Amazon to offer delivery of packages to 7-Eleven Lockers

AMAZON'S DELIVERY LOCKERS - Sept. 12, 2011 GeekWire has photos of one of the coming Amazon delivery locker systems to be housed by 7-Eleven.  These were taken or posted on September 5.  John Holdcroft (@johnholdsea) tweeted this particular story by GeekWire.

  It's been in the news that Amazon and 7-Eleven have been in talks on this, but it seemed a done-deal by this Sept. 5 report.  For those who have reason not to trust delivery to their doors when they're not at home, this will be an alternative.  At first, last week, I thought "Whaaat?" and pictured boxes left behind the counters :-)


  As you can see, in the larger version of the photo by Rebecca Lovell in a later story, there's a screen with a pin-code mechanism that looks a bit like a Verseteller.
  GeekWire's John Cook and his 2-year old explorer son had investigated the scene at 1522 East Madison Street's 7-Eleven in Seattle earlier when the lockers weren't ready..  They were told the lockers would be activated on Friday (the 9th). The larger photo of the now-active screen shows "Amazon Locker" at the top left.

They're not in actual (official) use yet, and they seem to be going through testing.  Amazon's not saying, so deliveries to Amazon customes haven't been set up in that case.

  I guess eventually these will be considered evidence of "physical presence" in the states that need tax collection by out-of-state companies .

Customers will get an email notification with a bar code used to get a pin number for keyboard entry.  The UK will get these also, and GeekWire says they'll "be located near the public toilets at the One New Change shopping center," going live this week.


Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's)   K3 Special ($114)   K3-3G Special ($139)   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. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
-- The Send to Kindle button works well only on Firefox currently.

Send to Kindle

(Older posts have older Kindle model info. For latest models, see CURRENT KINDLES page. )
If interested, you can also follow my add'l blog-related news at Facebook and Twitter
Questions & feedback are welcome in the Comment areas (tho' spam is deleted). Thanks!

Amazon 's new same-day delivery / BN e-reader pics

Called "Local Express Delivery," the new Amazon same-day feature will be available only in select markets, since the shipment destinations have to be within a reasonable distance of a distribution hub.

Amazon is implementing same-day delivery in New York, Philadelphia, Las Vegas, Baltimore, Boston, Washington DC, and Seattle.  PC World's Tony Bradley reports that there are plans to add Chicago, Indianapolis, and Phoenix in the near future.  He writes:

' The cut-off time to be able to receive same-day delivery varies from city to city.  For most markets the cut-off will be around 10 or 11 AM.  Shoppers in Seattle can place orders as late as 1 PM and still get their delivery that same day.

Amazon already has a premium shipping option called Amazon Prime.  Amazon Prime members pay $79 per year to subscribe to the service.  Members receive unlimited free 2-day shipping on a variety of items, and can upgrade to one-day shipping for an additional cost of $3.99

[Now] Amazon Prime customers in Local Express Delivery markets can upgrade to the same-day delivery service for $5.99.  Rates for non-Amazon Prime members are not yet available.  Suffice it to say that it is safe to assume that premium shipping will come at a premium cost. '

  He mentions that Barnes & Noble already offers this service, free for orders over $25, but only in Manhattan.
  B&N, by the way, will unveil their own eReader Tuesday, which also uses a 6" e-Ink screen in shades of gray.

  At the bottom of their e-reader, though, will be a little LCD window that will show the book covers in color although the book-reads will be in black & white, or grays, as with the Amazon and Sony models.

  Use of that LCD feature will drain battery power but I imagine it can be turned off.  A main feature of other e-readers is the long session life (a week or two) of the e-Ink screen with its light demand on battery life.  It'll use a virtual keyboard that displays when typing is needed (which would likely be even slower than the Kindle 2's physical keyboard).

  Here are some 'leaked' images of it with no information on whether it has equivalents of the Kindle's inline dictionary with status-line summary definition of the word your cursor is on, highlighting capability, notes, or word/phrase searches within books, or of the entire device, that the Amazon models have.  In fact there just is no information.  Only pictures.  Nicely clean design.  Rumors abound but on Tuesday there'll be actual info.

  For now, some have asked if it will also have text-to-speech, background mp3's, and audiobooks as the Kindle does.  B&N's software eReader is not readable on a Kindle or Sony, nor can a Kindle or Sony read B&N's eReader format.  Digital-rights-management complexity and multiple file-formats will continue.

  An important question will be whether or not it has wireless access to the B&N store.  It'll have to of course.  It's a sure bet, though, that it won't have even a slow but free 24/7 web browser as the Kindle does

  Monday, Amazon starts selling the International models of the Kindle.  Tonight or tomorrow, I'll write what I've found about the different Kindle features and Kindle-book offerings for the various countries and look at whether there is any reason for U.S. Kindle owners to move from the U.S. model they have to an International one.  Short answer - No, unless they travel a lot and don't mind paying extra fees for downloads to the Kindle while in other countries, or they don't get Sprint Whispernet where they live.  But there are other things to think about.

  Downloads while abroad can be continued to be done by U.S. Kindle owners to a computer and then transferred to the Kindle, at no cost.

  (International customers won't be charged fees for downloads made when in other countries, as the book prices include both VAT and some of the cost of international wireless access to the store.) Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
-- The Send to Kindle button works well only on Firefox currently.

Send to Kindle

(Older posts have older Kindle model info. For latest models, see CURRENT KINDLES page. )
If interested, you can also follow my add'l blog-related news at Facebook and Twitter
Questions & feedback are welcome in the Comment areas (tho' spam is deleted). Thanks!