP your Notepad Kindle Folder to your computer BEFORE downloading the Notepad 1.1 update, in case.

It's important not to delete any Kindle files yourself.  Let the automated download take care of things.

I had written Dragon 7's Abhi Singh to ask him how the Notepad upgrades are going as far as release-dates by Amazon and received a detailed reply tonight.

THE UPDATING PROCEDURE
When you already own Notepad, the Amazon Notepad page lets you know you have it already and offers the Updated version of it in the same box where one would normally purchase it.

  The product page lets you decide which Kindle (or computer if you don't have wireless and need to do a manual-upgrade) should get the Notepad Update and then wirelessly sends it to the Kindle (or computer) you specify.

Abhi says, on their webpage, that this automatic wireless download works "automatically and flawlessly" and that "The upgrade works seamlessly and does not cause any problems."

  If you have 3G wireless available in your area OR WiFi access, you should just download the update from the product page after you back up your Notepad app files to computer.

  The backup is especially important if you do a manual upgrade (to your computer and then to your Kindle's Notepad folder) instead of a wireless one.

DRAGON 7's ABHI SINGH's NOTE RE THE UPGRADE/UPDATE
 Here is his reply:

' Basically this is a combination of the original update with Word Wrap and Movement shortcuts and Persistent Shift [key] etc. and a newer update we submitted just a week ago that has Copy Paste.

The features include:
Copy Paste - It works like highlighting in Kindle Books. Press Once to go into Copy Paste Mode - press 5-way again to get options.

Persistent Shift [key] To get capitals you can now press Shift, let go, type 'a', and get 'A'.

The largest font size is now bigger. Earlier it was 30 and now it's 33. Note: Your current font size doesn't change unless you go into Aa menu (by pressing Aa key) and change it.

Anti-aliasing option on newer Kindles. On Kindle 3 and Kindle WiFi you can turn on anti-aliasing. [Anti-aliasing smooths out fonts, less-fast display]

Speed Improvements. With Notepad V1.0 once you crossed 100 notes you'd see slowness and would also see things slow down quite a bit once you got to 200+ notes. With Notepad V1.1 even 300-400 notes work relatively fast and everything is faster to use. More on speed improvements at the end of this post.

Word wrap. Now words don't get cut at the end of a line.

Smart Note Save Notification. Now the note save notification doesn't take focus and doesn't stop you from continuing to type. Press Alt+S and the note save notification appears at the top and you can just continue typing.

New Movement Shortcuts. Move around quicker using handy shortcuts:
Shift+Next Page: Goes to the End of the Note
Shift+Prev Page: Goes to the Beginning of the Note
Shift+Right on the 5-way: Goes to the end of the Line
Shift+Left on the 5-way: Goes to the beginning of the Line
You can press Shift and Up to scroll up quickly.
You can press Shift and Down to scroll down quickly.
Next Page goes to Next Page of the Note (Page Size = amount of the note you see on the screen at one time).
Prev Page goes to Previous Page of the Note.

Quick Delete feature - Press down on DEL and hold it. After around a second it starts deleting 4-5 characters per second.

Undo Feature - Press Alt+Z to undo your last few moves one by one. If you delete something by mistake or want to undo typing you can press Alt+Z to Undo.

It's a free update (except to us as we pay the data charges :) ) and it's available now. '

The backup procedure was written for Notepad in general and is something you we should use BEFORE downloading the Upgrade.

7 Dragons group offers Help files with detailed explanations of Changes/Improvements in PDF format for your computer especially, at bit.ly/notepadchangespdf, and in Kindle (mobi) format at bit.ly/knotepadchanges.

 The latter Kindle-format file should be directly downloadable to your Kindle via the Kindle (see "Download" option at that page).

  (The "http://" part isn't needed for the Kindle web browser nor on most computer web browsers, for that matter, as they add that in if you omit it.)

Here's to even more enjoyment of a great utility.


Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's)   K3 Special ($114)   K3-3G Special ($164)   DX Graphite

---

Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.  Liked-books under $1
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or £5 Max ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

Kindle News: Latest Amazon Tablet Rumors - by Aug or Sept

It'll be fun, once Amazon tablets appear, to see which reporters had the best sources.

On June 19, I noted TechnoBuffalo's Noah Kravitz writing about his own sources giving him information that conflicted with the previous strong rumors of "Hollywood" and "Coyote" code-named models that would be based, earlier reports had said, on NVIDIA processors.
  Not so, says Kravitz.

' My sources tell me Amazon’s tablet computer will run Android but feature Intel-based innards, and not an Nvidia Tegra processor, but what beats at the heart of Jeff Bezos’ secret creation is barely half the story here.  The all-but-confirmed Kindle successor should be available online before the end of this year – perhaps before Summer’s end – and while we don’t know anything official about it, most everybody and their “sources” agree that the thing will run Android. And no, really, I actually have sources. I promise. '

Today, June 22, I see that Digitimes's Yenting Chen and Adam Hwang have reported August or September due-dates and the following, which matches Kravitz's information but conflicts with Digitimes' own previous report on screen panels, but Wintek (see worker-poisoning problems) seems to supply a TFT type display:

' Amazon is poised to step into tablet PCs and will launch models as son [sic] as August-September, with targeted global sales of four million units for 2011, according to Taiwan-based component makers...
. . .
Amazon adopts processors developed by Texas Instruments, with Taiwan-based Wintek to supply touch panels, ILI Technology to supply LCD driver ICs and Quanta Computer responsible for assembly, the sources indicated.  Monthly shipments are expected to be 700,000-800,000 units.

Amazon will provide streaming movie services for users of its tablet PCs, the sources noted. '

Wintek supplies touch panels to Apple, HTC Corp., and Samsung Electronics Co.

Wintek supplies the touch panels for the Apple iPad 2
Mobile Mac World's Ben Camm-Jones, wrote in January (before the Feb. Digitimes report) that Wintek and TPK would supply the touch panels for the Apple iPad 2 and that the TFT-LCD displays would be made by LG and Samsung "having been designed by Apple."

I don't know how Digitimes explains its quite conflicting reports on the the type of technology used for Amazon tablet displays.

  Here's what Camm-Jones says about why the iPad 2 did not use the ffs technology (that Digitimes described in its earlier report): ' The most important reason why iPad 2 won't have retinal display is yield rate of panel making.  At this point, making high resolution and bright IPS/FFS panel is not easy and the production volume and cost couldn't meet Apple's requirements," the note reads. '

In the meantime, we'll see in August/September, maybe, which ones were given good info.

Here is the ongoing list of earlier blog articles on the many stronger rumors circulating on online gadget news sites about a coming Amazon color LCD tablet or family of tablets (by year end).
  ONE rumor has been about a smaller e-Ink Kindle as well, with touch screen some time during the fall (David Carnoy at CNet, who's repeated it twice since then).)

Kindleworld ANDROID TABLET blog articles on the larger rumors:

Wednesday, June 15, 2011
RUMOR: Amazon 10" color tablet to offer free streaming video as promo. Updated
http://bit.ly/kwtstream

Monday, May 16, 2011
Amazon tablet family rumors grow, with 'Coyote' and 'Hollywood' code names
http://bit.ly/kwamtab2

Saturday, May 14, 2011
Amazon's Android Tablet(s) later this year - more on the likely display
with samples of the type of screen resolution we might see
http://bit.ly/kwamtab

Thursday, May 12, 2011
Jeff Bezos talks about possible Tablet and concerns over adKindles
http://bit.ly/kwcrjb

Thursday, April 21, 2011
Is Samsung building an Android tablet for Amazon?
http://bit.ly/kwatss

Tuesday, May 24, 2011
SMALLER E-INK Kindle [possibility] with touchscreen - per David Carnoy
http://bit.ly/kwksmall#ksmall

Friday, November 5, 2010
That Amazon Android Tablet May be a Reality - UPDATE
http://bit.ly/kwktab2

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For daily free ebooks, check the following links:

Temporarily-free books - Non-classics - USA: by: NEW:  Apr  May  June 2011    Publication Date   Late-listed    Bestselling   High-ratings UK: PubDate   Popular What is 3G? and "WiFi"?       Battery Care Highly-rated under $1,  Newest: $1-$2, $2-$3

Most Popular Free K-Books U.S. & Int'l (NOT UK):    Top 100 free UK-Only:    Top 100 free USEFUL for your Kindle (U.S. only, currently):   99c Notepad 1.1,   99c Calculator,   99c Calendar,   99c Converter

Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's)   K3 Special ($114)   K3-3G Special ($164)   DX Graphite

Kindle news - 6/20 Nook Touch vs K3. Software hack

KINDLE NEWS OVER THE WEEKEND

MOBILE TECH REVIEW posted an announcement and description of its usual, very thorough video comparison of e-readers, this time of the Nook Simple Touch vs the Kindle 3.  The video takes almost half-hour to view because they go through all the features for each e-reader, comparing their pro's and con's.  They explain that they look at these elements:

  . books,
  . highlighting
  . the dictionary
  . PDF support
  . buying books
  . text clarity   (not a small thing, w/ Pearl screen capabilities)
  . reading features.

Their full written review will follow next week.  This was of interest to me because I hadn't seen any other news-site "reviews" yet that paid attention to anything but the TouchScreen interface, and -- while it is the key factor for many people because it does make navigation easier -- the effectiveness of an e-reader for people who read many books and periodicals is a lot more than that.

 It seems that many who look mainly at hardware don't pay attention to the other 4/5ths of a user's guide that will deal with the many reader options and explain the functioning of features that are very useful for book clubs and for classes but also for people who like to make notes about their reading or who like to look up more info while they're reading, with the ability to get back to that page with the press of a Back button.

  That your highlighting and notes can be easily lost without backup beyond the device's dependence on what happens with an e-book (accidental or premature deletion) and the lack of a method for transfering those notes to your computer (for use with a text editor or for printing or just for backup) is getting too 'simple' for my tastes.  But Amazon's 'cloud' has provided these capabilities for 4 years.  Beyond this, they added an extra copy of your web-readable annotations in a Kindle owner's private Amazon web page, organized by book.

The video review is at YouTube but can also be seen at MobileTechReview's forum.  (Those using Kindle blog-editions to read this can't run videos of course.)

The feedback at YouTube is mainly happiness at how thorough the reviewers are and there's little of the blind-siding with either device because the review goes into so much detail.  I did see there, and at MobileRead.com, that viewers of the video report end up discussing the merits of each without just going into the side-taking that's normally seen.

CONSUMER REPORTS also posted their results of a review of the Nook Simple Touch (NST) and the Kindle 3 (K3).  The new Nook "beat" the Kindle 3G model by 1 point, though the Touch capability is a strong factor.  So one can wonder how it did in other areas.

But to an extent, it makes sense that the Touch Screen makes the difference and the other factors are less important (especially when they're not mentioned).

  Oddly enough, CR stresses that the new Nook is "emulating Amazon's focus on reading with minimal fuss and extra features and adds, "The Simple Touch drops those bells and whistles and the second screen.  As a result, it (like the Kindle) successfully "gets out of the way and disappears and lets you get on with your reading..."

That is bizarre because the Kindle 3 has a plethora of very useful features that the Nook has dropped from what it put into its original Nook Classic a year ago or that it never had at all.  Consumer Reports is normally known for looking at a myriad of features that, together, make a product what it is, but in this case they looked mainly at the type of navigational control, as if just driving a car a certain way would be the sole concern while not caring how the car functions along the way when there are several things you hope it will do well if at all. [Edited to correct a word choice.]

  In this case a car radio would be an unnecessary extra feature (the Nook dropped its mp3 player and ALL audio and has no speakers), and while its original Nook Classic had a GPS-like unit that would guide you to various web sites and allow you to download books from other stores, that is not functioning in this model, at least, and B&N shows it (the web browser) as non-existent, mainly because it fails at doing the most basic things and is therefore hidden.

  For one thing a web browser, while you're reading, can take you to a library (Wikipedia or Google) for more info on a subject.  One of the features that the Kindle allows free via normally-expensive 3G cell phone networks, in 100 countries, is access to Wikipedia FROM the page you are reading, for a search word or phrase.

  For students of any age, that free, 3G cell phone network access to Wikipedia (or Google) is no small feature, and it's been present since 2007 on the Kindle.  I've little doubt that if other e-Ink readers gave customers this feature for no add'l charge via 3G, a review would heap praise on it and not consider it not worth a mention.

  But the Nook is US only, for purchasing Nook books, so is relatively limited and that's not particularly known either.

For those interested in the actual features that were made for people who love to read, see both my Features-Comparison and, for sure, the MobileTechReview video of the features of both e-readers, as it's a very balanced report, giving credit to each where due.

  The depth of the look via that video means there is less hype over just one product feature and less reliance on weight to today's library-lending when Agreements have been announced that the Kindle will be participating in that but, unlike most ereaders, there'll be no additional software to be downloaded or required, and the borrowed books will be delivered over Wifi without the arduous Adobe 3 DRM rights-protection method that requires using a computer and an extra piece of software to do the library borrowing.  However, Amazon came from behind on that one and since it's not ready as of today, that's fair game.

Here's the interesting reaction by the Mobile Read forum crowd to the Consumer Reports evaluation.  It's of interest because it's not a group wedded to any particular e-reader but they are a tough, knowledgable crowd.


KINDLE 3.1 SOFTWARE HACK FOR OLDER KINDLES
First, I'm not recommending that anyone reading try this, since it not only violates the usual Terms of Agreement but it is also not a piece of cake for most and you could wind up with a non-working Kindle instead of an improved one.

  I just came across PC World's story about a software patch that opens up older Kindles to new features such as enhanced PDF support and better web browsing.  See the PC World story by Chris Brandrick for the details.

  More than anything, it's a strong sign that Amazon is long overdue on providing a software update for its Kindle 2 and DX models but especially for the expensive DX Graphite (which has the Pearl screen capability that the Kindle 3 has and was released only a couple of months before the Kindle 3).  The natives are restless.


"AFTER DISCOVERING THAT PEOPLE DO ACTUALLY STILL READ, APPLE DECIDES TO BE A LITTLE NICER TO PUBLISHERS"
Ad Age's Simon Dumenco writes an entertaining story about what has happened in the e-reader world since Steve Jobs originally told the NY Times's John Markoff that the Amazon Kindle was doomed because "It doesn't matter how good or bad the product is," he'd said. "The fact is that people don't read anymore.  Forty percent of the people in the U.S. read one book or less last year.  The whole conception is flawed at the top because people don't read anymore."

  While he provided a tablet for web-browsing, video watching, and games, it also allows the unusual reading-users an area also.   And now, Dumenco adds, "the next version of the iPad operating system, iOS 5, will finally have a unified home for all your iPad newspaper and magazine subscriptions: something called Newsstand."


JOHN LOCKE IS THE FIRST SELF-PUBLISHED AUTHOR TO SELL OVER 1M E-BOOKS THROUGH AMAZON
The Bookseller's Lisa Campbell reports that John Locke is the first self-published author to join what Amazon has dubbed the Kindle Million Club.  Here's his Amazon page.

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For daily free ebooks, check the following links:

Temporarily-free books - Non-classics - USA: by: NEW:  Apr  May  June 2011    Publication Date   Late-listed    Bestselling   High-ratings UK: PubDate   Popular What is 3G? and "WiFi"?       Battery Care Highly-rated under $1,  Newest: $1-$2, $2-$3

Most Popular Free K-Books U.S. & Int'l (NOT UK):    Top 100 free UK-Only:    Top 100 free USEFUL for your Kindle (U.S. only, currently):   99c Notepad 1.1,   99c Calculator,   99c Calendar,   99c Converter

Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's)   K3 Special ($114)   K3-3G Special ($164)   DX Graphite