EA game apps at 50% off / 8M kindles sold 2010 / My NookColor - a report

ELECTRONICS ARTS HOLIDAY SPECIAL ON ITS KINDLE GAMES
  Electronic Arts is offering their games at 50% off through January 2, for SCRABBLE, MONOPOLY, Solitaire, Sudoku, and Texas Hold’em.   Also:

. SCRABBLE was UPDATED on 12/15 and it now features "improved graphics and enhanced contrast."

  If you bought this earlier, go to that page and there should be an "Update" button for you to get the newer version.

. I had not posted about the now-popular MONOPOLY game either, though you have to make the actual moves for the computer after it's calculated them (!) and I hear there are repetitive features involved.

. Texas Hold'em is another newish one, and I have resisted it since the title reminds me of all the spam ads that used to come at us on the original game.  It's not quite as well rated as MONOPOLY (the name is capitalized and is not my doing) but still gets 4 stars from Kindle owners who have bought and rated it.


AMAZON BEATS ANALYST PREDICTIONS (AGAIN)
From Bloomberg Businessweek comes the headline that "Amazon.com Kindle Sales Are Said to Exceed Estimates"
December 23, 2010, 10:34 AM EST (updated story)   Italics in some excerpts that follow are just for emphasis by me.

' Dec. 21 (Bloomberg) -- Amazon.com Inc. is likely to sell more than 8 million Kindle electronic-book readers this year, at least 60 percent more than analysts have predicted, according to two people who are aware of the company’s sales projections.

Analysts surveyed by Bloomberg estimated, on average, that the company would sell 5 million Kindles in 2010. Last year, Amazon sold about 2.4 million Kindles, said one of the people, who asked to remain anonymous because the company doesn’t disclose Kindle sales figures.
. . .
Amazon has disclosed few details on Kindle sales.  In October, the company said that sales of the lighter, faster Kindles, which were introduced in July, had surpassed total Kindle sales in the fourth quarter of 2009, the company’s busiest time of year. Sony and Barnes & Noble don’t disclose sales of their e-readers either.
. . .
Amazon’s sales demonstrate that the market for stand-alone e-readers is growing even as Apple Inc. builds demand for the iPad tablet, which lets users read books, watch videos and carry out computing tasks. Apple, based in Cupertino, California, sold 7.46 million iPads from their April debut through September. '

  About a zillion competing tablets are due in mid January :-)  The iPad itself is due to come out with an improved do-even-more tablet in Feb/March, per multiple rumors of probable features tweeted the last two days.  I'm hoping it has a USB port and an SD slot instead of a kludge adapter kit that's extra.

MY NOOKCOLOR
I now have a NookColor for magazines and travel/photoshop books.  The Nat'l Geographic magazine is just stunning on it, and I would like to keep it just for that.

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.

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(Older posts have older Kindle model info. For latest models, see CURRENT KINDLES page. )
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Electronic Arts Kindle Scrabble the first Kindle app for sale? - UPDATE

Kindle Scrabble from Electronic Arts Inc was released today.  Thanks to Golf11 for the tip via his Twitter account today.

Apparently, this is the first commercial Kindle app made available, and so far it has three ratings of 5 stars each.

Electronic Arts set the price at $4.99.  Their product description includes:  Simple controls make it easy to play any way you want, whether you're a casual or experienced SCRABBLE player. Pass N' Play with a friend, challenge the Kindle, or play a solo game. If you need help, use the Best Word feature to create the highest scoring word possible. You can even pause the game anytime and pick it up later.

They provide "instant statistics tracking" and offer it as a way to sharpen your vocabulary in a new way that should be fun.

If it's anything like the free Every Word or Shuffled Row it could be somewhat addictive.

So far, review headings are "Seamless, Fast, Perfect" -- "Definitely worth the price"  -- and "Very fun"...

UPDATE - Note that you can play against someone else by passing the Kindle back and forth.
  Also, this word game is available for Kindle 2 and all Kindle DX's as well as the Kindle 3's.  Kindle 1's are unable to access the screen directly due to the slower screen used in 2007.

Currently, Amazon has not yet made this available globally, though they've
stated that they intend to have all games available world-wide eventually.


Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's),   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.
    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!