Amazon and Walmart/Google bookwars

Walmart, taking a digital leaf from Amazon's Kindle books, is pricing ten of the top-selling hardcover books for $10 each, a new development which is sending even more shivers through publishing circles already upset at the $10 pricing for the Kindle books.  Walmart's $10 titles include Stephen King's latest book Under the Dome and Palin's Going Rogue, as well as books from James Patterson and Dean Koontz.

  Walletpop reports that Amazon fired back with $10 pricing on those books as well, which apparently caused Walmart to drop and shoot $9. Amazon did the same! And lowered the Kindle pricing as well for those books.  Customers won, Publishers zero, practically.  Most agree, both companies are apparently willing to lose money.  And publishers are right to worry that customers are being trained to expect a $10 price for books -- bad enough (for them) with e-books but on hardcover books also?

  Wall St. Journal had the best quote:

' "If there is going to be a 'Wal-Mart of the Web,' it is going to be Walmart.com," said Walmart.com CEO Raul Vazquez in an interview. "Our goal is to be the biggest and most visited retail Web site."

Wal-Mart's $10 promotion applies to the top 10 books coming out in November but the company is also selling 200 best-sellers for 50% of their list price. '

That's huge.
And Walmart's $10 pricing will include free shipping.

The WSJ also points out that

' Amazon has managed to encroach on Wal-Mart's general-store status online by steadily increasing the range of products it sells.  While it is best known for selling books and music, Amazon's second-quarter North American sales of "general merchandise" -- including everything from diapers to vacuums -- were for the first time larger than its sales of media.

It recently acquired shoe and apparel seller Zappos.com. And taking another cue from Wal-Mart, Amazon has steadily increased its range of private-label goods. '

So, this is actually more generalized war :-)  And again borrowing from Amazon, Walmart will start selling products from less well-known retailers, for a share of the receipts.


GOOGLE ENTERS BOOKSTORE SCENE WITH GOOGLE EDITIONS
Google announced it will be offering 500,000 e-books for any device with a web browser.

 I love my 10" screen netbook, which has a great screen, but I have no interest in reading books on it, via a web browser or any other program.  There's a big difference between surfing for hours (feasting on large bites here and there with the distraction and relief of multimedia) and linear reading of tremendous blocks of words, with that light shining into your eyes.

  Gartner analyst Allen Weiner is skeptical, citing Google's lack of experience selling media, and questions the effectiveness of offering e-books through Web browsers.  The only e-reader with a web browser at all is the Kindle which won't have a web browser enabled for some time in Europe or most of the rest of the world (though Kindles in Japan, Hong Kong, and Mexico will have that capability enabled).

EWeek adds some interesting info:

' As for the details of Editions itself, Google said it will offer in-print books from publisher partners, giving them 63 percent of revenues and keeping 37 percent for itself where it sold e-books directly to consumers.

Customers will be able to buy the books from Google directly or from other online stores such as Amazon.com or Barnesandnoble.com.  Where e-books were bought through other online retailers, publishers would get 45 percent and most of the remaining 55 percent would go to the retailer, with a small share going to Google. '

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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.
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Amazon Customer Service Q & A: Oct 7-12

These are from the Customer Service area of the Amazon forums, with links to the actual postings (which don't have hyperlinks or bolding for titles).
  I'll be keeping these reformatted copies, with hyperlinks added, as a set, in the reference section on the right-hand column.

10/7  Q&A
  Downloading Outside the U.S.,
  Non English Content and
  Documentation

Initial post: Oct 7, 2009 4:51 PM PDT
Last edited by the author on Oct 9, 2009 3:22 PM PDT
Amazon Kindle Customer Service says:

Traveling Outside the U.S. with Kindle (U.S. and International Wireless)

When traveling abroad, you can download books wirelessly from the Kindle Store or your Archived Items. U.S. customers will be charged a fee of $1.99 for international book downloads (this fee only applies when the U.S. customer is outside the U.S.).

U.S. customers can continue to receive all of their newspaper, magazine, and blog subscriptions via Whispernet while traveling abroad, for a weekly fee of $4.99, or $1.99 per issue.

To avoid any fees, customers can always download books, periodicals, and personal documents via their computer and transfer to their Kindle using USB. To download Kindle content to your computer visit www.amazon.com/manageyourkindle.

For non-U.S. customers, there are no additional charges for receiving books or periodicals wirelessly outside their home country.

English Only Text-to-Speech

The Text-to-Speech feature on our latest generation Kindles and Kindle DX can read English-language newspapers, magazines, blogs, and books out loud to you, unless the book's rights holder made this feature unavailable. The Text-to-Speech feature does not support reading in other languages.

Foreign Language Kindle Books

The Kindle Store includes primarily English-language books and U.S. and international newspaper and magazine titles with prices listed in U.S. Dollars.

To see if an item that interests you is available, please search for the title in the Kindle Store (http://www.amazon.com/kindlestore).

Foreign Language Kindle User's Guide

You can find non-English versions of some Kindle documentation available in PDF format on our Kindle Support pages:
  http://www/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=200317150.

---

Oct 9  Q&A:
  Help Pages,
  Personal Docs,
  Your Country Setting, and
  Kindle U.S. Wireless Owners

Initial post: Oct 9, 2009 9:49 AM PDT
Last edited by the author on Oct 12, 2009 4:05 PM PDT
Amazon Kindle Customer Service says:

Updated Help Pages

The answers posted by Kindle Customer Service in this forum are often taken from the Kindle Support Pages. We've recently updated these pages to make it easier to find the information you're looking for, you can visit them at: http://www.amazon.com/kindlesupport.

Customer service focuses on the most common questions and keeps these announcements at the top of the forum, making them easy to find. You'll also find that many knowledgeable Kindle owners participate in these forums and will answer questions for new Kindle owners.

Foreign Language Personal Documents

Kindle can display non-English content that uses the ISO 8859-1 character set (which is based on the Latin languages). The only characters from this set not currently supported are: spades, clubs, hearts, up-arrow, down-arrow, alpha, beta, and gamma. Kindle also supports Greek characters and monospace fonts.

Your Country Setting

When shopping the Kindle Store you will see the book selection available to you based on your home country. Your home country or region should be set to the country where you live. You can update your home country or region on the Manage Your Kindle Page (http://www.amazon.com/manageyourkindle). Scroll down to the "Your country" section and select the "Edit" option to change.

Kindle U.S. Wireless Owners

The new Kindle with U.S. and International Wireless uses different built-in 3G GSM technology that allows it to access Whispernet internationally. A Kindle with U.S. Wireless only cannot be modified or updated to allow it to access Whispernet from outside U.S.

Edit: added "Browsing the Kindle Store by Country" section (10/9)

---

Oct 12  Q&A:
  Ordering Kindle in Australia,
  Shipping Kindle to APO Addresses,
  and Kindle U.S. Wireless Price Drop

Initial post: Oct 12, 2009 4:03 PM PDT ...
Last edited by the author on Oct 13, 2009 ~11:45 AM PDT
Amazon Kindle Customer Service says:

Australian Customers Ordering Kindle (U.S. and International Wireless)

To order Kindle (U.S. and International Wireless) in Australia, please click the link presented to you after selecting that country on the Kindle product page. This will take you to a separate page for Kindles shipped to Australia:
http://www.amazon.com/Wireless-International-Generation-charging-Australia/dp/B000GF7ZRA

This Kindle purchase will include a USB cable for charging via your computer, but does not include a US power adapter.

Shipping Kindle to APO Addresses

U.S. Customers living or traveling abroad can have Kindle (U.S. and International Wireless) shipped to eligible countries. Shipping may not be available to all APO/FPO addresses. To check, please enter the shipping address at checkout. We do not allow you to place orders to APO/FPO addresses where we will not be able to ship.

Kindle U.S. Wireless Price Drop

If your order for Kindle (U.S. Wireless) was shipped between Sept 6 and October 6, 2009, please contact Customer Service and we will refund the $40 price difference.

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B&N 'color' Plastic Logic e-reader report was wrong

Jenn  iPhoned a much-distributed and tweeted video-interview with an alleged Barnes and Noble spokesguy who went on and on about how B&N's e-reader (in partnership with Plastic Logic) would be out in the Spring and "Ours will be in color" -- so, a posting to this effect went up on Mashable "on the big news" and was carried by Engadget, FastCompany, WIRED, et al, as reported by Jenn.   (Click on image to see the video.)

  I didn't run (or walk) with it because nothing in the guy's report matched what Plastic Logic has been saying the past half year and why would a Barnes and Noble salesman sitting at an exhibit be suddenly informally announcing a Plastic Logic color E-reader for the spring?
  (There'd be no way for Jenn to know this though.)

MobilitySite, which had also reported the interview and the color news, reports today that Plastic Logic has denied the report.

' "The video report is inaccurate and the individual (who was apparently filmed while attending a trade show was not an authorized Barnes & Noble spokesperson) was misinformed.

  We are excited to have Barnes & Noble powering the Plastic Logic e-commerce store.  While colour is on Plastic Logic’s roadmap, it is not on the map for the Spring of 2010. &n bsp;Plastic Logic has said for quite some time it is working on colour, but not for a product in the coming year." '

  Well, I doubt that he just attended the tradeshow and put on a B&N shirt and lanyard and readied himself for interviews (while around actual B&N staff) for the sport of it.  More likely, he was a temp staffer helping with B&N's exhibit, misinterpreted what he was hearing from employee conversations, and then eagerly passed that on when interviewed.
 People get overexcited by the word "color" when it comes to e-readers.

 He didn't, as speculated, probably make it up as a video-worthy answer to her question of what made the B&N reader better than its competitor(s), as they kiddingly refer to the Kindle);  he actually mentioned earlier in the video, w/o being asked, that it would be in color.

  As for why B&N didn't instead choose to quietly retract it or just say instead that "it may be not be ready by Spring 'exactly' -- what?  It's not going to be ready in the coming year.  They've been very clear about that.

Any color we see will be of the LCD variety, unless Pixel QI is involved.  E-ink color just is not ready.

  I recently got a 10" Netbook that I will be writing about.  I love it, and one thing it's shown me is why any Tablet device may not do that well after all, if as high-priced as reported and marketed in a big way for reading of entire e-books along with web browsing, though the latter would be a fun use of it using home or office WiFi.

  But trying to read an actual book on a 10" LCD color screen is not going to be one of the world's big pleasures.  Surfing the net?  That's another matter entirely and doesn't demand linear concentration of the eyes on only words for a good length of time.

  One thing about e-reader news today - wishful thinking drives a lot of it.  But there's an energy in gadget excitement that I definitely understand too well. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
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Read foreign-language web pages in your language

I've found that the Translate a Web page" Google tool is not used as much as it could be because many don't know about it.
  I received an alert about a webpage that had linked to an article in A Kindle World and found that it was in Greek or, as they say, it was all Greek to me :-)

It was of interest because it was a forum in Greece that was discussing the new International Kindle available in that country.

So I went to Google's general translation tool (always shown next to the Google search bar in small font) and scrolled down until I saw "Translate a web page."

  Then I pasted, into the long bar, the URL/link I was given, and chose - from the pull-down menus - the language I wanted translated and then the language that would allow me to read and understand what was said on the page.
  Clicking on the gray "Translate" button took me to the English version of the forum page.

  While this type of automated webpage-translation is notoriously primitive, it usually gives you at least the gist of the conversation.

  It did pretty well, for the most part, in a message by website administrator "Hal9000" -- I can understand what he's saying.  They are discussing a color e-reader that Fujitsu will release as well as the administrator's Kindle 2, which he's had for awhile. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
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Kindle 2 International and actual UK vs U.S. book pricing - Update

UPDATE - Oct 12 - Australia's The Age just copied The Guardian story without checking Amazon's Australia country-info on product page for the International Kindle.
  The Age and other repeating-newspapers claim it's $13.99 for books in Australia and a 40% increase while the product page says $11.99 unless marked otherwise.  Whatever happened to first-level fact checking?
  Meanwhile MediaBistro understandably picked it up and reports that "Jeremy Fisher, executive director of the 3,000-member Society, thinks Australian writers should avoid the Kindle for these pricey reasons."

---

Main blog entry from Oct. 10
Well, a column by writer Bobbie Johnson that I briefly referenced yesterday for citing an unreasonably-high pricing calculation for the cost of providing a book for UK residents via 'roaming' mechanisms (at the same time that a sibling Guardian-column quoted an Amazon spokesperson saying there would be "no" roaming fees for UK residents in the UK) was updated by Johnson to report that, per a conversation he had with an Amazon rep, Amazon "confirmed" they will be charging a "premium" for UK residents and then he linked us to another column of his that said "International Buyers to be charged 40% more per book" than U.S. customers are - an alarmist column that did anger readers who believed it.

  I bring this up because today Twitter is alive with 'tweets' about other newspapers picking it up, one after the other, and just repeating it as fact.  That's nothing new but it's unnecessary and definitely misleading.

  Ironically, that was an update to a column in which Johnson originally opined that American customers were subsidizing the UK customers' higher costs for Amazon.

  Johnson cited the one UK price of $13.99 despite the Amazon product page for the UK Kindle specifically saying, from the announcement day:

' Free Wireless: ... No monthly fees, service plans, or hunting for Wi-Fi hotspots.  For non-U.S. customers, there are also no additional charges for wireless delivery in or outside your home country...

  Low Book Prices: New York Times® Best Sellers and New Releases are $11.99 to $13.99 (prices include VAT), unless marked otherwise. You'll also find many books for less - over 70,000 titles are priced under $5.99. '

First, Value Added Tax charged by Great Britain is *included* in the book price.  That's not an Amazon premium charge.
  As of January the VAT will be nearly 17% over the cost of the book.
And the base price of the range is $11.99, not $13.99. In the U.S. bestsellers are $9.99 and up.

So, no, it's not generally 40% over the cost in the U.S.  Even at the $13.99 range, U.S. Kindle owners are aware some bestsellers are not selling for only $9.99, too often going for as much as $15  And, again, the int'l pricing includes the government's value-added tax and is not a charge for the book. (Edited per correction by Jim.)

However, the UK will not have the experimental web browser, which some of us value having.  And I guess they won't have it unless or until the wireless-provider pricing is low enough in affected countries to cover the cost of that as Sprint does here in the U.S.   Countries which WILL have the web-browser enabled are Mexico, Hong Kong, and Tokyo.

For added irony, Johnson linked us to another Guardian article, this one by Charles Arthur, who spoke with Amazon's SVP in charge of the Kindle, Stephen Kessel, who reiterated Amazon's policy (I quoted this yesterday) that UK residents won't be paying roaming charges at home nor in the U.S.  This was why Johnson's first focus was that it seemed to him that U.S. residents would be subsidizing UK Kindle users.

  The problem for those in the UK is that they can buy books for now only from the U.S. Amazon store.  This means a possible import/customs fee -- these don't apply to hard-cover books but somehow appear to be in the mix for e-books (which the government can change).  However, those also are not Amazon book charges.  But prospective buyers will need to factor that in.

So, as this 40% added Amazon-charge for UK customers rumor percolates around the globe, maybe some will know it's not true, even if repeated by 50 newpapers and online sites.

  The basic price difference in the bestseller price-range for both U.S. and U.K. is 17% - near the cost of the Value Added Tax charged over there.   And here are additions from knowledgeable people commenting to the article.

===
"Pricing sounds quite logical, VAT will be 15% or 17.5% from 1 January which does explain part of the price differential vs. a print book. Why is this?
Surely the EU should be promoting E-books from a green perspective and allow no VAT like the paper format?

It would also make sense that from a scale perspective that costs in the other countries will be more than the US where there is a bigger market."
  [ by jimbob70 ]

_______
"On the pricing thing. A lot of it has to do with UK publishers charging higher list price for their ebooks than US publishers.

For example Audrey Niffenegger's new book Her Fearful Symmetry...

US list price $26.99 (approx 17.02)
UK list price 21.84 (approx $34.63) "
  [ by BrianEb ]

_______

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Kindle 2 International - Follow-up news 10-09-09 - Update

Follow-up news on the Kindle 2  International after the big splash on Tuesday.

Mildly updated the "kindlecountries" file of country-specific Kindle information formatted from the Amazon page to include the news/rumors in New Zealand and Canada.

NEW ZEALAND
Kindle may yet come to New Zealand per New Zealand PC World's James Heffield.

Vodaphone's Paul Brislen says that Vodaphone is in "deep discussions" with Amazon to bring the K2i to New Zealand. However, he wouldn't speculate on how likely a deal with Amazon is or when it might happen and wasn't sure whether other telecommuications providers were also in negotiation with Amazon.

Telecom spokesperson Rebecca Earl was non-commital about ANYthing, confirming nothing but saying the company could "see the appeal of the Kindle" and was exploring options for "a device of this type."


AMAZON IN NEGOTATIONS WITH 3 CANADIAN COMPANIES?
The Globe & Mail reports that Amazon has 3 possible partners in Canada now while Amazon is shopping around for the best deal on the cost of providing Kindle owners wireless capability there.

If the problem lay with the inability to find a wireless carrier at a doable price, Amazon could have offered Canada the same non-wireless option it offered other countries, but someone in the know says it's a matter of time and deciding which company will handle it.
Rogers, an AT&T partner, had seemed the only source (maybe causing it to keep its pricing higher?) but Bell and Telus are going live with their next generation network earlier than expected, in November, which has implications for the holiday season.
The article ends with yet another report that a Canadian Kindle user reported to the newspaper that he has been able, in the last month, to download wirelessly in Canada.


UK/EUROPEAN MOBILE PROVIDERS DESCRIBED AS SURPRISED BY KINDLE INT'L
According to Mobil Phone News's Luke McKinney, Vodafone and O2 are "in charge of wireless signals" in the UK but they seem to have been caught off guard, judging from their press releases, by Amazon's latest news. McKinney feels it's "especially odd considering Amazon’s previous statement that they couldn’t unleash their equipment in the UK until extensive negotiations with telecoms companies were complete."

He writes that UK mobile service is "notoriously provincial" with "various networks having hotspots and not-spots."


THE GUARDIAN (UK) ON ROAMING CHARGES PAID BY VISITING AMERICANS
The writer asks why Amazon UK didn't launch it -- I think it's because they don't have the serving technology, Kindle billing and Kindle customer service support setup there yet. But the article references another Guardian article in which Amazon SVP Stephen Kessel spoke with the Guardian writer and mentioned the Kindle Int'l is not shipping until after the Frankfurt Book Fair, where publishers work their deals). I'm not sure how that relates to the question.

But the import tax situation then for UK residents is not attractive. The UK Value-Added Taxes are included in the cost of the books there.

Kessel did say, ""In the future we plan to introduce a UK-centric experience to allow people in Britain to purchase Kindle and Kindle books," Kessel said."

In connection with the puzzlement of UK wireless providers, The Guardian adds:

' Another mystifying question: which mobile network is Amazon going to use? AT&T, its partner in the US, doesn't have a presence in the UK. So who is Amazon's UK mobile network? Its earlier statements this morning were models of non-clarity:

"Kindle with international wireless uses advanced 3G GSM technology to power Amazon's wireless delivery system 'Whispernet' over the AT&T Global Network."

Could Kessel elucidate? Is Amazon going to be a mobile virtual network operator in the UK, like Virgin, renting airtime from the main four networks (O2, Orange, Vodafone and 3)?

"AT&T is through their network of partnerships providing 3G network coverage to Kindle and Whispernet across 100 countries." Er, OK, so which network in the UK? "You'd have to ask AT&T." We intend to. But he said that there will be no "roaming" charges; if you're a UK Kindle buyer you won't get any charges using it in the UK from a mobile network. What about a UK Kindle owner in the US - would they see roaming charges? "You pay no roaming charges."

[ What ? ]

Then there's the final question, relating to books and publication rights, which has exercised publishers and authors and agents. You'll know that some books are published in some countries, but not in others. These are often the subject of big rights bids.
. . .
Even so, we've heard that if you subscribe to UK papers on a Kindle in the UK that you may not be able to get images downloaded (there might be copyright issues). We're seeking confirmation on that. '

The commenters to that article are not overenthused about e-readers in general.

Returning to the article about "Roaming Charges paid by Americans" - that takes official customer-rates for 'roaming' rates to a situation in which the wireless will be provided by partners who are right there in the UK and comes up with an unreasonably high figure for costs there as a result, and even U.S's Sprint is said to charge relatively little to Amazon for unused bandwidth relative to what they'd charge individual customers.

Every article referenced from the Guardian has wholly different points of view on this.


FUN MUSINGS by JIM CRAMER on AMAZON
This is Cramer's intro to a story for which have to sign up to read it in full, which I didn't.  Since it's used as a lead and lure for a 14-day trial, I'll expand the possible audience here.  Cramer writes:

' Do you know that Amazon is closing in on its all-time high? Do you know that what was once considered the most overvalued stock in the world is now starting to be viewed as cheap, even as it goes higher, because of the tremendous scale it is reaching and the company's effort to drive down product pricing?

When I heard about still one more price cut for the Kindle, it dawned on me. Amazon is Ford, and Jeff Bezos is Henry Ford, without the cranky anti-Semitism and braggadocio demeanor, although I never heard Ford laugh, so I don't know if they have that in common. Ford decided to make cars for the masses, and with it, he broke down the price barriers and grabbed market share and mind share and scale, making it so that his company was so rich that he could afford to pay... '

OFF-TOPIC, BUT INTERESTING BEZOS/GOOGLE STORY
'...Kara Swisher at All Things D has details from Ken Auletta’s upcoming book, “Googled: The End of the World as We Know It, says TechFlash.
  Among the juicy tidbits: Bezos invested $250,000 in then-startup Google in 1998 at 4 cents a share. The Amazon CEO told Auletta that he “just fell in love with” Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin at their first meeting in a Silicon Valley garage.  While it’s not clear what Bezos did with his piece of Google, Swisher notes that his stock would be worth $1.6 billion today. '

 Ouch!  The article also mentions Amazon's Google-search-challenger A9 which did not do well.  The A9 unit still provides the searches for its ecommerce sites.  The Amazon forums had no searches for the last 2 years but added a very fast, effective one last month.
  Jeff Bezos was an early investor in Twitter too.

KINDLE DX
Several articles quote Amazon as saying they'll make an international Kindle DX also, but how could they not ?  They say only that it'll be sometime next year. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
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US/INT'L Kindle for release Oct 19 '09 Update9

UPDATE 6 - Added "kindlecountries" file of country-specific Kindle information formatted from the Amazon page for easier browsing of where Kindles or Kindle content can be shipped and where wireless access is available for Kindle owners, as of October 6, 2009.

UPDATE 7 & 9 - The experimental web browser and blogs are NOT available in almost all the countries I explored, including the UK, France, and Italy.

  This is said explicitly for most countries, but Japan, Hong Kong, and Mexico do not have the negative wording, so they may well have the web browswer capability.  I didn't check the entire list for that though.

Check the detailed pull-down menu at the Kindle Int'l page for your country.  Book prices are different and there are such things as the VAT or value-added-tax being included in the UK pricing but also purchases in some countries being subject to customs duties, import taxes and other fees levied by the destination country. Those fees will show upon upon checkout.

UPDATE 8 - Clarification of the $2 charge
  "When traveling abroad, you can download books wirelessly from the Kindle Store or your Archived Items. U.S. customers will be charged a fee of $1.99 for international downloads."
  This can be avoided by having the book be downloadable to your computer instead, for transfer to your Kindle via the USB cable.

NOTE that for the UK and other countries:
  "You can transfer personal documents to your Kindle via USB for free at anytime. Service fees for transferring personal documents via Whispernet are currently $.99 per megabyte." (vs the $.15 per megabyte for U.S. customers nearer the servers).

UPDATE 9 - Wireless coverage maps for all Kindles
These are now under "Whispernet Coverage" in the reference section (right-hand column).

---

Main blog entry Oct. 6
I will be updating this blog article as it goes! Our conjecture about the reasons for the weekend glitches was on the money.  It had to do with international sales and the horrors of publisher prohibitions in some areas while making agreements in others.

  Hardcover sales don't know international boundaries that e-books are subjected to by the publishers.  That makes a nightmare for the programmers since people are temporarily in some places where rules are different.

BUT the INTERNATIONAL KINDLE is a reality now.  Pardon the caps.
  And this means "no monthly charges" in those areas too, per the product page ad.

These will be ready October 19 for wireless use in the UK, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Cambodia, Japan, Taiwan, Cayman Islands, and other countries that I've not checked yet.  Countries not involved yet include Canada, China and Singapore, alas. Australia gets a special page of its own.  Beyond that, I've not checked for now.  Check the pull-down menu on the product page though.

Here are the following Kindles and pricing as of now, for ordering and, in the case of the new Kindle with International capabilities (3G), pre-ordering.

Kindle 2 - $259,   Kindle US/Int'l - $279, Kindle DX - $489

Also, Australia needs to sell one without a power adapter and relies on the USB cable for power.   Go to AUSTRALIAN Kindle page.

WIRED MAGAZINE info
WIRED magazine's Steven Levy has more salient details and quotes from Jeff Bezos

' As Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos explains it in a phone interview with Wired, “The two Kindles are identical, except for the radio.” The new device does not sync with Sprint, which was previously the exclusive supplier for Amazon’s Whispernet technology.  Instead, it works with AT&T’s wireless network, which has the global reach that Amazon needs for its international plans.

...Won’t everybody want to spend 20 bucks more on the AT&T version that that works all around the world, even if a cross-border trip isn’t on the immediate horizon? “I would!” says Bezos. Indeed, having a Kindle that downloads from overseas means you can get your favorite newspapers and magazines delivered instantly, at the same cost you pay at home. '

The Lonely Planet series will be sold on Kindle along with currently available Frommer, Rick Steves and Michelin.

In Europe, the current Kindles that people have will not work with the European AT&T wireless.   This is kind of funny:

' ... Those who bought a Kindle in the last 30 days can exchange them for the international version.  Maybe the biggest gripes will come from those who bought the most expensive Kindle, the supersized DX.  Imagine sitting in a Paris bistro with your US-download-only $490 DX and watching some tourist with a puny $280 Kindle filling up with newspapers, Michelin guides and the latest Michael Connelly thriller.

  The story explains the complexities of copyright and royalties dependent on where an e-book book is sold and mentions that of the 350,000 books in the Kindlestore, only 200,000 will be available in some countries.

  Also, publishers who will not release a Kindle edition along with the release of a hardcover edition are being somewhat shortsighted.  Bezos says, ""When you’re on NPR and someone goes on their Kindle to look for the book, it’s your chance to make that sale... They won’t remember in a month or two.”

KINDLE SALES - STATS - PER WIRED MAG INTERVIEW
While Bezos startled the publishing world by announcing that Kindle sales were 35% of Amazon book sales in cases where Kindle editions were also made available, Wired reports: "Now, he says, the number is up to 48 percent."

  Here's a point Jeff Bezos made, which is important re pricing:

' The international Kindle is not just for Americans traveling abroad.  Bezos says that Amazon’s sales patterns show a sizable demand for English language books in countries that speak other languages.  Until now, readers in those countries have found such books to be expensive and hard to find, not to mention slow to arrive after being ordered.  The global Kindle will make the process cheap and instant.

  In connection with digital tablet rumors, Wired reports:

' He says that Amazon is hard at work making software apps (like the one already available for the iPhone) that will extend the Kindle system to other devices. He’s also still open “in principle” to rival e-reader manufacturers who wish to use the Kindle store to provide content.  But he feels that while people may read on phones and web-surfing tablets, the dedicated e-reading device will keep improving.
  “We want Kindle to be the best way to read,” Bezos says. And now, people can read books that they download outside the US.

See more details at WIRED magazine.

I will be doing more updates with the detail I find for countries that I can summarize.

You can try the pulldown screen for countries of interest to you at the Kindle Int'l page though. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
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A geographic-restriction glitch for non-USA Kindle book purchases - Update3

See UPDATES at bottom of this blog article.  Glitch is now fixed for most reporting in.

Customers on the MobileRead forums and Amazon Kindle forums reported that although they have, for a long time, been able to buy Kindle books while out of the country for Kindles Amazon had shipped to their given U.S. addresses, they received geographic-restriction rejections of the Kindle book orders, starting this weekend.

This occurred even with People using U.S. credit cards (rather than gift certificates which can be used internationally).  Kindle owner and author Bufo Calvin started an Amazon forum poll to try to find out the circumstances of those affected before making assumptions and gathered already some good information.

A reassuring response came from customer Eliza Bennet, from Canada, who responded to Bufo with this information:

' I just (an hour ago) spoke with a kindle CS rep and he informed me that "something went wrong" with the amazon server and many techies had been called in over the weekend to fix the problem vis à vis the "geographic restriction" message.  I live in (Ottawa) Canada and gave him the name/billing address of the credit card attached to my account (which belongs to a friend living near Boston), and he made no comment about it not being my own card.  He also had no adverse reaction to my saying I paid for books with a gift card.  Certainly hope that he knew whereof he spoke! '

BlogKindle had an earlier article today in which he suggested a workaround if needed, using US proxy servers.

This weekend's problems are likely due to changes made in connection with an anticipated launch of the Kindle in the UK, which has had digital book restrictions also, and programming changes, too often, have untoward effects on other areas of similar code.

When you have questions that other customers can help with, a visit to the Amazon Kindle Community forums can be helpful.  There are also some amusing threads there too that I've pointed to before.  The forums are for sharing of information between customers and can also be playful (sometimes a tad rough) and is a good community with lots of new people everyday needing help.  Now they finally have a forum-search mechanism so that helps quite a bit.

UPDATE2 10/5/09   - Original Posting was 10/4 at 3:52 PM
  (Update1 was incorporated above.)
Julia of the forum-poll thread above added a written response from Customer Service tonight, which was another example of customers with U.S. credit cards and address being affected by the problem as well:

' I'm sorry for the trouble you had when trying to purchase Kindle books outside U.S using a payment method issued by a U.S. Bank with a U.S.billing address. I've reported this to our technical team, and they're working on taking care of it.

Please try again over the next few days. Errors like this are usually
corrected shortly after they're reported... '

They've been corrected for some customers, so far, as reported in the forum thread.

UPDATE3 10/6/09, 3:15 PM -  Original Posting was 10/4 at 3:52 PM
Caroline Wong has made a second, updated poll at the Amazon Kindle forums, to monitor how the fixes by Amazon are going.  Many are reporting they can once again order as they did before.  And in the original poll by Bufo Calvin, some who had problems have been reporting they are once again able to order/buy from Amazon as before and have received non-boilerplate email from Amazon Customer Service representatives who have been following up on the problem.

 At MobileRead forums, 'mgmueller' describes how he has been buying books from Germany as an Amazon-US customer and that it is working for him.  Earlier than his post is one from 'Dharmabum' who was unable to buy e-books this weekend unless using an IP# workaround but can buy again today using his regular method, which is like mgmueller's and those of others reporting on the Amazon forum threads.

  The glitch is obviously being fixed for many, including some who were/are skeptical about it being a technical glitch.  Various workarounds over the weekend had been Hotspot Shield, VPN to US, and UltraSurf 9.5 - the latter has been reported to be not entirely safe due to processes noticed in it, reports which I can link to later; it could also be due to processes meant to confuse authorities in China who are banning Net access to many to various sites, but I opted not to test it due to some reports.

UPDATE4 10/12/09
On October 7, one day after the International Kindle 2 announcement, Customer Service wrote to Bufo Calvin's poll thread at Amazon forums to say that they felt they had resolved the problem and that all affected were able to receive books again, with the gift certificates they had been using. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
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DX and PDF Author-Title Corrections. K1 & K2 also.

Mark Alexander recommended, in the Sheet Music comments section, the free pdftk command-line utility to modify the metadata (title, author) in PDF files before transferring them to the Kindle.  He mentions that the Kindle appears to recognize only Author and Title fields.  See Mark's instructions for modifying that data.

He wrote an extra file for use with this - "pdfmeta" - which allows one simple command to be given (shown in his guide) instead of having to make the small file with author and title info.

HOWEVER, Windows users would run any of this in a DOS window and I realize most are not comfortable with that.  In that case, you can instead try Calibre to change that type of info in a PDF.  This must be a not-easy thing to do, as Calibre's method does not work with some PDF files.  At any rate, you can choose to get Windows, Mac, or Linux versions of Calibre and there are pages for features, with screenshots.

Calibre is what I used for converting any of Google's million free ePub files to Kindle-compatible files.  Calibre can do many things.

I'll add a blog entry later for good free utilities that convert PDFs to Word files to keep some complicated formatting and then sending these to Amazon for a free conversion to Kindle format which would be emailed back to your everyday email for free so that the attached converted file can be put, via USB cable, into to your Kindle DX or Kindle 1 or 2.  Of course, we can send instead to our [us]@kindle.com address to have converted files sent to our Kindles via Whispernet but that costs 15 cents per each megabyte of a file.

  At any rate, For DX's, this conversion provides an added non-PDF file copy that can be highlighted and for which notes can be made and the Kindle inline-directory used (and the text-to-speech would work for those also, while that function doesn't work with PDFs).
  For Kindles 1 and 2, it can provide a conversion with better layout, though simple-layout PDFs with one column and almost no illustrations can be sent to your Kindle address for the usual Amazon conversion.

I'll be going on vacation, during which time I will concentrate more on Kindle tips.  If you have questions about how anything might be done, contact me and I can add it to a list of topics. Thanks! Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
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Kindle DX' - Refurbished, $350, now available - Oct 2009

THIS IS THE EARLIER ANNOUNCEMENT IN OCT 2009. PLEASE SEE INSTEAD JULY 2010 PRICES (CONSIDERABLY LOWER) AT July 2010 Refurbished DX pricing.

The rest, below, are just archives and history at this point. 

Amazon is now offering (June 2010 update) refurbished Kindle Dx's for $399.99 $349.99, with a year's warranty when they become available.  This is a large savings over a new Kindle DX.

  There is currently one offer under the Refurbished category, when I looked at the Used area (there are no used ones currently). These are factory refurbished and factory sealed packages which carry the usual Amazon customer service and the Kindle 30-day return policy if you don't want to keep the DX (return shipping is paid by Amazon).

  I called the Amazon Kindle customer service dept about the warranty, and 'Gustavo' checked on it, to see that the warranty on refurbished DX's is the same as for refurbished Kindle 2's.  It's the basic one-year Amazon warranty and covers any defects (the Kindle is replaced in that case) but doesn't cover accidents in which the Kindle is damaged.

Here's a summary of warranty information:
    WARRANTY: 1 full year for defects. Doesn't include accidents.
      No extended-warranty from Amazon is available on these.
      Drops w/damage resulting can qualify for discounted new refurbs.
      Year 1, any unit defects are covered.
      Amazon offers the usual 30-day return policy on these.
      Above information from Customer Svc Reps Nitesh and Gustvao.

    SquareTrade offers an extended warranty for refurbished units
    but they don't cover drops/accidents on refurbished units.
      (Drop coverage is the reason many of us get an extra warranty.)
      If wanting a SquareTrade extra-years warranty,
        google for a SquareTrade coupon to use with it.


I am partial to the DX myself (more info on the basic unit at Amazon's product page).

  Here are photos I took of my own DX showing how it looks with web-pages, PDFs, and with normal book text.
  I added a photo of plain text on the screen, taken at an ice cream shop last week (here's a smaller shot that includes the keyboard also).

  Remember that the Kindles have 24/7 free, though slow, web access via cellular wireless network, with no monthly or annual subscription charges currently or for the last two years.

  No other e-reader comes with that feature, which has been useful for me when away from my computers and needing to look up info.  Google and Wikipedia are built-in options for searches on words or phrases. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
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Media exaggeration on the Daily Princetonian story

Media exaggeration and some misrepresentation was of interest to me this week as online columns described The Daily Princetonian report on, essentially, one student's remarks and turned it into a "consensus of students" and headlined "failure" of the Kindle at Princeton, from those bare bones after the beginning two weeks of an entire Fall Session study.

Longterm, who knows, that could be, but not based on the college newspaper's story.

  (I've had my own doubts about our inability to make notes on PDF's, a critical flaw for academic use, even if there are workarounds, and have written about it.)

But, after reading yet another misstatement of the Daily Princetonian story from a writer at a large online tecnnical site who actually gave the most balanced interpretation I've read (from about 20 online articles), I wrote a comment to the columnist.  I'll just insert that here and call it a day.  (There is a lot of other, more interesting news and I'll get those up tomorrow night.)

Written to the column mentioned above:

' October 1, 2009 7:34 PM PDT
' _____, you wrote one of the most balanced pieces on The Daily Princetonian report but even you said:

' Feedback from some students complained about the
Kindle's annotation system being "too slow" to keep up with the thinking of a reader who wants to effortlessly mark up text.  Others called the entire Kindle device "a poor excuse for an academic tool." '

  As with the other online reports that used mostly one student's feedback [but referred to] "some" and "others" (as above), they were/are all quoting primarily Aaron Horvath, who said all of the above.

  The ONE other student quoted talked about the 'huge benefits' and the downsides as well, one of the downsides being that you have to charge the Kindle to use it.

  The other two people quoted were
  (1) an obviously resistant professor who was "permitting"! his students (in a selected KINDLE STUDY classroom) to use Kindle location numbers, since not one of the students has dropped out of the study though they are allowed to, and
  (2) another professor who enjoys using the Kindle and had nothing negative to quote.

The Amazon Kindle study with several universities is taking place this year, so it's no surprise the relative effectiveness of the learning process using an e-reader and the paper-saving goals which are also a focus) wouldn't be studied next year.

  From that we've been getting tons of articles generalizing from that one student's words after two weeks of use, calling [the negative feelings] a "consensus" in one article and the study "a failure" in others.  As I say, yours was the most balanced I've read of about a dozen so far. '

  I don't know.  Am I the only one who wishes columnists would not overgeneralize and, essentially, mischaracterize one student's statements this way?
  The reluctant professor is obviously not loving the idea in the first place.  But the headlines have been about how "students" are responding to the Kindle :-).

  Students are allowed to opt out of the program, but so far none have, and we've now heard, primarily, from one student out of the 50 in the study. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
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Amazon settles lawsuit over remote-deletion of '1984' - UPDATE4

Amazon settles lawsuit over deleted Kindle copy of '1984.'

UPDATE to Student sues Amazon despite finding 1984 notes (and despite a Good Samaritan type having given him -- after hearing of his plight -- a copy of the same 'location-numbered' book previously downloaded DRM-free from Feedbooks.com).  The lawsuit was based on the principle of the remote deletion and to get legal assurances that this kind of remote deletion wouldn't occur again under those circumstances, as had been said by Amazon spokesperson Drew Herdener in an e-mail message to Brad Stone of The New York Times, but clarifying what any other 'circumstances' might be.  That more vague actual statement was:

'Amazon effectively acknowledged that the deletions were a bad idea. “We are changing our systems so that in the future we will not remove books from customers’ devices in these circumstances,” Mr. Herdener said. '

  The linked article from 7/31/09 was a summary of what went before, expanding on what was described in earlier articles (1)  and  (2) on the Amazon '1984' debacle.

Tech Flash's Eric Engleman

' Now Amazon has settled the lawsuit with Gawronski and a co-plaintiff. As part of the deal, which awaits court approval, Amazon said it "will not remotely delete or modify" works on Kindles, with some exceptions.

Here's an excerpt from the settlement document (pdf, 9 pages) which was filed Sept. 25 in U.S. District Court in Seattle and just unearthed by TechFlash:

Amazon will not remotely delete or modify such Works from Devices purchased and being used in the United States unless (a) the user consents to such deletion or modification; (b) the user requests a refund for the Work or otherwise fails to pay for the Work (e.g., if a credit or debit card issuer declines to remit payment); (c) a judicial or regulatory order requires such deletion or modification; or (d) deletion or modification is reasonably necessary to protect the consumer or the operation of a Device or network through which the Device communicates (e.g., to remove harmful code embedded within a copy of a Work downloaded to a Device).

As part of the settlement, Amazon will pay a fee of $150,000 to the plaintiff's lawyers, and the plaintiff's lead law firm KamberEdelson LLC will donate its portion of that fee to charity.

Amazon spokesman Drew Herdener had no comment.  Attorney Michael Aschenbrener of KamberEdelson, who represents Gawronski and the other plaintiff, Antoine Bruguier, called it a "great settlement."

"It provides protection for Kindle users and provides confidence to them that the books, newspapers and magazines they purchase will not be subject to remote deletion by Amazon," Aschenbrener said. "It sends a message to digital media purveyors of all kinds that sellers really need to respect users' rights to that content."

Techflash says that since the lawsuit had been seeking class action status, the settlement ends the possibility of a "painful legal situation."

Note that the settlement "awaits court approval."

UPDATE 2, with further addition to this section 10/2/09
  In connection with some who have insisted that the ability to do a remote-deletion be completely removed, the settlement speaks to processes I'd mentioned re dynamic network maintenance involved in subscriptions and other ongoing content-deletion based on time factors; these are taken care of in the document:

' This paragraph does not apply to (a) applications (whether developed or offered by Amazon or by third parties), software or other code; (b) transient content such as blogs; or (c) content that the publisher intends to be updated and replaced with newer content as newer content becomes available.
  With respect to newspaper and magazine subscriptions, nothing in this paragraph prohibits the current operational practice pursuant to which older issues are automatically deleted from the Device to make room for newer issues, absent affirmative action by the Device user to save older issues. '

UPDATE 3
  After reading various articles on this, which didn't seem to take into account details of the actual document, I decided to add here the items below:

'4. Amazon will pay Plaintiffs’ counsel a fee of $150,000, subject to the understanding that KamberEdelson LLC will donate its portion of that fee to a charitable organization that promotes literacy, children’s issues, secondary or post-secondary education, health, or job placement.

 5. Other than as set forth herein, Amazon shall not be liable for any fees or expenses of Plaintiffs or Plaintiffs’ counsel in connection with the Action.

 6. Plaintiffs agree that, to the fullest extent permitted by law, neither this Stipulation nor the fact of it, nor any act performed, nor any statements made publicly or otherwise in responding to concerns raised by Plaintiffs or other users, nor any document negotiated or executed pursuant to or in furtherance of it, is or may be deemed to be or may be used as an admission or concession of, or evidence of any liability or violation of any law by Amazon in any court, administrative agency or other tribunal. '

UPDATE 4 - 10/2/09. Also of interest is the clause:

' WHEREAS, based on current circumstances, Plaintiffs believe they would not likely be able to certify classes under Rule 23(b)(3) because of Amazon’s offer to fully reimburse affected consumers for all Subject Works previously removed by Amazon from Devices and to restore notes and annotations... '

 Also, some eagle eyes have noted what another clause may imply, whether for the near or distant future:

'...does not apply to (a) applications (whether developed or offered by Amazon or by third parties), software or other code...'

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Kindle 2's UK launch announcement said to be next week

Bookseller.com says today that "authoritative sources" report that Amazon will announce next week the arrival of the Kindle 2 to the UK, finally.

' One source told The Bookseller: "The key things they needed to tie up have been tied up.  The rumours I've heard are all saying next week."  The source confirmed that publishers had signed non disclosure agreements so would not be able to comment on the record.  But added: "I've heard it from multiple reliable sources.  I think they want to avoid the general kerfuffle of Frankfurt."

Qualcomm has been working on a wireless solution in the U.K. for the Kindle 2.

The article SEEMS to have an error though, in saying that Qualcomm provides the whispernet service for Amazon in the U.S. -- it's Sprint that does.  While the two companies have worked together on some projects and Sprint will support Qualcomm's "Brew" platform, they're separate companies and Sprint is the Whispernet provider in the U.S.  Qualcomm created the CDMA methodology by which Sprint operates and provides the service for Amazon here in the U.S.

After seeing how UK e-reader-interested people are on many Kindle forums and getting the Kindle the harder way (through numerous workarounds and not being able to use wireless with them but wanting the Kindle's other notable [study] features), the device will have an eager market. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
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E-Readers are the holiday's hot ticket - Sony vs Kindle report

L.A. Times predicts
E-Readers are the holiday's
hot ticket.

 Worth quoting:

' Acording to an online survey, 1 in 5 shoppers said they planned to buy an electronic book reader such as a Sony Reader or Amazon Kindle this year.

  When asked what they would like to get as a gift this year, about 1 in 10 cited a digital book reader.

  Portable music players, once the hot holiday ticket, got just 3.4% of the vote, while game consoles came in at 6%, according to the survey commissioned by Retrevo, a gadget review website...

  Of those who said they planned to spring for an electronic book reader, 62% said they would buy Amazon's Kindle 2 or Kindle DX, while 32% favored the Sony Reader... '

One has to wonder if the Sony Readers' presence in stores will increase its percentage of sales over expectations?


NEW-SONY-READERS VS KINDLES - REVIEW BY GIZMODO
Amazon sells Sonys as well as Kindles, but most reviews have been pretty hard on the Sonys.  And the Sony Daily Edition (PRS-2121) won't be released until approximately December.

Gizmodo's review headline: "Too Many Compromises."  Wilson Rothman writes:
  the Sony Touch is "overloaded with tricks but killed by glare"
  and the Sony Pocket is "simplified past the point of goodness."

Rothman's right; few reviewers notice that the Pocket Edition has no study tools (highlighting, notes, searches, in-line dictionary active during a reading session) and of course no whispernet either but they then equate the Sony Pocket with the Kindle 2 for less cost ($200) but they don't, unlike Rothman, let readers know the many reasons the unit is less expensive.

Re the Touch, he just really is put off by the glare caused by the addition of the layer for the touchscreen and writes that "Sony's problem with glare continues unabated." and for that reason he is not optimistic about the coming Daily Edition also with a touchscreen.

Still, some Sony users say that the PRS-600 Touch's glare problem is not as big a problem as was the PRS-700's and that all you need to do is angle it a bit differently when you see glare.

  But Rothman adds, amusingly: "lying in bed, with just my reading light on, I can see the perfect outline of my face.  Sure, I am handsome, but when I read a book, I expect to be staring only at words on the page, not my own lovely mug.  In a well-lit room, the glare from all sides is positively frustrating, and it shifts with every minor adjustment of my hand."  He mentions that the iRex manages to make a touchscreen without glare.

  After giving props to the Sony PRS-300 Pocket Edition for better screen contrast than on the Touch, he adds:
  "The Pocket's problem is that it is barebones to an almost insulting degree: No search, no dictionary, no card reader, no nothin'...
      I could actually live without all of those features save one: Search.
Keyword searching is to future readers what leafing around is to current ones.  Don't remember where you last saw the mysterious man in black?  Do a quick search..."

  Because of the lending-library feature due soon ("Overdrive" for e-books from the sets your local library carries -- one Amazon forum member had only 16 in the set at her library), he says "you could get the first reasonably budget reader."  But he ends with, "One thing is for sure, no matter who the competition is, Sony is going to have a rough holiday season if that Daily's screen is anything like the one on the Touch."

  I think that not many reviewers write such a thorough review on the features of all the e-readers -- so, many people won't be aware and Sony may do all right for that reason though there was buyers' remorse with the PRS-700 and they discontinued it earlier than expected.

There are several other long ones out there and I'll add more later on, as they add more detail in some areas.

Thanks to kindle2u for the tweet re the L.A. Times piece. Below are ways to Share this post if you'd like others to see it.
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Weekend books reminder: free, lowcost, and $ - Update3

Something a bit different for this (late) weekend-reminder pon mostly free and low-cost books. This week I'm including the 4-1/2 to 5-star rated books (customer-rating system) which have made it to the 25 Amazon Bestsellers of the current hour (this does change hourly).

  Most are free, but some aren't.  If the few $-ones are doing that well against the free books, they're probably worth a look.

  The usual free- or low-cost book links will follow this new listing (mainly for newcomers who may not have checked the bestseller lists yet  The Lost Symbol isn't on this particular list although it's selling best.  This just lists the ones with more than 4 stars average received.


Urge To Kill, by John Lutz
(3 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $0.00

According To Jane, by Marilyn Brant
(12 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $0.00


The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, by Benjamin Franklin 1706-1790
(4 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $0.00


The Help, by KATHRYN STOCKETT
(911 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $9.99



The Last Song, by Nicholas Sparks
 (27 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $9.99


Say You're One of Them (Oprah's Book Club), by Uwem Akpan
 (39 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $6.99


The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Arthur Conan, Sir Doyle
 (55 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $0.00


Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen
 (881 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $0.00



The Girl Who Played with Fire, by Stieg Larsson
 (229 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $9.99


The Art of War, by 6th cent. B.C. Sunzi
 (8 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $0.00


MetaGame, by Sam Landstrom
 (18 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $0.01


The Legends of King Arthur and His Knights, by Sir James, Knowles 1831-1908
 (3 customer reviews)

Kindle Price: $0.00


Here are Mobile Reference Kindle books:
. sorted by bestselling
. sorted by "low to high" price
. sorted by avg. customer review
. sorted by most recently published
. sorted by relevance


As ever, the weekend reminder highlights the "Free [or low-cost] Kindle books box from this page's right-side-column.


For Kindle newcomers especially:  In addition to the usual new $$$-books, we can enjoy Classics for free, both from Amazon and from other book sites, many directly downloadable to the Kindle.  A few are promotional and free for only a while.

1.  Amazon's 7,000+ free books, sorted by:
        "Bestselling" or by "Avg Customer Review"

2.  Amazon's currently free  Non-Classics - This one changes.

    a. That link above is to Non-Classics sorted by BESTSELLERS.
    b. Here are Non-Classics sorted by NEWEST books first.

3.  "Big Deals on Kindle" - This one doesn't change enough.

4.  Project Gutenberg e-books (MOBI ed) catalog for Kindles.  You can search the catalog on your Kindle and click on one to have it downloaded to your Kindle from the site.  There are no Amazon charges on a download from this site.

5.  A long Amazon Forum thread on a million or so books readable on the Kindle - How to get them (mostly free)

ALSO, previously featured free non-fiction books that are free or under $1.00
1. (Recommended under-$1 books)

2. Amazon's most popular free books.

  Michael Rubin is still offering, for an unspecified time, the full text of his $35 "Droidmaker" book on George Lucas and Lucasfilm via a set of 3 PDFs.  The photos from the book are included.

Some of this will be redundant, but at least there are a lot of choices for people on a budget. 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!

Bits and pieces - 09-27-09 - Update

Lots of news this last week.  Catching up here...
UPDATE 9/28/09 to add alternative smaller photos of the Kindle DX screen.  See bottom of this blog article for the smaller ones.

Len Edgerly's The Kindle Chronicles podcast continues with its weekly good stuff, and the last two weeks brought us a couple of really fun, interesting interviews.

 Friday's interview: Brad Stone.
  "Brad Stone, technology reporter in The New York Times’s San Francisco bureau, talks about secrecy at Apple and Amazon,  Dan Brown,  a Kindle developer apps store,  and the brilliant description his 22-year-old daughter had of his Kindle recently."

A trip to Belmont Library, Massachusetts:
  "Maureen Connors, left in photo, is director of the Belmont, Mass., Public Library.  She and Emily Smith, technology librarian, told me all about their impressive Kindle experiment on a visit I made to the library on Sept. 16."
  Len also provides video of the checking-out process for Kindles, including a mobile-light version also.

GOOGLE BRINGS US LIFE MAGAZINE, full original run 1936 to 1972
Google announced its partnership with LIFE Inc. "...to digitize LIFE Magazine's entire run as a weekly: over 1,860 issues, covering the years from 1936 to 1972."  I found out via a retweet by Jan Zlendich of the original tweet by @idigg of this great news.

 Don't miss The LIFE photography collection with its 10 million images, 97% of which were not published in the magazine.  These are all included in the Web and Image searches of Google.

FREE ONLINE TEXTBOOKS Offered by The University Press of Florida
The University Press of Florida will be offering free online textbooks and reduced-price print copies.  Nice trend!  

' The plan is to eventually provide free online textbooks for every general education class taught at any of Florida's 11 state universities, said Meredith Babb, director of the press.
  All they can do is offer the free books, Babb said. Professors can decide to adopt them or not.
  "Eight hundred dollars a semester [for textbooks] is stupid," she said. "Maybe the students will force the professors into some of these options. That would be nice." '

 Most of the textbooks are being made available in print as well, at 40 to 50% less than the prices of similar textbooks at other stores, she added.
  They also plan to make the e-books available in as many formats as possible.
  Thanks to Suzanne Preate and DigitalKoans for the tweeted information.

MICROSOFT'S COURIER TABLET
This pleasant surprise has even Apple stalwarts excited.  After stories that the Mac Tablet/iPAD will likely go for $800 next year when it is ever released, this one is likely to be not much cheaper, but Windows has always charged less, which is why it has about 95% of the business market despite the quality of the Apple offerings.

  GottaBeMobile summarizes the Gizmodo scoop with additional pictures and embeds the video, but here's the easier-to-read Youtube video of a computer rendering of what the 'tablet' may be able to do (these are inevitably smoother than the actual processes) .  It's said to be a prototype in the last stages of development.

  The Los Angeles Times's David Colker asks: "...but is it real?"
  Microsoft is coyly neither confirming or denying any of it :-).  ' "We do not comment on unreleased products," company spokesman Doug Free said. '

  The article points out that everything shown in the videoclip is done with fingers or stylus and no keyboard is shown. While the video'd tablet user is shown making many handwritten notes, handwriting recognition isn't shown in the video even though Microsoft's Windows 7 operating system is said to have handwriting recognition features.  That would be something.  This seems far down the road and if Apple does anything that it's rumored to be doing on a tablet, they may be out with theirs, supposedly, in February.


MY KINDLE DX - a bit off-topic about my new camera that took a picture of it)
  I got a new camera for a trip because I didn't want to bring two cameras as I had 3 years ago on my last trip.  This one will do the work of two.  Its megazoom lens goes from 28mm to 560mm with excellent clarity, though smaller cameras like this one with this kind of long-zoom flexibility always have a bit more noise/grain and also 'purple fringing' or chromatic aberration seen in big enlargements than the larger cameras will.  However, in-camera adjustments by the manufacturer at the time of shooting can cause other problems, and the fringing at 100% size (which is huge) is easily eliminated with the $25 PT lens utility, which is painless and amazing and sold by 'word of mouth' among photo nuts.

  I bought the older one (Canon SX10 IS), which is increasing in price these days because the new one (Canon SX20 IS) crams more megapixels into the same sized sensor and produces more noise and chromatic aberration than the older model.  This is okay with 4 x 6 photos but not as good at 8x10 and above.
  The attraction of the SX20 is its High Definition video.

  At any rate long-distance shots are amazingly clear and it gets closeups of things I cannot even see in the default wider/normal shooting settings.  If anyone reading has one of these, I saw good recommendations at dpreview.com forums (Amazon now owns dpreview.com, a fantastic site) to choose to shoot with sharpness =-1 and contrast =-1 and then you can edit afterward and wind up getting a very clean photo in the big enlargments.

  So, I took a photo of my DX at the ice cream shop to see if it could render the text and screen better than my other camera did, and it does.  It should, since it costs more. But it's better than I expected.  As you can see, the screen is extremely readable.

  UPDATE 9/28 - I was reminded that the photo I had originally put up was larger than the browser screen and when some browsers, by default, then resize-down the photo to make sure the full shot fits the screen, the resized version is barely legible.  So now I've now substituted the cropped version that you probably just clicked on above (it leaves the font size the same but cuts out the bottom of the Kindle) and a smaller, full shot which will fit a browser window.

(Apologies for all the experimenting.) 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!