Amazon's Amazon Coins: Why?They're worth a penny each, and 100 make $1.00. Most of us with Kindle Fires will have received email notices Monday that we've been given 500, or $5 worth, of these, to spend on apps or games for the Kindle Fire tablets.
I'm not sure what the reason is for the coins except it seems as if what has the appearance of play money may seem easier and, for some, more fun to use, as if we weren't really spending (because we'd bought the coins earlier) but there's a deal of sorts in that if you buy these in bulk, Amazon says you'll get a discounts "of up to 10%" on purchases. There's no expiration date or fees on them.
For now they're not usable for books or videos from Amazon, but apparently, they'll expand the use of these. This is considered just a start. It has the feel of a test, actually. But I'll look at reasons for their trying this.
Having read there are many millions of Kindle Fires in customer hands now, I think $5 per Kindle Fire customer is quite an outlay for Amazon, which shows that they expect these will encourage use of the coins and, it's hoped, more spending on Amazon apps, with the coin-system of purchasing still bringing app developers 70% of the purchase. So it's another way to support apps you enjoy and want improved and updated. Also, if app developers make a bit more this way, they may develop apps sooner for Amazon tablet users than they do, instead of making us wait until all the iOS and pure-Android tablet users have their versions.
In keeping with the expansion of Kindle Fires and apps to almost 200 countries globally, this should also encourage more app development in other countries that have waited awhile to get access to Kindle Fire apps.
Amazon's press release is here.
Amazon's apparent acquisition of Samsung's Liquavista
The watchful Nate Hoffelder and his The Digital Reader site reported Monday new filings from the Netherlands Chamber of Commerce that reveal that Samsung no longer owns Liquavista and that its new owner "is listed as a faceless LLC registered out of Delaware."
In following the trail showing Haverl LLC, with no online presence or products on the market but leading to a holding company called CSC, he noted the similarity to the way in which Amazon hid FCC filings last year, to thwart early reporting of its doings.
In the meantime, Nate adds in an update the same day that Amazon confirmed that news,
Since Samsung wanted to sell the company (which they bought 2-1/2 years ago or so), one has to wonder why, if Samsung doesn't find the "electrowetting" technology and its promise of brighter portable color screen quality useful for its own screens, Amazon would want it. Most stories assume it's because of what it can bring to black & white type eReaders with lower power needs and outdoor readability.
But PC Magazine's Damon Poeter points out:
' Electrowetting produces displays with advantages in a couple of key areas—viewability in various lighting conditions and low-power video playback.
Amazon, a leading maker of both ereaders and tablets, may be interested in Liquavista's technology for both device categories.
""Liquavista's display cell concepts allow radically brighter and more efficient flat panel displays to be built – but use today's established manufacturing infrastructure and processes to achieve it," Liquavista says on its website. '
Liquavista's flexible electrowetting displays are described by Liquavista as
' Liquavista’s displays are based on the principles of electrowetting and bring bright and colourful images and video that ensures excellent indoor and outdoor readability but uses dramatically less battery power. The technology is uniquely suited for colour and video electronic paper displays because of its very high reflectivity and its intrinsically fast video-rate switching speed. '
In a forum discussion last night, someone opined that he himself had no need for color eInk-type reading and therefore saw no need for this for the rest of the world.
I added my thought that others have wanted and, actually, needed, to see diagrams and illustrations in color, since figures and diagrams are often color-coded. Add that many would like to be able to even see these at all while out in sunlight.
While I'm happy with tablets as they are -- if they're able to keep the costs down with a color e-Ink-like type eReader and provide color that's not as drab as with e-Ink color displays we've seen recently, that could be quite a plus for outdoor reading on devices with batteries that last longer than 7 hours.
Amazon Cloud Player for PC
The Amazon Cloud Player for PC app is a new offering, in that although we've been using Cloud Player for WEB to play via our computers our songs from Amazon's Cloud, this also downloads them to your computer for playing offline without needing a web browser and with your music search results leading you to your offline results as well as those on the Cloud.
You don't have to click on the search bar first, as the universal search is triggered by typing when the app is the active window. Per Softonic's Lewis Leong:
' ... users can set Cloud Player to automatically add music to iTunes, Windows Media Player, and Amazon. It will even import songs from your iTunes library if you wish to use Cloud Player as your main audio player.
It's nice to see Amazon come out with a dedicated desktop application, something its competitor, Google Music, is lacking. Amazon is also leveraging it's physical media sales with AutoRip, which automatically gives customers a free digital version of a CD or LP. '
Also, you can scan your computer for music files that haven't been uploaded to Amazon's Cloud.
Amazon Cloud Player for PC app is compatible with Windows 7, Windows Vista, or Windows XP SP3.
"Kindle Love Stories" podcast, with discussion group at Goodreads
PaidContent's Laura Hazard Owen reports that Amazon Publishing is launching this romance-reader-focused weekly podcast which will "feature author interviews, reviews and trends in romance books, and is accompanied by a book discussion group on Goodreads...
...
"One possible advantage of “Kindle Love Stories” is that, if it focuses primarily on titles published by Amazon, all of those titles should be available free to Kindle owners through the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library."
A Mac version is said to be coming soon.
Current Kindle Models, worldwide for reference, plus free-ebook search links.
NOTES on newer Kindles.
Check often: Temporarily-free recently published Kindle books
Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources. Top 100 free bestsellers. Liked-books under $1
UK-Only: recently published free books, bestsellers, or £5 Max ones
Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.
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Amazon's forum announcement
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] Now, if only they'd add TTS [Text-to-Speech], I would use the app a little more (which I try to do anyway on the assumption that Amazon updates the apps that are used the most). 
