Awhile back, we did a review and giveaway of WaveSecure, an app that allows you to remotelyloss and theft of your Android device. Now, tenCube, maker of WaveSecure, is set to be acquired by McAfee.

According to the official announcement on McAfee's website, they say that the acquirement is set to:

• Further establish itself as the leader in mobile security with the most complete set of mobile technologiesMcAfee now has the technology needed for users and their families to locate, lock, encrypt, protect against malware, wipe, filter, manage, back-up, restore and access their data online
• Leverage its expertise at the endpoint and in the cloud to broaden its existing mobile security portfolio beyond anti-malware, data protection, Web security and family protection
• Expand the addressable device market with best-in-market mobile device platform support, including a wide range of mobile operating systems including Android, Blackberry, Symbian, Windows Mobile, iPhone and Java powered feature phones
• Combine the skills and resources of both companies to develop and deliver scalable solutions through global partnerships with mobile service providers and mobile device manufacturers
• Expand the breadth of its device management solutions available for enterprise IT administrators to implement policies, assist users and enforce compliance for mobile applications across the enterprise

Darius Cheung, chief executive officer of tenCube, has commented on the acquisition, saying Mobile devices have become an extension of our lives. Through this acquisition, McAfee can broaden its security capabilities and offer users protection and remote control of the phone whether it is in their possession or not. This means no more worries about the whereabouts of your phone or losing personal contacts, photos or messages.

The procedure is on track to be complete by the end of August. What are your thoughts? Let us know in the comments below.

[via McAfee]

For more information on Android and the current Android mobile phones, check out our Android Guides

McAfee acquires tenCube, makers of WaveSecure

Source: Slacker Radio Press Releases (http://www.slacker.com/company/pressreleases.jsp)

Shared by Jim
I agree with this, I loved my Kindle. I sold it when I got my iPad because it didn't make sense to have two devices, but it was great for reading. If you're a reader, at this price now it doesn't make sense for you not to own a Kindle. (if you don't have the need / want for an iPad)

Yesterday, Amazon announced a new Kindle, similar in design to the new DX and just $140/$190 for WiFi-only and 3G models, respectively.

Naturally, the tech press is already declaring it dead, because the tech press loves product killers and other perceptions to completely rule out entire classes of products because they lack the empathy or worldview to recognize these products' markets.

Dave Winer says:

When I read on tech blogs that Kindle is a goner, I think these people must not read very much.

I love the Kindle. The iPad didn't kill it. Amazon is going to sell a ton of these, especially at this new price point.

Reading on the iPad is a bit of a kludge. You can read on it, and it's a lot better than reading on a computer, but it's still too reflective, heavy, bright, and power-hungry compared to the Kindle.

People often assume that the iPad's backlit LCD screen is an advantage over the Kindle because it doesn't need a separate light to be read at night. But the Kindle's e-ink screen is actually more versatile for different lighting: not only does it work in bright sunlight just as well as paper, but I find it easier to read a Kindle at night with a small lamp on than with an iPad in the dark, even using dark mode and low brightness. And I often can't use those same nightstand or headboard-clip lamps with the iPad to light the area less harshly because the iPad's screen is too reflective. The iPad is also too heavy to comfortably hold in most ways for long periods, and its wide range of software capabilities can be distracting. When you're holding a Kindle, all you can do is read. When I read on an iPad, I always want to go check my email. And my feeds. And Tumblr. And Twitter. Just for a minute.

The iPad is a great casual computer, but the Kindle is the superior reading device.¹ And there doesn't need to be any killing. If you really like an iPad for its other uses, now that a Kindle's entry price is $140, it's perfectly reasonable to have both.

Tiff and I are taking our first backpacking trip in a few weeks. We'll presumably have no access to AC power for 6 days, and we'll likely regret carrying anything heavy or unnecessary. But we'll have times at camp in which it will be nice to be able to entertain ourselves.

I'm not bringing the iPad. I'm certainly not bringing a laptop. I'll have my iPhone for emergencies, but powered off to conserve its battery. I'm bringing the S90, not the 5D Mark II.

And I'm bringing a Kindle, loaded up with books and Instapaper compilations, in a Ziplock bag for waterproofing. No case, no charger, no extra batteries. Total weight: 10 ounces. (I'll be carrying more coffee than that.) If it breaks, it's a lot cheaper to replace than an iPad. Its battery will outlast the trip, even with heavy use. It holds so much text that I'll always have a great selection and more than enough supply. And I'm simply bringing a few extra sets of AAA batteries (2 oz.) for my headlamp to light it at night if needed.

Gizmodo and the like probably don't care that the Kindle is the perfect device for so many uses like this that people encounter on a regular basis in Real Life. But Kindle owners, and Amazon, don't need them to.

Many news outlets, including ReadWriteWeb reported yesterday that the first piece of Android malware may have been discovered in the wild. It now appears that we were mistaken. In an interview with Android Tapp Jackeey Wu, the developer of the wallpaper app in question, denied malicious intent. He said he was gathering device information to take advantage of favoriting features in Android.

Sponsor

In my applications I collected some device data, not user data. I collected the screen size to return more suitable wallpaper for the phone. More and More users emailed me telling that they love my wallpaper apps so much, because that even "Background" can't well suited the phone's screen.

I also collected device id,phone number and subscriber id, it has no relationship with user data. There are few apps in Android market has the favorites feature. Many users suggest that I should provide the feature so I use the these to identify the device, so they can favorite the wallpapers more conveniently, and resume his favorites after system resetting or changing the phone.

In a follow-up on its blog, Lookout, the security company that originally reported that the wallpaper apps were transmitting data, notes that the app did disclose that it was accessing phone data. However, not every app that accesses data actually transmits it off the device, and Wu's apps did not disclose that phone information would be collected (enterprises most certainly are not going to want employees voice mail passwords transmitted to third parties, regardless of that third party's intentions). Whether Wu himself knew he'd be collecting passwords along with users' phone numbers, we do not know. We have not been able to find a way to contact Wu.

We will update with additional information as it becomes available.

If you've ever tried to jailbreak your iPhone handset before, you'll know it's not always that easy. Aside from the fact that your jailbreak tool has to relate to your iPhone (2G, 3G, 3GS, 4) and iOS, words like baseband and boot loader are thrown around like Frisbees leaving those unfamiliar with the art (like me) more than a little confused.

However, the guys over at Jailbreak Matrix have a solution. They've posted a table for each generation of the iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad, detailing the jailbreak tool required for your firmware, baseband, and bootloader. Additionally, Jailbreak Matrix also gives a recommended version of iTunes, and the relevant unlock software.

So, if you're thinking of jailbreaking your iDevice following America's recent change in attitude, be sure to take a look at Jailbreak Matrix and find out which jailbreak tool is right for you. And thanks to lifehacker for spotting this!

Related Posts

• iPhone Dev Team Jailbreaks iOS 4 For iPhone 3G And iPod Touch
• Dev-Team Issues Warning About iPhone 3.1 Firmware Update
• Jailbreak iPhone OS 3.0.1, You Already Have The Tools
• Leopard Update Don't Do It
• People Of Walmart Invade Your iPhone

Many news outlets, including ReadWriteWeb reported yesterday that the first piece of Android malware may have been discovered in the wild. It now appears that we were mistaken. In an interview with Android Tapp Jackeey Wu, the developer of the wallpaper app in question, denied malicious intent. He said he was gathering device information to take advantage of favoriting features in Android.

Sponsor

In my applications I collected some device data, not user data. I collected the screen size to return more suitable wallpaper for the phone. More and More users emailed me telling that they love my wallpaper apps so much, because that even "Background" can't well suited the phone's screen.

I also collected device id,phone number and subscriber id, it has no relationship with user data. There are few apps in Android market has the favorites feature. Many users suggest that I should provide the feature so I use the these to identify the device, so they can favorite the wallpapers more conveniently, and resume his favorites after system resetting or changing the phone.

In a follow-up on its blog, Lookout, the security company that originally reported that the wallpaper apps were transmitting data, notes that the app did disclose that it was accessing phone data. However, not every app that accesses data actually transmits it off the device, and Wu's apps did not disclose that phone information would be collected (enterprises most certainly are not going to want employees voice mail passwords transmitted to third parties, regardless of that third party's intentions). Whether Wu himself knew he'd be collecting passwords along with users' phone numbers, we do not know. We have not been able to find a way to contact Wu.

We will update with additional information as it becomes available.

One of the first disappointments a brand new iPad owner often faces is the fact they can't use their magic new toy right out of the box. New iPad users turn on their device and what greets their eyes? An iTunes activation screen; the same screen iPod touch and iPhone users see. To setup an iOS device, whether iPad, iPod Touch, or iPhone, you need a computer running a compatible version of iTunes.

But why?

Other smartphones, tablets, and media players don't require a connection to a computer before you can use them. Moreover, iPad users learned recently what iPhone and iPod touch users already know: to upgrade their device's OS, they again need a computer. Other devices can do updates over the air. Software updates on a Mac or PC don't require a second computer, so why should iOS devices?

The initially obvious answer is the fact you need an account with iTunes to fully use an iDevice. That account manages the purchases you make on your iOS device. Since many users already have an iTunes account, this argument doesn't make sense. A new iOS device owner should simply be able to enter their account info (or create an account on the spot) when turning on the device for the first time. Instead, new owners have to hook up to a real computer.

Again, why?

Of course, having a computer synced with your iOS device is handy. You can back up your data and quickly sync data from your computer. Documents, music, movies, pictures, calendars and contacts all easily get transferred from the desktop. However, with our lives existing more and more in the cloud these days, transferring this data via a computer running iTunes seems to defeat the independence of the iPad. With the camera connector kit, the argument has even less relevance. We can use the iPad anywhere, but we have to race to a computer with an Internet connection to do updates or move content back and forth.

Why? Why? Why?

Cynics would say that it's about making sure that iPad sales don't cannibalize traditional computer sales. With Apple's market share though, sales shifting from desktops and laptops over to iPads is actually a benefit to Apple as evidenced by the recent earnings conference call when this issue was discussed.

There are probably a lot of PC users with older Windows machines who would be happy to replace their old PC with an iPad, which would handle almost all their computer needs. Apple's walled garden approach really shines through for these users. No worries about competing browsers and email clients, downloading and installing software (even in the Mac universe, how many times do you see people running apps off the disk image rather than dragging it to the Applications folder?) Malware isn't currently a concern, and the parental controls are quite handy. The price helps bridge the digital divide, making powerful computing accessible to everyone. That goal was one the motivators of the netbook movement. Apple changed the rules and added a new one: this magical and revolutionary device still needs a traditional and mainstream copy of iTunes running somewhere for setup and maintenance. Againwhy?

Because Steve said so, that's why!

Ultimately the iPad will probably gain independence. But for now, regardless of logic, market conditions, or technology, Steve Jobs sees the iPad as a companion rather than a replacement for the traditional desktop or laptop. It's both something more and something less than the typical computer. Will we see the day when the umbilical cord between traditional operating systems and the iOS devices is cut? One can dream.

Do you think iOS devices should require a separate computer? Why or why not?

Related GigaOM Pro Research (subscription required): Can Anyone Compete With the iPad?

A $35 price point for a laptop generates a lot of buzz. The announcement of such a device ready to market in India, with its robust economy and a rapidly growing tech center, is a huge development. India already boasts some 81 million Internet users, but with a population of 1.1 billion that represents a paltry 7.3% Internet penetration rate. This new device could help unlock the other 92.7% of untapped potential.

The $35 question is: Will cheap accessibility mean a group of new computer users who are empowered by the device to take to the internet?

Is a $35 price point low enough?

At $35, it looks cheap by US standards. With an average gross domestic product (GDP) of $46,400, the prototype computer is barely the price of a nice steak dinner.

But given that the average India GDP is $3,100, the price of a new laptop represents about 1% of their annual income.

Is this cheap? Maybe. Is this going to be something everyone is going to rush out to buy? No.

But what if it drops in price as Kapil Sibal, India's Minister for Human Resource Development, has predicted? Are average citizens going to take to the computer, which is eventually expected to drop to $20 or even $10 once it enters mass production?

What about the practical components?

According to the wire report the laptop, developed by India's top Information Technology colleges, has no hard disk. It is instead using a memory card, much like a mobile phone, which can run on solar power. It is expected to run the Linux operating system.

The success of such a device relies on cloud computing services like web mail and web storage. It's unlikely to be able to run applications, unless the device is customized to run applications off its memory a la the Apple iPhones and iPods.

Maybe it's my bias from using personal computers, but lacking a hard disk or other form of mass storage counts as a disadvantage in my book. Would there be enough functional apps available to be tapped into to make it practical for business or productivity use?

Then there is the issue of red tape

The biggest hurdle to mass adoption has to do with red tape. The various regulations Indian government has put up has historically got in the way of industry growth.

For example, there's discussion on sites like the PayPal blog about users having difficulty accessing the payment provider to make and receive payment. As some India bloggers have noted, withdrawing funds to a personal bank account is difficult if not outright impossible due to the Reserve Bank of India's policy requiring some to register their businesses online. As if to bring the point home PayPal announced today that starting July, 29 2010 users in India will no longer be able to make electronic withdrawals from their PayPal accounts. Withdrawals will only be available by check.

The reason for such an abrupt change by PayPal? Compliance with regulatory redtape. Such problems are hardly conducive to ecommerce.

The final outlook for India's cheap laptop

Let's look at the impact of the cheap laptop:

1) Pricing: $35 simply isn't cheap enough for mass adoption and until it drops to the $10 price point, it will remain out of the fiscal reach of most people in India.

2) Performance: Is cloud computing reliable and scalable? Will there be enough productivity tools? Neither question is clear.

3) Red tape: No amount of tech innovation is going to solve political atrophy. If there are conditions like India's requirement of business registration to merely buy or sell something online, these laptops might be as useful as pocket calculators or fancy MP3 players.

While the emergence of such a laptop does herald India's continued growth in the electronics sector as well as their internal commitment to mass adoption of technology, the $35 dollar laptop still has a lot hurdles to overcome. What do you think the $35 laptop's impact will be?

Samsung will introduce a slate device running Google's Android operating system this quarter, in an effort to capitalize on the tablet frenzy created by Apple's iPad. The Samsung tablet will use a 7-inch display, the company told Reuters, making the device smaller than the iPad, which uses a 9.7-inch screen. No additional details on the tablet are available, although UnwiredView found a reported picture of the slate, showing it to be similar to the iPad in design. Such a device faces immediate challenges, however, even though Samsung has a richer history of creating tablets than most other electronics companies.

In 2006, Samsung was among the first to create a 7-inch touchscreen tablet, the Q1. The ultra-mobile PC ran Microsoft Windows using an Intel Celeron processor and an 800 x 600 resolution screen. Samsung improved upon the original device with numerous new models that used higher resolution displays and more energy-efficient processors. Even after four years of selling tablets, Samsung hasn't sold as many Q1 devices as the 3 million iPads Apple has sold since April of this year. But Samsung has experience building tablets, which could help it with a new slate this quarter.

Unfortunately, Android isn't yet optimized for a tablet by Samsung, or anyone else for that matter. Froyo, the most current version of Android just starting to roll out to existing handsets from carriers, is still limited to an 854 x 480 screen resolution. That's fine for a smartphone or a tablet up to five inches in size, but larger displays won't look as crisp with so few pixels spread out. Unless Samsung has access to a newer version of Android, such as Gingerbread, and that newer version supports higher resolutions, a 7-inch Android slate won't provide an optimal end-user experience.

Another key problem Samsung faces is a lack of Android Market support on non-smartphone devices. Prior Android tablets haven't had native access Android's software ecosystem, which greatly reduces the appeal of a Android tablet, since most consumers want to buy apps. It's possible that Google is working with Samsung and others to modify what devices can access the Market, but currently, few non-phone devices have gained it. In cases like this, the tablet manufacturers have created their own pseudo-Market, but for an Android tablet to succeed in the mass market, it's going to need native Market access.

Related GigaOM Pro Research (subscription required):

Google's Mobile Strategy: Understanding the Nexus One

Image credit: UnwiredView

I've never been one to have commitment issues. But my decision to move from the iPhone 4 to the Nexus One just couldn't stick. Last month I wrote about what I saw as the flaws of the iOS platform and specifically the issues I had with the iPhone 4. I also wrote a glowing review of the Nexus One and I stand by (most) of that analysis. But yesterday I sold my Nexus One and will soon be buying an iPhone 4.

When I announced this news on Twitter and Facebook last night I think I stunned just about everyone of my friends and followers. I got a lot of questions like What did Android do wrong? but did get a few statements like I knew you'd be back when I left last month, I didn't intend to come back. But there were a few lingering issues that I just couldn't get past.

Subsidies

The Nexus One I purchased cost me $529 direct from Google. So I take that phone and attach it to my AT&T account and then pay AT&T the same amount of money for my voice, data and TXT messages as I would if I were on a 2-year agreement. AT&T spends nothing upfront and makes a larger profit from me than it does for someone who spends $199 for a iPhone 4. The obvious benefit for me is that I can take my phone and go to another carrier, or cancel my account anytime I want. But here's the kicker my only real choice is AT&T.

Beyond the logistical issues of having every friend and family member I know being on AT&T (free mobile to mobile) and the fact that they have one of the better networks in the Kansas City area Google for some reason designed two different Nexus Ones. One radio optimized for T-Mobile and one for AT&T. So if I decided I was fed up and wanted to move to T-Mobile, I'd basically cripple my phone by relegating it to EDGE network data speeds. And since obviously Verizon and Sprint are on different technologies, they're not even something to be considered. Google would have been wise to use a radio that would work on both types of GSM networks, if that were possible. Realistically, I'm locked into AT&T, regardless of if I have a 2-year contract or not.

So the real question for me was, in order to make the value of owning the Nexus One worth it was my experience with it more than 2.5x better than the iPhone 4?

Basically. No.

Quirks

Here's the thing about reading reviews done by people who purchased the product with their own money we tend to want to make ourselves feel good about the purchase, so things that might annoy an totally objective person are sometimes overlooked (or not mentioned.)

There were a few things about the Nexus One that annoyed me from the start, but were not enough to make me dislike it completely. If it was going head to head on price with the iPhone 4, I wouldn't give them much of a second thought and would probably still consider elements on the device and the OS to be superior. But here are a few:

1. Nothing beats iTunes for syncing music. I tried a variety of solutions for Android and was really quite impressed with a program called Double Twist. But the Windows interface was worse than using iTunes on Windows, and the process of syncing tended to take a really long time.
2. The row of home, back and search buttons on my Nexus One were very picky. You have to touch them just above where the actual indicator button is for them to work properly. It's something you get used to, but when you hand the phone to someone else, they tend to have a hard time getting it to work.
3. Battery life was less than stellar. The more I used the device, the more I saw where I was coming very close to not being able to go through the day without a recharge. Since I'm not much of a night owl (I'm usually at home or even in bed by 10PM on a Saturday) it didn't hit me too bad. I did initially purchase a second battery for the device, but I never used it.
4. I found the ear hole for the speaker to be in an old location, at least compared to the iPhone. I had to hold the edge of the phone up to my ear to hear other people clearly. It was something I had to get used to, but found to be somewhat bothersome.
5. The on-screen keyboard was just not as accurate as the iPhone version. In fact I found the touch screen to be somewhat laggy compared to the iPhone. By this I mean, the iPhone screen seems what I would describe as spring loaded snappy and ready to flip from around with ease. On the Nexus One it was common to try and flip two or even three times before the screen reacted.

Applications

Despite what I initially said, the Android Marketplace has a long way to go before it catches up with the App Store. While there were a sizable collection of applications that had been ported, many of them did not function anywhere as smoothly as the iPhone version. The Facebook for Android application was painful to use at times, forcing me to manually refresh pages to see updates or get notifications. This was common for most of the applications that I used, things that seemed to just happen naturally on the iPhone either required multiple menus or buttons to access, or the features were missing.

There is also something to be said for the investment in Apps that I'd made over the last two years as an owner of the iPhone 3G. I have hundreds of Apps in my iTunes library, and I'd paid for a sizable chunk of them. Many of them I could just not find a replacement for in Android. Really, the App Store is one of the smartest things Apple did to insure people stay with the platform.

Photography

Nowhere was this lack of Apps more obvious than in the world of photography, which is my main hobby. Apps like Photoshop Mobile, Best Camera and Camera+ were ones that I'd come to use often on my iPhone, and despite my fruitless searches, I could not find anything similar in the Android Marketplace. They were also Apps that I already owned, and couldn't use.

There is also something to be said for the iPhone 4 camera, versus well, anything in a phone or even most point and shoots.

While not really photography, something else I found ridiculous about Android compared to the iPhone was how impossible it was to easily take a screenshot on the Nexus One without doing a USB tether to the Android SDK, or rooting the phone to install custom applications. It's a simple process of clicking two buttons on the iPhone. Not that I often need to take screenshots, but I do it enough where it was bothersome.

Death Grip

I griped (a lot) about the iPhone 4 and the death grip. Why? Because it really teed me off. However, and I really hate to admit this, the Nexus One had a very similar issue.

While I could never get the signal to drop to the point where I would disconnect calls (which I can do on the iPhone 4) there was a noticeable decrease in signal strength when holding the phone, and the tighter the hold, the fewer the bars. It was not uncommon to watch my signal go from four bars (full) to one bar. Granted, the problem wasn't simply touching a specific area of the phone like Apple seems to have engineered their device for but the issue is there.

Another related issue, was I could never get my phone to remember to automatically reconnect to my home wireless. It had no issues at work, but for some reason when I came home I'd always have to enter the wireless settings and reconnect. It managed to save my SSID and WPA2 keys, so it only took a few seconds but for some reason it would never stick. Same goes for leaving the phone on standby and then waking it up. It would connect to 3G but never Wifi without a little extra encouragement.

Discontinued

It never makes you feel good when you buy something and then two weeks later learn they're not going to sell the product anymore. On the other hand, it made it a lot easier to find a buyer on eBay.

It's Not All Bad

Even with my complaints about Android and the Nexus One. It's not all bad. I still stand by my analysis of the intricacies of the operating systems from my previous review. Things like the notification system and the integration with Google services are really top notch and the notification system in iOS is something Apple really needs to address.

Synopsis

Will I miss my Nexus One? Yes.

Would I buy it again? Yes (subsidized) Would I encourage others to buy it? Yes.

Would I encourage others to look at Android? Yes

But in the end, I just couldn't make it stick. Weighing all the factors, the iPhone, with it's assorted Apps and features was the better choice for me. Forgive me Father Jobs, for I have strayed from the light. Please accept me back to the comfort of the Reality Distortion Field once again. I promise I'll (probably) buy an iPad!

Android is free for device makers to use on their devices Google doesn't make a cent on the operating system itself. It's an interesting model that hasn't yet translated into money, but it has certainly translated into a ton of devices and end users.
Google is activating 160,000 Android devices per day whoa! [...]

OK, this has been an interesting two weeks on th e-book front.

If your life is like mine, everyone is asking you, the librarian, for your personal and professional opinion on e-books and e-readers.

So, to prepare you for the family, neighbourhood and friends' BBQ's this weekend, here's some interesting tidbits to throw about in conversation:

First read the full post for this one:

Top 10 Myths about our e-Book Future

Here's the highlight list:
1. Due to an avalanche of self-published and poorly edited e-books, readers will be submerged in a big pile of suck.
2. Publishers are going to disappear.
3. Paper books will disappear.
4. E-books are going to destroy libraries.
5. All authors will have an equal shot.
6. The book world will be divided into a few megabestsellers and everyone else selling only two copies. It will be impossible for authors without platforms to get anyone to pay attention to them.
7. We're all going to drop our e-readers into our bathtubs amid a massive, world-wide power outage and multi-government e-book deletion conspiracy that causes us to permanently lose every book the world has ever published.
8. The reading world will be divided between those who can afford an e-reader and those who can't.
9. Bookstores will disappear.
10. E-books will evolve into all-knowing robots that will implant carnivorous baby e-books inside our brains and devour our heads from within.

Of course the big news was Amazon's anouncement:

Amazon: Paper Books Are Dead, Or Something

Over the past three months, for every 100 hardcover books Amazon.com has sold, it has sold 143 Kindle books. Over the past month, for every 100 hardcover books Amazon.com has sold, it has sold 180 Kindle books. Peace. Out. Trees.

KINDLE DEVICE UNIT SALES ACCELERATE EACH MONTH IN SECOND QUARTER;
NEW $189 PRICE RESULTS IN TIPPING POINT FOR GROWTH
Amazon.com now selling more Kindle books than hardcover books

SEATTLE-July 19, 2010-(NASDAQ: AMZN)-Millions of people are already reading on Kindles and Kindle is the #1 bestselling item on Amazon.com for two years running. It's also the most-wished-for, most-gifted, and has the most 5-star reviews of any product on Amazon.com. Today, Amazon.com announced that Kindle device unit sales accelerated each month in the second quarter-both on a sequential month-over-month basis and on a year-over-year basis.

We've reached a tipping point with the new price of Kindle-the growth rate of Kindle device unit sales has tripled since we lowered the price from $259 to $189, said Jeff Bezos, Founder and CEO of Amazon.com. In addition, even while our hardcover sales continue to grow, the Kindle format has now overtaken the hardcover format. Amazon.com customers now purchase more Kindle books than hardcover books-astonishing when you consider that we've been selling hardcover books for 15 years, and Kindle books for 33 months.

Kindle offers the largest selection of the most popular books people want to read. The U.S. Kindle Store now has more than 630,000 books, including New Releases and 106 of 110 New York Times Best Sellers. Over 510,000 of these books are $9.99 or less, including 75 New York Times Best Sellers. Over 1.8 million free, out-of-copyright, pre-1923 books are also available to read on Kindle.

Recent milestones for Kindle books include:

Over the past three months, for every 100 hardcover books Amazon.com has sold, it has sold 143 Kindle books. Over the past month, for every 100 hardcover books Amazon.com has sold, it has sold 180 Kindle books. This is across Amazon.com's entire U.S. book business and includes sales of hardcover books where there is no Kindle edition. Free Kindle books are excluded and if included would make the number even higher.

Amazon sold more than 3x as many Kindle books in the first half of 2010 as in the first half of 2009.
The Association of American Publishers' latest data reports that e-book sales grew 163 percent in the month of May and 207 percent year-to-date through May. Kindle book sales in May and year-to-date through May exceeded those growth rates.

On July 6, Hachette announced that James Patterson had sold 1.14 million e-books to date. Of those, 867,881 were Kindle books.

Five authors-Charlaine Harris, Stieg Larsson, Stephenie Meyer, James Patterson, and Nora Roberts-have each sold more than 500,000 Kindle books.

Readers are responding to Kindle's uncompromising approach to the reading experience. Weighing 10.2 ounces, Kindle can be held comfortably in one hand for hours, has an e-ink display that is easy on the eyes even in bright daylight, has two weeks of battery life, lets you buy your books once and read them everywhere-on your Kindle, Kindle DX, iPad, iPod touch, iPhone, Mac, PC, BlackBerry, and Android-based devices-and has free 3G wireless with no monthly fees or annual contracts-all at a $189 price.

To reiterate, those stats don't include free Kindle books. A tipping point indeed.

Of core,you'll want to remmeber that: Amazon isn't only place peole buy books and e-books, the Kindle isn't the only reader, some people borrow books (grin), paperback books are by far the biggest part of the market and Internet buyers and brodband users represent a different demographic than the average or general population at this time.

See this post:

How Many Kindle Books Has Amazon Sold? About 22 Million This Year By Jay Yarow (Silicon Valley Insider)

Yesterday Amazon announced a big milestone: In the last month, Amazon's e-book sales outpaced its hardcover sales on Amazon.com nearly two to one.

It's a nice stat, but what does it actually mean? How big are hardcover sales, anyway?
According to Nielsen Bookscan, only 23% of total dead-tree book sales this year come from hardcover books.
The rest are from paperback books. In other words, assuming Amazon's book business reflects the overall industry, Amazon is still probably selling twice as many paperback books as Kindle books.

Amazon is estimated to have 19% of the book market, which implies the company sold 15.6 million hardcover books so far this year.

In its announcement yesterday, Amazon said it sold 143 Kindle books for each 100 hardcover books last quarter. (Last month alone, it sold 180 e-books sold for every 100 hardcover books sold.)

If we use the ratio from the last quarter, it implies Amazon has sold around 22 million Kindle books so far this year. That's just the equivalent of 6% of the total print book market, which remains tiny.

Another factor that Amazon doesn't mention is that it makes less money per e-book than it does on print books, and in some cases is losing money on e-books. It's good for Amazon to attack the e-book market and try to own it, even if costs a little early on, but let's not forget that e-books don't generate the same income or sales.

Five Reasons Amazon E-Books are Outselling HardcoversBy Steven

PC Worlds Are you still holding out to see what happens with this whole ebooks fad before deciding whether to embrace it for your business? Well, the times they are a changin' and there are a variety of reasons that ebooks are outpacing printed books. Amazon reports that ebook sales are three times higher than last year, and that Kindle versions of books have outsold their hardcover equivalents by 43 percent over the last quarter. The traditional written word printed on paper will not be fading to oblivion any time soon, but here are five factors contributing to the success of the ebook

1. Cost.
2. Portability.
3. Accessibility.
4. Cross-Platform. (A device like the iPad provides access to various e-reader platforms.)
5. Conservation.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2010/07/20/urnidgns002570F3005978D800257766005BA5CF.DTL#ixzz0v6aeSFx4

Lastly, we have your first million seller (downloads) this month with Steig Larson.
It's a shame he didn't live this milestone.

Stieg Larsson is the first author to reach one million books sold on Amazon

So there's some interesting soundbites to throw about over hot dogs. Hey, you're the book professional so you're in the know!

Stephen

As you're undoubtedly aware, location is one of the hottest fields out there right now. Startups, services, devices, and advertisers are all hovering around it. As you're also likely well aware, Apple likes to be in control of their own devices. So it should come as no surprise to hear that Apple is moving to be in complete of their own location database.

Back in June, Apple changed its privacy policy to reflect some of the newer things they were doing with regard to location. This worried some people including two U.S. Congressmen who sent a letter to Apple asking about the change. A couple weeks ago, Apple responded to that inquiry with a letter from Apple's general counsel, Bruce Sewell. The overall main points of that letter have already been covered quite a bit (basically, none of the data Apple collects is linked to a specific user or device and no data is shared without consent). But buried on page 5 of the 13-page letter is a bit of information that's rather interesting.

Here's the passage (highlights are mine):

To provide the high quality products and services that its customers demand, Apple must have access to comprehensive location-based information. For devices running iPhone OS versions 1.1.3 to 3.1, Apple relied on (and still relies on) databases maintained by Google and Skyhook Wireless (Skyhook) to provide location-based services. Beginning with the iPhone OS version 3.2 released in April 2010, Apple relies on its own databases to provide location-based services and for diagnostic purposes. These databases must be updated continuously to account for, among other things, the ever-changing physical landscape, more innovative uses of mobile technology, and the increasing number of Apple's customers. Apple has always taken great care to protect the privacy of its customers.

In other words, since iPhone OS 3.2 (since renamed iOS) which shipped on the iPad, and continuing with the new iOS 4, Apple is now in complete control of the location services on the iPhone (and iPad/iPod touch). Previously, Apple relied on the location information from Skyhook and Google. But now they have built their own databases to be able to drop those guys going forward (though, as they note, the older iOSes still use that outside data).

As I said, this continues Apple's long tradition of wanting to have complete control over their products by developing everything they need in-house. They didn't have the capabilities to do that with location services when the iPhone launched. Now, apparently, they do.

When reached for comment, Skyhook wouldn't specifically talk about their relationship with Apple, but they did say that everyone who has a platform wants to own as much of the location stack as possible. Location data is going the be huge and owning it is going to be the next big war in mobile.

It has to be particularly nice for Apple to be able to ditch Google in this regard. While Google helped Apple build the Maps application on the iPhone, the relationship between the two has obviously changed over the years. With Apple now making its move into mobile advertising with iAds, clearly they didn't want to be sending or receiving all the location information for all of their millions of devices from what is now a chief rival. And Google is making fast moves to beef up its mobile location-based ads, as well.

It will also be interesting to see what, if anything, this means for the Maps application on the iPhone and iPad. Earlier this month, Apple bought Poly9, makers of a 3D mapping software. And last year, they bought Placebase, another map-maker. Both of those purchases were likely for their talent, rather than the products it would seem as if Apple is moving in the direction of having its own mapping products. If they do that, clearly they're going to want their own location databases as well. And now they have just that.

One thing a lot of services such as Google have been working on recently is building up their place databases. It's not clear if Apple will be building their own one of those as well but I wouldn't bet against it.

This also may signal Apple eventually baking in location to some of their other apps like Contacts. While I suspect they wouldn't do this in a way that would directly compete with all the third-party location startups out there, it could be something along the lines of being able to tell where family members are at all times (provided they opt-in, of course).

And, of course, Apple likes to tout their Find My iPhone feature, which is all about location. It's perhaps the perfect example of how Apple is able to tell where any iPhone (or iPad) is at anytime, anywhere. It makes sense to try to fully control that information, and all the data surrounding it.

Just a couple hours ago, news broke of the $99 Copia Wave5 e-reader, or tablet, or whatever you want to call a 5 LCD-based device focused on reading. That isn't the extent of the lineup, however: Copia has two more LCD-based tablets coming out soon, as well as two E-ink-based readers with Kindle-esque designs.

As they've said since their CES debut, the draw is supposed to be their unique social platform, which allows a community of readers to exchange reviews, recommendations, and so on and although it will start as an exclusive to Copia-branded devices, they're trying to go OEM and make the Copia service the premier social layer for e-books.

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Gallery: New Kindle

Continue reading New Amazon Kindle announced: $139 WiFi-only version and $189 3G model available August 27th in the US and UK

New Amazon Kindle announced: $139 WiFi-only version and $189 3G model available August 27th in the US and UK originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 28 Jul 2010 19:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.