Archive for the ‘tablets’ Category

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Live-Blogging the Amazon Press Event

Wednesday, September 28th, 2011

10:51: Kindle Fire will cost $199.  Ships November 15.

Bezos keeps stressing the notion of “premium products and non-premium prices.”

10: 44: The browser on Kindle fire will be something new:

Bezos says Amazon asked how it could use its server power to improve the speed of mobile Web browsing.  A new product called Amazon Silk, a split browser that lives half on Amazon’s cloud computing systems, half on Kindle Fire.

10:43: This won’t kill the iPad, but it will be the first device to compete…

10:37: Bezos takes aim at Apple, saying the model of backing up content is “broken” as is the idea of syncing.  All content on Kindle Fire is backed up in the cloud.

Whispersync works with all content on Kindle Fire.  Pause a movie on the device, pick up where you left off at home on another device.

10:34: “Is there some way we can bring all of these things together into a remarkable product offering that customers would love?” -Bezos

“The answer is yes: It’s called Kindle fire.”

7″ IPS display, duel core processor.  14.6 oz, all the content.

10:29: Now Bezos is running down the various facets of Amazon’s media businesses: Amazon Prime, streaming video, MP3 store, cloud player.  Lead-up to a tablet that synthesizes all of these?

10:27: Now Bezos is talking about how Amazon has spent 15 years building its media business.

Customers who don’t want touch can get a $79 Kindle!  This devices ships today.

Pre-order starts today and ships 11/21.  “We’re going to sell many millions of these,” says Bezos.

Also announcing Kindle Touch 3G.  Same but with 3G.  $99 was the wi-fi.  3G is $149.

Kindle touch will cost $99!  The fabled $99 e-reader arrives.

10:18: New feature called “x-ray” that lets you look at “the bones of the book,” by which Bezos means looking up various historical references and real characters mentioned on a particular page.  Amazon has “pre-calculated all of the interesting phrases” in a book, so along with the book comes a “side-file” with all of this information included.

10:14: Unveils Kindle Touch with infra-red touch display.  This is a surprise, sort of…no tablet yet. But this is very cool.  New kind of touch display that, Bezos says, enables readers to switch hands.  With infra-red touch, Amazon has revised the tap zones so it’s easier to turn pages no matter how it’s held.

Bezos is running down all the things Amazon has enabled the Kindle e-reader to do: e-ink, real page numbers, Kindle singles,

10:05: Jeff Bezos takes the stage…

10:03: The event opens with a video of cool professionals touting the virtues of the old-fashioned Kindle.

10:01: Nuthin’ doing yet.  Some speculation: I think we’re likely to see an inexpensive, lightweight tablet that will be, like the Kindle, a pipeline into Amazon’s various content stores and fairly low-powered in terms of other functions. Not expecting, for instance, a fancy Web-browsing experience.  This will be the t

Someone’s coming on stage and taking a cover off of something on the podium…

9:50: Things haven’t started yet, but we’re seated in front of a stage with a big Amazon logo projected on the screen.  The conversation here is all about whether and what kind of a big deal this announcement might be.  Also, lots of complaining about the cold and the heat while waiting to get in.  Things are supposed to start at 10.

9:25: I’m here with a whole lot of other journalists waiting to get in to the Amazon event where we are expecting to see the unveiling of Amazon’s tablet offering, rumored to be called the Kindle Fire.

 

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Posted in amazon, e-books, tablets | 4 Comments »

The PW Morning Report: Friday, May 27, 2011

Friday, May 27th, 2011

Today’s links! And please check out our new Facebook Page.

Teen YA Lit Monster Mashup. It’s all about mixing chills, thrills, adventure, and romance at BEA’s YA Buzz Panel.

Politics and Superheroes. What’s Superman’s position on the death penalty?

Robot Librarians! Robots take over the University of Chicago’s new $81 million Joe and Rika Mansueto Library, sort of.

Book City USA. Amazon Ranks the most literate cities in the U.S.

King Kindle. Despite Agency Model, the Kindle leads the pack in titles, readers and sales, while the iBookstore brings up the rear.

Google and the Future of Everything. Google Talks at BEA; people listen.

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Posted in amazon, apple, comics, e-books, events and festivals, google, kids' books, libraries, New Books, Publishers, tablets | No Comments »

The Tablet: the Future of the Past of Newspapers

Monday, May 2nd, 2011

This video, which was produced in 1994 by a Newspaper industry think tank and more or less anticipates the age of tablet computing, has been going around the Web lately, and it’s so uncannily spot on about its predictions–so many of which have come true–that I want to make sure PW readers don’t miss it.

The video features Roger Fidler of the Knight-Ridder institute, where a group of journalists and technologies got together to imagine the future of Newspapers.  What they came up with was almost exactly like the iPad. In the vision of the future according to this video, “”We may still use computers to create information, but we will use the tablet to interact with print, video and other information.”  Aside from the fact that video predicted we’d have tablets in our hands by 2000, it’s pretty much right about how we would use tablets (and their smaller, unanticipated precursors, smartphones) to consume information.

Of course the video mentions books as well.  There’s a lot to be learned from looking back at the future of the past, which, it turns out, really became the future.  The video’s a bit long, but well-worth watching if you can spare a few minutes.

[via TUAW]

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An iPad 2 Roundup

Thursday, March 3rd, 2011


Unsurprisingly, everybody’s talking about the iPad 2 today.  Here are a few blogs’ and journalists takes on it.  Above, you’ll see Walt Mossberg of the WSJ giving his initial impressions right after the unveiling event yesterday.

Here’s a TUAW blogger on why he’ll be buying an iPad 2 after holding off on the iPad 1.

Here’s eBookNewser’s play-by-play of the Apple event.

A blogger or TechCrunch loves the iPad 2, noting it feels a lot like holding a Kindle.

Finally, in this post, Engadget offers some video and pics from the hands-on area Apple set up after the event.  One video emphasizes how fast the new iPad is, even down to the page turns in iBooks.

What do you think?  Gonna buy one on March 11?

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Tablets, Tablets, Tablets

Monday, February 28th, 2011

It’s going to be a big week for tablets.  On Wednesday, March 2, Apple will hold its iPad 2 event, at which the company will show us what it’s got in store for the next model of the iPad.  There’s lots of speculation.  The image above, from the Web site BGR, is circulating around the tech blogs: it was hoped to be an illustration of the actual iPad 2, but seems, instead, to be an Apple’s fan’s imagining, according to TUAW (I frankly doubt Apple would design anything this square).  There’s murmurs, too, that Apple will release this next iPad in both black and white models (see this post from MacRumors); ooooh.

Whatever Apple brings to the next iPad (a camera, better display, can opener), for the first time, the world’s most popular tablet has some actual competition: David Pogue of the NYT favorably reviewed Motorola’s entry into the tablet game, the Xoom, and he says that its operating system, a tablet-specific version of Google Android called Honeycomb, is “the real iPad competitor,” though he also notes its in some ways too complicated and counter-intuitive.  But this is the OS that will power the throngs of tablets soon to hit the market.

We’ll have to wait and see whether Apple has anticipated Honeycomb’s advances and shortcomings.  But whatever happens, this is going to be the year that the tablet becomes a product category, not just another name for the iPad.  And that should mean more e-books, and e-books becoming more a part of readers’ way of life. And it’s likely to really get underway this week.  Whoa…

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iPad 2 Unveiling Event Confirmed for March 2

Wednesday, February 23rd, 2011

Apple has sent out a none-too-subtle invitation to a March 2 press event at which, as you can see above from the iPad peeking out from behind the iCal icon, the company is almost certain to unveil its next iteration of the iPad.  Note, too, the slogan, a riff on the media tag that 2010 and 11 would each be the year of the tablet.  Looks like Apple is pretty confident it won’t be the year of other companies’ tablets.

Rumors have been going around that the iPad 2 will be thinner, have an improved display, a camera, a faster processor and other enhancements–Apple’s always got some surprises, so we’ll keep you posted.

[via The Loop and TUAW.]

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iPad 2 Poll Results: It’s iPad or Nuthin’

Monday, February 14th, 2011

In a surprising turn of events, our iPad 2 poll, in which we asked readers whether they would buy an iPad 2 when it comes out (as rumors have speculated) in the next few months, the largest group of respondents, 26.71%, said they are not ready to buy a tablet. Plus, a bunch of folks filled in the “Other” box with similar sentiments: “No. Tablets are too pricey”; “I want one but they are too expensive.”; “I would if I could afford it.”

The second largest group of respondents, 24.66%, make up that group of people who don’t buy first generation technology products but hold out for the second model.  Now they are ready to dive in to iPadland. 18.5% are even more cautious and will out for the iPad 3. Almost 14% also said they’d upgrade from iPad 1 to iPad 2, though several people who wrote in the “Other” box said they liked their iPad 1 and won’t be upgrading.

Surprisingly, or maybe not so surprisingly, very few respondents have been seduced by the promise of other upcoming tablets, such as the HP TouchPad (though one person did mention wanting a Blackberry Playbook in the “Other” category).  Looks like Apple ain’t losing its hold on the tablet market any time soon.

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Will You Buy An iPad 2? A PWxyz Poll

Thursday, February 10th, 2011

Rumors are flying that Apple will introduce the second iteration of its iPad in the coming weeks, and that it’s likely to go on sale as soon as March.  And, according to some sources (such as MacRumors), Apple may even introduce a third iPad model as soon as September.  So, we thought it might be a good time to conduct a little poll about the iPad:

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Meet the HP TouchPad

Wednesday, February 9th, 2011

This may be the first real iPad competitor to show up, mostly because it’s built to be just like the iPad, but to head off some of iPad users’ complaints: it’s HP’s entry into the tablet market, the TouchPad, just unveiled today and due to his stores this summer.

Below you’ll find HP’s promo video for it via Engadget.  eBookNewser has some more info here. The TouchPad brings Palm (now HP’s) lauded WebOS to a larger screen.  The TouchPad is the same size as the iPad, but with a camera (though the iPad 2 will have one, too).

And, of course, Amazon has already announced its Kindle app for the device, even though it will be months before anyone can get their hands, let along their e-books, on it.  Do you want one?

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Samsung Galaxy Tab Not Doing Too Well: A Little Tablet News Roundup

Tuesday, February 1st, 2011

Despite all the hype about Samsung’s entry into the tablet market, the Galaxy Tab, seems like things ain’t going so well, and that the the sequel to The Year of the iPad may be The Year of the iPad 2.

First there was January’s news that Samsung announced it had sold 2,000,000 Galaxy Tabs. Then came the rather damning explanation that it hadn’t sold that many to consumers but to retailers. In fact, a Samsung VP was quoted as saying consumer sales were “quite small” (though this quote has since be revised to reflect that the exec said “quite smooth,” rather than “small”). Hmmm.

Now there’s the further news, reported by the WSJ‘s All Things Digital blog, that return rates on Galaxy Tabs are quite high: 16 percent. All Things Digital’s John Paczkowski goes on to point out that the version of Android on the Galaxy Tab is not optimized for larger screens.  Oy.  What a mess.

To top that off, the Web is a-flutter, as usual, with iPad 2 rumors, including speculations about a thinner screen, front and rear cameras, and a faster processor.  Paczkowski calls the likely update (to the screen) “evolutionary” as opposed to revolutionary.

Anyone out there buy a Galaxy Tab?  Do you like it?

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