Google announced a major deal in France that clears the way for the sale of millions of e-books that have been caught in legal limbo until now. The deal could spur digital publishing in Europe and shape control of the continent’s fledgling e-book market. Read more at paidContent »
Season 2 of HBO’s Game of Thrones series may have ended last week, but HBO GO is just getting started: Amazon’s Kindle Fire is now supported. Although Amazon has its own content ecosystem, adding media from others could actually add more revenue to Amazon’s coffers. Read more »
The adoption of tablets, social media and new interfaces and the changing nature of the TV itself mean the digital living room will continue on its path of rapid change, thanks to new ways of creating, viewing, bundling, distributing and selling content. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Amazon is reportedly trying to sell ads that would appear on the Kindle Fire’s welcome screen, at prices of at least $600,000 for a two-month campaign. Does that mean a cheaper, ad-supported Kindle Fire is coming soon? Read more at paidContent »
Matt and Kevin share hands on thoughts this week of the Toshiba excite10 LE tablet, HTC Titan II smartphone and Kindle Touch case with integrated light. Plus some discussion on the new $399 Galaxy Nexus that Google is selling directly to consumers. Read more »
For developers, consumers and even carriers, Android seems irreparably broken. But Google’s not likely to “fix” Android anytime soon, because despite the fragmentation problem, the company is getting what it wants: massive amounts of user data. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Smartphone sales surged both in the U.S. and worldwide, carriers struggled to cope with the ever-increasing consumption of mobile data, and the fight for spectrum remained front and center in the first quarter. Our latest quarterly wrap-up analyzes these trends and more. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 2, a Wi-Fi tablet running Android 4.0 hits the market on April 22. With its $249.99 price tag, this is Samsung’s first real attempt at taking on Amazon’s successful Kindle Fire, but it may be reaching for a smaller potential target audience. Read more »
A Texas shell company is claiming that battery technology in devices like the Kindle Fire and the Samsung Galaxy Nexus infringes its patent. Read more at paidContent »
Kindle Fire owners wanting to include locations in their tweets can do so with the updated version of TweetCaster. Nearby tweets are available too, even though Amazon’s tablet doesn’t include a GPS radio. Instead the slate uses a Wi-Fi location solution from Boston-based Skyhook Wireless. Read more »
Like a few million others, I took delivery of a new iPad from Apple last weekend. Mine arrived late on Friday afternoon, and after a week of use, I’m turning more to the new iPad over other tablets. Here’s why and some minor wishes or gripes. Read more »
Analysts don’t know how many Kindle Fires have been sold any more than you do. Sometimes, though, they do cool stuff like an analysis (PDF)… Read more at paidContent »
This week saw an advanced 7-inch tablet that could become a low-cost Google Nexus slate, plus a $99, no-contract Android phone for first-time smartphone buyers. Android 4.0 is finally rolling out to some handsets, but will consumers still be happy with custom user interface skins? Read more »
The majority of U.S. college students now prefer digital formats whether they’re reading textbooks or “fun” books, according to a new survey… Read more at paidContent »
Months after it began testing a program that provided select advertisers with information about the readers of tablet editions, Condé Nast… Read more at paidContent »
A look at two new reports about shipments of media tablets and e-readers shows that nobody really has any idea yet whether tablets are canni… Read more at paidContent »
After the launch of its iPad app, Citibank has launched its app for the Kindle. It is a sign that in the somewhat confusing Android world, Kindle Fire is proving to be an attractive option for app developers and mainstream brands. Read more »
By 2016, one-third of the U.S. population will own a tablet, says Forrester. This figure — 112.5 million people — is an upward revision due to two names in the tablet market: Apple and Amazon. All other tablet makers should leave Android for Windows, says Forrester. Read more »
Mobile ad provider Jumptap said data gathered through its ad network indicates that the Kindle Fire has grown to 33 percent of tablet traffic in January, up from 20 percent in December and 4 percent in November when it launched. Read more »
Rumors of a $199 Google Nexus tablet are making the rounds, but even if true, such a device alone won’t solve the primary problem Android tablet owners face. Google has to do a better job at courting developers, supporting dev hardware and building out its ecosystem. Read more »
At their current and expected growth rates, tablet computers are on pace to start outselling traditional form-factor PCs by the third quarter of 2013, says Horace Dediu. It sounds crazy until you start looking at the numbers and the seismic shift towards highly mobile computing. Read more »
Tablets represent the next evolution in the advancement of mobile computing, and by 2015 or 2016, the tablet will begin to replace the laptop and the desktop operating systems market will begin to level off or perhaps decline. Our latest forecast examines these trends in detail. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Barnes & Noble announced a $199 version of its Nook Tablet on Tuesday with half of the memory and storage of the current $249 model. B&N is taking aim at Amazon’s $199 Kindle Fire, but it doesn’t have a full-featured ecosystem to compete with. Read more »
Low-priced media tablets sold well in 2011, with an estimated 7.5 million units combined from Amazon and Barnes & Noble. On Thursday, iHS noted that tablets from these two companies accounted for 11 percent of the total market. But it wasn’t the iPad that was hurt. Read more »
The Netflix streaming app is now available on over 800 different devices, which is nearly double the number of devices that the app was on only six months ago. Yet for all that growth, Netflix is suddenly looking vulnerable in mobile video as new competitors with ... Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Do Kindle Fire owners still like their devices now that they’ve had a few months to kick the tires? A new survey indicates that for the most… Read more at paidContent »
Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN) says unit sales of print books grew by “double digits” in Q4 compared to last year. That “is impressive given the shift… Read more at paidContent »
Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN) disappointed investors by reporting Q4 2011 revenues of $17.4 billion this afternoon, up 35 percent from a year ago but… Read more at paidContent »
Given Amazon’s reluctance to disclose hard numbers regarding the number of Kindles it has sold and the interest in the Kindle Fire as a tabl… Read more at paidContent »
The Kindle Fire in just a couple months has barely edged passed the Samsung Galaxy Tab as the most used Android tablet with 35.7 percent of application user sessions, according to Flurry. This is despite the fact that the Fire only hit the market in mid-November. Read more »
Amazon’s Kindle Fire is the latest example of a growing trend to move traditional computer activities to tablets and smartphones. AlwaysOnPC, a $25 mobile app, connects the Kindle Fire to a cloud instance of Fedora Linux with Open Office, Firefox, Chrome and integrated Dropbox support. Read more »
Although there’s some overlapping functionality between tablets and e-readers, it doesn’t seem to set up either device to cannibalize the other; at least not yet. The number of adults who owned either a tablet or an e-reader doubled this holiday season. Here’s why neither is “winning.” Read more »
From SOPA to Microsoft’s expanded Xbox live platform to cloud-based content storage from Apple and Google, the fourth quarter in consumer electronics and media was all about the continued battle for digital living room dominance. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Continuing a yearlong trend, the fourth quarter in big IT was all about big data, and Hadoop in particular. Still, many are beginning to recognize the software framework’s shortcomings, which is why this quarter also saw more attention for startups claiming easy analytics and real-time processing. Elsewhere in infrastructure, SaaS startups made out well and valuations for these companies are getting higher, and naturally there was news from the AWS camp. This quarterly wrap-up examines these events and more, including the quarter’s dark spot, the hike in prices in the hard-drive manufacturing space due to the floods in Thailand. Companies mentioned in this report include Calxeda, Heroku, Rackspace, Salesforce.com and Tier3. For a full list of companies, and to read the full report, sign up for a free trial. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
In a surprise development, Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN) has quietly resolved a lawsuit that alleges its Kindle Fire violates four patents related to… Read more at paidContent »
Amazon’s Kindle Fire continues to draw interest from publishing companies, including ones who have already embraced Android tablets. This ti… Read more at paidContent »
This is the last in a series of posts that highlighted key people, companies and trends to watch in 2012 in the sectors we cover most, from… Read more at paidContent »
Call it the year of lessons learned, if not quite bubbles burst. In 2011, several trends in the connected consumer space that appeared inexorable at the start of the year seemed disorganized by the end. What does that mean for the next 12 months? From cloud-based media storage to daily deals to the fight for the digital living room, 2012 will be a year of consolidation and integration. Both entrepreneurs and investors will figure out that many once-promising standalone business models need to be grounded on more solid, integrated platforms to create real value. Companies mentioned in this report include Hulu, LivingSocial, Netflix and Zynga. For a full list of companies, and to read the full report, sign up for a free trial. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Amazon’s desire to tell the world how well its redesigned Kindle devices are selling keeps bumping up against its inability to deal in real… Read more at paidContent »
The outsize growth in online spending this holiday season suggests that e-commerce as a sector of the economy has passed some kind of tipping point and that factors beyond simply convenience and price — both long-standing hallmarks of online shopping — are propelling the e-commerce sector ... Read more at GigaOM Pro »
