Amazon

Apple gets coal in stocking as holiday online satisfaction drops

Ed Sutherland ∙ December 27, 2012

Apple, usually the benchmark for customer satisfaction, fell from its lofty perch during the all-important Thanksgiving and Christmas shopping period. After quickly jettisoning its senior vice-president of retail and suffering questions surrounding supplies of new products, the company "stumbled", falling to a four-year low, according to a customer satisfaction analytics firm Thursday. The iPhone maker fell 3 points to 80 out of 100, dropping it from the overall top five online holiday retailers and behind #1 Amazon.com, which was rated 88 out of 100 by Forsee...

Microsoft’s post-PC trouble: capturing the profits of bygone days

Ed Sutherland ∙ December 18, 2012

Before PC demand dwindled, software giant Microsoft was happy with licensing its Windows software to computer makers. Now that we are taking the first steps into the post-PC era, the Redmond firm still wants its profit. But how do you charge a $50 per-tablet royalty fee when the device itself costs $199?

Enter the $499 Surface, says one independent analyst. While Google's Nexus 7 and Amazon's Kindle Fire both sell for $199, the Surface carries the much higher price tag because Microsoft stubbornly refuses to give up the 30 percent profit margin it's accustomed to receiving for Windows and Office software licenses...

Amazon smartphone reportedly in production at Foxconn, launching mid-2013

Cody Lee ∙ Updated December 20, 2017

Since its debut last year, the Kindle Fire has garnered quite a bit of attention in the tablet space. Despite Amazon's reluctance to release actual sales numbers, there's no doubt that the slate has made at least a small dent in Apple's majority marketshare.

And now it looks like Amazon is ready to take on Apple and others in the smartphone space as well. A new report today adds to previous rumors that the online retailer is working on a handset, claiming it's already in production, and set for launch next year...

EU ends e-book Apple probe, opening door to cheaper Kindle books

Ed Sutherland ∙ December 13, 2012

It looks like another win by Amazon against so-called "agency" pricing model employed by Apple's iBookstore and other digital bookstores. Following the lead of a US court, the European Union (EU) Thursday announced that the iPhone maker along with four publishers will relent after all.

Specifically, Apple and publishers reportedly have agreed to lower e-book prices on competing stores, including the Kindle store operated by Seattle-based Amazon. Apple, along with Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins, Hachette, and Macmillan, signed the agreement because it wanted to avoid fines that could have topped an astounding $15 billion.

As part of the settlement, Apple's so-called "most-favored nation" clause - that barred publishers from offering lower prices on competing stores - gets suspended for five years...

Amazon opens Kindle store in China with iOS and Android apps

Ed Sutherland ∙ Updated January 26, 2016

When it comes to China, much of the conversation centers on smartphones and tablets. Amazon is attempting to change that picture, opening a Kindle store to compete against home-grown e-book companies. One problem: there isn't a Chinese-language Kindle available, yet.

So, Amazon, which competes against Apple, is offering iOS e-reading applications, as well as versions for Android devices. Although Chinese regulators approved the Kindle Touch and Kindle Fire in June, Amazon is still working on content deals with Chinese publishers.

Apparently, the aim of the store is to establish the Amazon Kindle brand name. Local e-commerce giant China Dangdang has offered ebooks since 2011, building a library of 100,000 titles, reports say...

Amazon’s Instant Video app updated with iPhone and iPod touch support

Christian Zibreg ∙ December 13, 2012

Amazon released its video player app as an iPad-only affair back in August and today the online retailer has updated the software with support for the iPhone and iPod touch. The new universal binary is still provided on a free of charge basis, though the videos, of course, must be purchased from Amazon. That the Instant Video software now works natively on all form-factor iOS devices is no doubt a good news for those of you who get your entertainment from Amazon. The program allows you to download videos for offline viewing and comes with an included selection of top Prime Instant Video titles included in the app...

iPad mini November ad impressions surged 28 percent daily

Ed Sutherland ∙ December 10, 2012

How is the 7.9-inch iPad mini doing in the war amongst small tablets? Pretty well, according to one company. During November, the number of ads displayed on the mini grew 28 percent each day. By comparison, mobile ads on Amazon's Kindle Fire tablet rose 19 percent per day during November.

According to Millennial Media, the iPad mini is both a "game changer" and a holiday "must-have gift." Perhaps most-telling is that minis purchased in November as likely holiday gifts didn't stay under wraps for long...

Amazon updates Kindle app with X-Ray for Books

Christian Zibreg ∙ December 4, 2012

After updating its Kindle e-reading app for the iPhone and iPad last month with the X-Ray for Textbooks feature, the online retailer Amazon today refreshed the software, having added the useful X-Ray for Books capability. Basically the “bones of the book”, as Amazon puts it, X-Ray for Books helps you learn more about notable characters, places and phrases with nice descriptions from Shelfari.com and Wikipedia. In addition to this feature, the new Kindle app also boasts Manga image rendering improvements, per iTunes release notes. The new Kindle app is still a free universal binary and it looks great on all iOS form factors, including the iPad mini...

Amazon says Kindle sales double 2011 level, but where are hard numbers?

Ed Sutherland ∙ Updated October 11, 2018

Amazon's Kindle Fire is the Rodney Dangerfield of tablets: it gets no respect. Again, Tuesday, the online retail giant reinforced that image by announcing Thanksgiving Weekend sales of the Kindle were "more than double" those in 2011 - but released no hard numbers.

Just how many Kindles - such as the $129 Kindle Fire Amazon pushed during Cyber Monday - were sold this year versus last year? Dunno. We have plenty of commercial spin, however. This year's Cyber Monday was the "biggest day ever" for global Kindle sales. The Kindle Fire HD "is the most gifted and most wished for" Amazon product worldwide, according to the company...

Apple hit with $29 million Aussie tax bill

Ed Sutherland ∙ November 16, 2012

Not even Apple can avoid taxes - although it tries. According to a Friday report, the Cupertino, California company owes the Australian Tax Office a nice 28.5 million Australian dollars in back taxes, or approximately $29 million in US currency. Apple's tax bill for the entire fiscal year 2012, which ended September 24, sits at $94.7 million on $4.9 billion in revenue in local currency. Earlier this week, the French government demanded Amazon pay $252 million in back taxes. The government charged the online retail giant operated a network of smaller units, including a Luxembourgh-based tax haven...

How to add Facebook, Twitter, and more search options to Spotlight

Jeff Benjamin ∙ Updated April 10, 2018

The awkwardly named SLightEnhancerSearch, is a recently released jailbreak tweak that adds a ton of new search options to the stock Spotlight search on iOS. When it was first released, I ran into many issues with the tweak, namely, the search options not showing up on the Spotlight page when enabled.

The tweak was updated today, and the developer seems to have stamped out all of the bugs that plagued the initial release. SLightEnhancerSearch, as silly as its name may be, is a quality jailbreak tweak that many will no doubt find useful...

EU to accept Apple’s offer resulting in cheaper e-books for Amazon

Christian Zibreg ∙ November 6, 2012

In an exclusive report out this morning, Reuters reports that EU regulators are going to accept an offer proposed by Apple and four e-book publishers that will allow retailers like Amazon to sell digital books at lower prices compared to iBookstore. Publishers Simon & Schuster, News Corp unit HarperCollins, Lagardere SCA's Hachette Livre, and Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck, the owner of German company Macmillan, all offered concessions back in August and Apple in September abandoned its e-book agency model in EU in order to avoid a potentially harming anti-trust investigation...