The big news today is that Amazon has released a new cloud-based music service, Amazon Cloud Player. The service gives any Amazon customer a free 5GB Internet locker for storing music. Amazon provides a free uploader and both Web-based and Android clients. Files are securely stored on Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3). Amazon Cloud […]

Amazon today announced two new enhancements to the latest generation Kindle—85 percent more battery life and a native PDF reader. The 6-inch Kindle now has a built-in native PDF reader. This will let users read documents in  PDF format without conversion. To read PDFs, users can email PDFs to their Kindle email address or move […]

Music startup doubleTwist today launched a new application, available for Mac and PC, that wants to replace the proprietary world of Apple’s iTunes with one where you can download music and sync it to any player. Here’s how doubleTwist explains what they do: Our vision is simple: to create a unifying media platform that connects […]

The Electronic Frontier Foundation‘s Corynne McSherry has published a blog post that explains why the group is taking part in a lawsuit against Amazon over the Kindle: Customers who shell out $300 for a Kindle are not getting the product they expect: a device that will let them do electronically most of the things they […]

From the day it was released, people have recognized that the Kindle is crippled by compromises. Since then: We’ve learned that the Kindle is a failure as a new media platform; Amazon is turning off Kindle features to keep publishers happy; and that “Buying” a book for the Kindle is like Russian roulette. A lot […]

Amazon today announced that more than 2 million users have downloaded Lexcycle Stanza, an electronic book reader application for the Apple iPhone and iPod touch. Stanza users have downloaded over 12 million books. “These milestones highlight that many people are quite comfortable reading full length books via Stanza on their iPhones and iPod touch. From […]

The Amazon Kindle may be a failure as a new media platform, but it’s great for reading books, right?

Maybe not.

Based on the experience of Gear Diary’s Dan Cohen, buying a book on the Kindle platform is a game of digital Russian roulette.

The Kindle book reader is a technological wonder – but some bloggers are beginning to recognize that the device is a bit of a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

The Kindle looks like it should be a new media platform, but it’s primary focus is old media.

As a result, supporting the Kindle is, at least for some bloggers, a waste of time.

Online book mega-retailer Amazon.com today announced the “Your Amazon Ad Contest.”  The competition solicits customer-created television commercials, the best of which will win a $10,000 Amazon gift card. “One need only look at the customer reviews for Tuscan Whole Milk and the Three Wolf Moon T-shirt to see how many creative and talented customers we […]

Amazon has released a new Kindle iPhone App that expands the reach of the Kindle platform to Apple’s popular iPhone and iPod touch.

Will the Kindle iPhone application help make Amazon’s ebook platform relevant, or is it just another speedbump on the road to a more open ereading future?