Singularity for PS3 $27.99 with free shipping

Amazon has Singularity for only $27.99 with free shipping. You save 20% off retail price of $39.99.

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Singularity with Bonus Exclusive Graphic Novel

Oscar-nominated films on Kindle, Dvd/Blu-Ray. HarperCollins limits library loans.

          OSCAR CENTRAL



Click on the image at the left or on this line to get Amazon's Oscars page.

For books that either inspired or followed Oscar-nominated films, see Kindle Film Reads: 2011 Oscar Nominees and more, on Kindle.   I loved The King's Speech and Colin Firth's performance in it, but for some reason, that particular title is not available on Kindle at this time.

  It's available only in paperback, and the video is to be released April 18 on Blu-Ray and DVD, although there are 114 reviews of the movie when normally we will want to see reviews of the DVD/Blu-Ray quality and any extra features.  People are pre-ordering with a lower-price guarantee.

There are Kindle books for other nominated films though, including The Social Network

Ultimate Movie Quiz, is a recently-released movie trivia game for Kindle, with 10 rounds of questions that increase in difficulty or in a continuous stream, and with a countdown timer if you want a bigger challenge.

NEWS: HARPER COLLINS LIMITS PUBLIC LIBRARY E-BOOKS TO 26 LOANS
New York Times Media Decoder's Julie Bosman reports that while a print book can be checked out of a library countless times, HarperCollins, announced that:

'... it had revised its restrictions for libraries that offer its e-books to patrons."
. . .
HarperCollins said on Friday that ... beginning March 7, its books may be checked out only 26 times before the license expires.

“We believe this change balances the value libraries get from our titles with the need to protect our authors and ensure a presence in public libraries and the communities they serve for years to come,” it said in a statement. The policy does not affect books already licensed by libraries.

Steve Potash, the chief executive of OverDrive, a provider of e-books to public libraries, said HarperCollins was the first publisher to limit how many times an e-book may be checked out.
. . .
While hundreds of publishers make their e-books available to libraries, at least two major publishers, Simon & Schuster and Macmillan, do not.
. . .
Librarians fumed about the limit, complaining that it would require them to pay more for HarperCollins’s books when budgets are being cut.
. . .
Overdrive's Potash said the change would force some libraries, especially those that stock a lot of best sellers, to be more careful about the publishers from which they buy.  “Libraries will have to consider whether they want to invest in titles that, after a year or 18 months or so, they’ll have to replenish or buy additional units,” he said.  “There will be some who may have to be more selective about how they can use their digital book budgets.”

On Sunday, he said that OverDrive would take HarperCollins titles out of its general e-book catalog, which would keep them available but make them less easily accessible. '

Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's),   DX Graphite

---

Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or highest-rated ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

books, books and more books!

I won't even try to justify this. My latest book buys for the past few days:

- Other Words for Love by Lorraine Zago Rosenthal

- Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

- Haven by Kristi Cook

- Cryer's Cross by Lisa McMann

- Darkfever by Karen Marie Moning

- Bloodfever by Karen Marie Moning

lake house getaway!

I've been on a three day cleaning frenzy....  Sheer madness on my part :)

We have decided that in order to reach our crazy goals/dreams, we need to rent out our lakehouse for the times we don't want to/ won't be using it.  So, we are getting things ready.  We LOVE our lakehouse and LOVE the times we spend with the family down here.  Absolutely nothing better and the memories we all have are so special, but we are not here every weekend, not at all throughout the week ( usually) so there is no reason not to allow others to get to create their own memories!  And, of course, the extra income will help us reach our ultimate goal!!!

So, it's been a crazy couple of days doing some deep cleaning, getting photos and things ready to get this house listed before the summer booking season starts!

If you or anyone you know wants a great home on the lake, please get in touch with me!

I've gotten a LOT done......  still  a LOT to do......

These are just a few of the pics, I have so many more and still more work to get done.  Oh well, there's always next weekend, right?

Discussion:  Do you have a big dream/goal that you are trying to achieve, if so, how are you going about achieving it?

Free Kindle books, more info. Are new e-book royalties cheating authors?

A REMINDER RE ONGOING FREE AND LOW-COST KINDLE-BOOK LINKS

At the end of most recent posts here you'll see a section of links like the one just below, so you won't have to wait for a blog entry to see the latest free nonclassics at Amazon.

  You can check for yourself at any time:

---

' Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or highest-rated ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers. '

---

I recently added to the reference section a newer Amazon page of Kindle books that are tagged by Amazon customers as "99 cents kindle" to make these easier to find.

  A problem there is that e-book prices are always subject to change, so the tags on some are no longer accurate.  Amazon asks that customers use the tagging system to "vote down" those that are no longer related to the "99 cents kindle" tag.

  Kindle books that are tagged only "99 cents" might be missed using the link above, depending on other tags involved.  This link is to the shorter-tag results for Amazon products in general because the word "kindle" is not part of the tag and may interest those looking for low-cost products in general.

The ongoing Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources includes links to non-classic/contemporary ebooks that are within the range of $1 to $2 as well as free.

More important to many will be the section titled:
FREE CLASSICS AND PUBLIC DOMAIN BOOKS AVAILABLE ELSEWHERE,
as many, if not most, gadget columnists are unaware that Kindle owners can download e-books from other sources.

KindleClassics
New to me is a guide to some of the better editions of the classics blog that will be useful for many who may not know where to start with all that's available or who have been frustrated by the bad formatting too often seen in public-domain e-books.  Marilyn Sue recommends (for both US and UK readers) classics she's enjoyed and also warns of the downsides of some releases.  The blog header explains "Because some conversions are sloppily done, a free download can be a waste of time." The blog is ranked #1 on the Amazon UK Literature Blogs list & is in the Top Ten listing of Amazon US Literature Blogs.

NEWS: "How E-book Royalties are Cheating Authors"
andyrossagency writes that the Authors Guild posted an analysis of the dynamics of competition in the e-book market and "came down very hard on Amazon" but that they posted another analysis, this one showing how "the prevailing formula for author royalties on e-books unfairly diminishes authors’ income even as publishers earn more for each e-book sold."

  Many of us cautioned authors about this when their publishers sent them to the Kindle forums to explain how customers, publishers, and authors would be much better served under Apple's Agency model.  We explained in detail how the traditional reseller model used by the online bookstores was better for authors.

  The Big5 execs explained in interviews that the pricing of e-books was too low and "devalued" their books (their hardcover or paperback books).  They were also worried about the power that Amazon could have over publishers, explaining to us that Amazon, once they owned the market, would raise prices on us all.

  Their solution to that was to raise prices now.   :-)

The reality is that publishers were primarily concerned about Amazon's power over publishers, of course, and that's understandable.  What's not is their decision-making on e-book pricing and their open disinterest in what today's book customers want.

  At the end of the blog article, andyrossagency gives a breakdown on the numbers, as they read them, from the Authors Guild analysis (emphases mine) :

' Here’s the math:

“The Help” has an e-book list price of $13 and is sold under the agency model.  Publisher grosses 70% of retail price, or $9.10.  Author’s royalty is 25% of publisher receipts, or $2.28.  Publisher nets $6.32. ($9.10 minus $2.28 royalties and $0.50 encryption fee.)

“Hell’s Corner” is also sold under the agency model at a retail list price of $15 list price.  Publisher grosses 70% of retail price, $10.50.  Author’s royalty is 25% of publisher receipts, or $2.63.  Publisher nets $7.37. ($10.50 minus $2.63 royalties and $0.50 encryption fee.)

“Unbroken” is sold by Random House under the reseller model at a retail list price of $27.  Publisher grosses $13.50 on the sale.  Author’s royalty, at 25%, is $3.38. Random House nets $9.62.  ($13.50 minus $3.38 royalties and $0.50 encryption fee.) '

However, other analyses have shown that because Amazon took a loss on $10 bestsellers (making this up elsewhere) while guaranteeing publishers 50% of the list price set by the publishers -- under the traditional reseller model -- both publisher and author would tend to make less under the Agency model.

  The brouhaha has actually been over control rather than current profit-taking.  One publisher focus was to try to slow e-book sales because they hurt hardcover sales, and if customers were willing to buy e-books at those higher prices, all the better.

---

Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's),   DX Graphite

IMSLP - 85,000+ free, downloadable, classical music scores, staying alive

"FREE TROVE OF MUSIC SCORES ON WEB HITS SENSITIVE NOTE"
The New York Times's Daniel J. Wakin writes about the amazing International Music Score Library Project site and its (successful) battle to stay alive, with its treasure of 85,000 scores or parts (for nearly 35,000 works - public-domain, classical) available for free download.   There are "several thousand being added every month." Included also are performances on recordings.

  While publishers have challenged the right to download, for free, music scores written a couple of hundred years ago, the challenges have been weak, and a primary challenger, Universal Edition (Europe) has been making more conciliatory sounds,saying several times in an interview that:

'...“there’s room for both of us.”  At the same time, Mr. Irons said, it is important to separate “this very valiant and completely kosher and clean repository of public material, which we perfectly endorse, and this kind of firebrand ‘We want to show the publishers they’re wrong’ kind of attitude." '

 The photo at the top-left (larger one here) is of the owner, Edward W. Guo, who founded the site 5 years ago, when he was 19.  He's now at Harvard studying law, the copyright questions having stoked his interest in that.

' With the reports of billion-dollar valuations floating around other interactive Web sites, has Mr. Guo ever thought of trying to profit from his site?

“That’s really not my M.O.,” he said. “As a musician I have a duty to promote music. That’s the basic philosophy behind it.” '

You can read how he began the site, and what's involved, at the NYT article.

I wrote a blog article on this (and on sheet music for the Kindle) in 2009, and I'll include some of that below for any of the several million later Kindle-3 owners who might be interested in the free classical music scores.  It's a wonderful resource.

FROM THE 2009 BLOG ARTICLE
  I've a few files of sheet music on my Kindle DX in PDF format and they look really nice.  At the bottom, I've placed a link to a couple of examples.

You can scan sheet music, that you already have, to images at about 150 dpi (dots per inch), as 300 dpi is not needed for this, and they'll load or give you faster page turns).  You can't take notes on the sheet music, on the Kindle, but you could learn pieces, write notes on them and then scan them for carrying around or always having with you.
  (I preface the sheet music filenames with 'sm-' for sheet music so that I can find them easily.)

Google "sheet music pdf" and you'll find many places that offer music in PDF format.  For classical, there is the IMSLP / Petrucci Music Library - "The free public domain sheet music library" with downloadable PDFs, and you can search by composer name, time period, genre, or instrumentation.  The full name of this amazing website is International Music Score Library Project, and the files are legal.  Here is their FAQ explaining the organization.
. . .
I have a couple of photos of some sheet music (PDFs) on my DX, in vertical mode and rotated to landscape mode.  It's very clear, but the display is still somewhat smaller than an 8.5 x 11" piece of paper.  Best used when you've become acquainted with the notes.  And if the images are very high resolution it may take a few seconds for a page turn.  On the whole, the ones I have take about 2 seconds to turn.  For me, pressing the button (on the inside) is much easier than trying to do a page turn with paper.

  As for music in general on the Kindle, all the Kindles play mp3's.  
On the Kindle 2 & 3 and the DX, they play in the order in which they were placed in the "music" folder.  (On the original Kindle (Kindle 1), they play in random order.)  The features are minimal in that the music can play in the background while you're reading and you can rewind 30 seconds back or fast forward by the same, but you don't get information on what's playing.

  If you want a specific mp3 to play you can put it in the "audible" folder and select it from the Home page, as it will look like a book title, but in that case you wouldn't be able to read a book at the same time.

  I should add that the 6" Kindle (UK: K3) is too small (for reading sheet music while playing it), except for study purposes now that we can use the Zoom feature on PDFs.  Also, with either Kindle you don't want to turn pages in a panic and knock the Kindle off the stand :-)


Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's),   DX Graphite

---

Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or highest-rated ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

DVD nights

Finally, these arrived today! More reasons to stay up late at night :)

- Friends Complete Series (Seasons 1-10)

- Glee Season 1

- Grey's Anatomy Season 6

32 hours

Make this into a girl and this is me after being up for 32 hours straight - working. The last time I pulled an all-nighter was about 2 1/2 years ago...and this is something I didn't miss at all. The entire team stayed throughout the night to meet our deadline for today and in fairness, we did finish all our deliverables. We finally called it a day at 8am but Ochie and I still had an 11am meeting so no choice but to stay :( We were literally floating and exerting all efforts to keep our eyes open. I hope this is the last of it! Now it's time to catch up on my badly needed sleep...zzzzzz....

Record year for movie industry

The MPAA has claimed that piracy has ruined the movie industry yet this year was record setting. 3d was a huge part of why this year was successful and I think the MPAA should think of more innovation than combat piracy.

via CrunchGear

Why Kindle books will be readable & sync'd on Apple devices no matter what

PREFACE
What Apple has actually said about One-Off E-Bookreader apps so far and what it has said about Subscription-Content apps

What we've read, for the most part, is what an online news-site paraphrased from whatever Apple said and then interpreted in an extended way as fact, which was repeated by other sites by the hundreds (although ultimately they could still be right if Apple does prove quite that self-destructive and actually tries to apply their 70/30% rule to ebookstore non-subscription, one-off book-sale apps).

We've had quite an uproar since the Apple press release about Subscription-Content Apps on February 15.
  In the meantime, many of the quotations we've seen on the general rules of Apple were put into place in November 2010 and are accessible to App developers only, as guidelines for their apps.

However, 3 months after those newly edited guidelines were released, there was a "clarification" given by an Apple media rep about the reason for Sony's eBook-Reader app being rejected -- it was given in response to media questions:

QUOTE FROM APPLE REP TRUDY MULLER ON SONY'S *E-BOOK READER APP REJECTION
In response to the Sony rejection on its e-reader app, Trudy Muller said, on February 1:

' "We have not changed our developer terms or guidelines," Apple spokesperson Trudy Muller told Ars. "We are now requiring that if an app offers customers the ability to purchase books outside of the app, that the same option is also available to customers from within the app with in-app purchase." '

  [That means an alternative option to purchase via Apple rather than just accepting an in-app option to leave the app to buy at the bookseller's store.  Again, this quote is for an e-reader app, not a subscription one.]

  While that is the only Apple quote about one-off e-bookreader apps, so far, we're waiting for the other shoe to stomp.  Until then, the one-off, non-subscription e-book shoe is up in the air.

QUOTE FROM STEVE JOBS in that February 15 press release, the entire focus of which was on Subscription-content apps whether by publishers or subscription-content providers in general (the bracketed comments are mine]:

' Apple® today announced a new subscription service available to all publishers of content-based apps on the App Store℠, including magazines, newspapers, video, music, etc. This is the same innovative digital subscription billing service that Apple recently launched with News Corp.’s “The Daily” app... [subscription-based, of course]
...
“Our philosophy is simple—when Apple brings a new subscriber to the app, Apple earns a 30 percent share; when the publisher brings an existing or new subscriber to the app, the publisher keeps 100 percent and Apple earns nothing,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO.

  “All we require is that, if a publisher is making a subscription offer outside of the app, the same (or better) offer be made inside the app, so that customers can easily subscribe with one-click right in the app.

[ This is a harsh rule to some, but original subscription-publishers still get 70% share of revenue with this subscription-app rule.  Subscription-content apps provided by an e-book store would be subject to the same split, which would make an e-book store's subscription-app wholly unfeasible because it would leave the online competitor bookstore nothing after its 30% share is given to Apple instead and the other 70% to the original subscription-publisher.

 It would certainly explain why Kindle for Android DOES offer newspaper and magazine subscriptions while Kindle for iPad does NOT.

  Add that the Kindle for iPad app for e-books update was approved by Apple mid-February and it currently offers an option to purchase Kindle books at Amazon via Safari and then brings the customer back to the Kindle app on the iPad.  Apple probably won't allow this scenario July 1, unless Amazon gives an option to do an in-app purchase via Apple, but Apple's app rules allow them to decline approval of any Update at any time and they approved this update.

  Many feel that if Apple insists on in-app Apple-purchases, Amazon could just no longer offer a link within the app to leave the app to purchase at Amazon via Safari, and the Kindle app would become a reading-app only but one which still allows the Kindle owner to sync the reading material with other Kindle devices.]

"We believe that this innovative subscription service will provide publishers with a brand new opportunity to expand digital access to their content onto the iPad, iPod touch and iPhone, delighting both new and existing subscribers.” '

I'm not alone in noting that Apple's quotes apply, so far, only to subscription-content when quoting any 70-30% split or requirement that a subscription-publisher's website not be linked to at all within an app for Apple devices.
  See bottom FootNOTE for excerpts from Mashable and from The Telegraph.

ALSO, if Amazon and Apple agreed to a read-only Kindle-for-Apple-devices app, with no purchasing offered at all, in the app, this would be one solution.

KINDLE FOR WEB TO THE RESCUE
In the Kindleworld blog article on the coming Kindle for Web, it was noted that this web-app will make Kindle books readable IN FULL on web browsers and will support Chrome OS devices, including the new Chrome OS Notebook, as well as the Chrome browser and other web browsers."  Also, Amazon's web app description states that anywhere we have a web browser, we'll see that our Kindle reading library, last page read, bookmarks, notes, and highlights are always available no matter where we bought the Kindle books or how we choose to read them.

  For this reason and because Kindle books and the ability to buy them via a web-browser will be accessible on Android tablets, it will be Apple's loss if Apple execs decide to discourage Kindle or other ebook-reader apps for Apple devices.

 They would no longer be able to say that we can read any ebookreaders' books on Apple devices (except via a web browser, connected to the Net) and it will make Android and probably HP webOS devices much more attractive to avid e-book readers if people find they can't read Kindle (UK: K3), Nook, Sony, or Kobo books offline, directly on an Apple device anymore.

  The iPad would no longer be much of an offline-ereader at all when the iBook store has something like 35,000 contemporary e-books for sale vs Amazon's almost 800,000 contemporary e-books.

  Today, author Chuck Toporek noted:

' Amazon isn’t worried. They have a solution already in beta testing and it works just fine.  Instead of using the Kindle app, iOS users can just point Safari to Amazon’s site, buy the Kindle ebook, and read it right there in Safari.  No app required.

Again, Kindle for the Web is just a beta right now, so full text isn’t available at the moment. You can bet Amazon will make a big splash about this, though, once they have all the publishers lined up and ready to go. '

FootNOTE - Others who noted that Apple's quotes refer, so far, only to subscription apps:

' Here's The Telegraph (UK) on Subscription vs "One-Off"
Shane Richmond, Head of Technology for Telegraph Media Group, wrote:

' ...That has led to speculation about what this will mean for an app such as Amazon’s Kindle app, which provides a link to purchase from Amazon’s website.  It may be that Apple intends to force ebook retailers to offer ebooks for sale within their apps and take 30 per cent of thosee sale. That would force ebook retailers to raise their prices or lose money.  Maybe that’s what will happen.

  However, that’s not what Apple has announced today.  This is about subscription not sales of one-off products.  If you’re a publisher and you want to allow people to subscribe to your publication then you must offer the same subscription price within your app as you offer on your website and Apple will take 30 per cent of the in-app subscriptions. '

'

  And here's Mashable's:  Christina Warren drew attention to the fact that the focus of the February 15 announcement was on subscription apps.  Here is her take on that aspect:

' Earlier this month, the Sony Reader app for iOS was reportedly not accepted into the App Store because it violated some of Apple’s policies.  At the time, it was unclear if the cited policy violations would extend to other e-book applications like those from Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Because Apple’s latest remarks concentrate on subscription content, it still isn’t clear to us if these new provisions also apply to other types of apps.  We don’t know if this means that applications — like Amazon’s Kindle app that sell purchases a la carte — must now remove links to outside web stores.
  The Kindle app for iOS received an update Monday and, for the record, the link to the Amazon Kindle website is still in the app. '

UPDATE - Also note that there apparently is, as written earlier, an awkward restriction with the In-App-Purchasing system in that it might handle no more than 3,000 or so items in a catalog for an app.  If true that's certainly an obstacle to in-app purchasing for an e-bookstore. [End of Update]

It's Apple's call if they want to make themselves irrelevant when it comes to the rather wildly surging e-book market.


Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's),   DX Graphite

---

Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or highest-rated ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

Velocity SPYDER PRO 25% off

Slappa has the Velocity SPYDER PRO backpack for $67.49 after you enter discount code FEB25. You save $22.50 off the retail price of $89.99.

Buy it now HERE
Enter FEB25 at checkout

Marilu Special!!!

I have a great deal for you!!!  marilu.com is running a membership drive right now and I know that you have probably heard me talk about how instrumental Marilu's books were on getting me started on my own personal health journey!! 

So, part of the membership drive is that if we have 5 people sign up for the 1 year membership, we can get the 6th one free.   This will save you money, you get a great chance to get healthy, met some amazing people and get access to Marilu herself!!!! 

Marilu teaches classes as well as offers classes by her GREAT coaches!!  The current class is The Core Class:  Getting to the Heat of THM.  My favorite class is Booty School!  I even attended one of the SPArty get togethers in California and had a blast, I have met some of my closest friends through marilu.com!  Everyone at marilu.com is a friend!!

getting makeup tips from Marilu at the SPArty in Ojai CA

the gang at Marilu's book signing in Oklahoma City

Another GREAT reason to get signed up now for the 1 year membership is because anyone that recomends someone that signs up gets to be entered for a drawing for a VITA-MIX!  Talk about some great SWAG!

So get started on your own health journey for a reduced price, get a friend to join you and you have a chance to win a VITA-MIX!

I am sure you know how much I love my vita-mix.  I use it every, single day!  Love it to make smoothies, soups, ice cream, and so much more.

green lemonade

You have to get in touch with me so that I can arrange the special pricing.  Leave me a message here, on facebook, twitter or email me! 

This is just another way to get healthy together!

Discussion:  do you have close friends you met online or thorugh a website like marilu.com?

Nikon D3100 for $549

Amazon has the Nikon D3100 for $549 plus shipping. The 14.2MP Camera comes with 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 AF-S DX VR Nikkor Zoom Lens.

Buy now here
Nikon D3100 14.2MP Digital SLR Camera with 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 AF-S DX VR Nikkor Zoom Lens

Yahoo! MyBlogLog to be discontinued‏

Yahoo! has officially axed the MyBlogLog service for bloggers. The service will end on May 24, 2011.

via Yahoo!

No, No Nona!

It's easy to see who rules the roost around our place on Wednesday's.....

Grumpy, I need some dip dip.....

Outside, please

walk, please

Grumpy do it

Asking her if she wants to get down will get you the stink eye

Ready to go back to the house?

No, No Nona!

We've had a good day!

We are exhausted, but it's been a good day!

Does Apples in-app-purchase allow > 3,000 items sold? Readability app rejection

I've no idea how accurate the assumptions are in the stories below.

Ubergizmo.com's George Wong writes that in connection with the Apple subscription pricing brouhaha much discussed last week, he's apparently found that:

'...the catch is that Apple’s in-app system has a restriction of being able to only sell 3,000 items – Amazon and Kobo each have around 2.5 million different books available.

  And unless Apple removes this restriction and increases the amount of items that their purchasing system can store, these major book stores will have no way of using iOS to sell their books through in-app purchases, thus putting them in violation of the App Store rules.

  When June comes around, these apps will not be able to comply with the rules and will be pulled out of the App Store, and opening up the field for Apple to come in with their own bookstore service.   And Apple will obviously be able to bypass their own rules since it’s their app store after all. Sneaky? Definitely. Fair? Who’s to say. Let’s see how this situation gets resolved in the coming months. '

But here's another aspect
Venturebeat.com's Matthew Lynley writes that the team behind the popular article tool "Readabiity" (which strips unnecessary material from the body of an article, presenting just the essentials and in a more readable way often) was one of those that had an application rejected, as they did not use Apple's in-house in-app purchase (IAP) service.

Lynley thinks that Readability might be the first company that works closely with Apple (Readability appears in Safari) to publicly trash Apple's new service.  (He wrote an open letter to Apple yesterday, "attacking the company for a 'new policy [that] smacks of greed.' "

Richard Ziade, Readability's creator said that Subscriptions represent a “sliver of a sliver” of revenue for Apple and Lynley said that's true — "most of Apple’s revenue comes from iPhone, iPod and iPad sales. Apple brought in $26.7 billion in revenue in the fourth quarter last year, and only $1.1 billion of that came from the iTunes store — which includes app sales and in-app purchases."

 I guess they were tired of it being a sliver.

In pointing out Google's more welcoming way with developers, Lynley claims that "Google recently overtook Nokia and other phone manufacturers with the largest mobile operating system market share.  And despite a few hiccups with the application approval process, most apps make it onto the Android Marketplace without having to pass through anything like Apple’s black-box approval procedure."

In also saying, though, that

'Google also launched a more publisher-friendly Google One Pass that will allow publishers to sell subscriptions with better terms than they can get with Apple. And Google is only taking a 10 pecent share of the revenues, '

he doesn't mention (or doesn't realize) that the 10% deal is for subscriptions that are WEB-based and must then be read by accessing the web.

Also, for actual Android device apps, Google does charge 30%.  "However, unlike Apple, Google allows publishers to avoid selling within the app and instead to send customers to a mobile Web browser to make a purchase (NYT)." '

Lynley adds that Ziade apparently said that the new Apple policy feels like a greedy move... and Lynley wonders "if the new subscription plan will be the final straw for developers across the board.  But for Ziade, and for Readability, it looks like enough is enough."


Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's),   DX Graphite

---

Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or highest-rated ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

Rumor Apple iPad 2 Event March 2nd

All Things Digital is proclaiming that the iPad 2 event will happen March 2nd. The venue is likely Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. This is of course just a rumor at this point.

via AllThingsD

Amazon intros free video streaming for Prime members

Amazon Introduces Free Video Streaming For Prime Members
Huffington Post's Amy Lee reported this today, as it was announced in Amazon's business wire, which has not gone out in Amazon email as I write this.

' Amazon Prime Members Now Get Unlimited, Commercial-free, Instant Streaming of More Than 5,000 Movies and TV Shows at No Additional Cost

...Prime membership will continue to be $79 per year. Amazon Prime's all-you-can-eat free Two-Day Shipping has already attracted millions of members. Customers can learn more about an Amazon Prime one-month free trial and start watching instantly at www.amazon.com/primevideos.

"Millions of Amazon Prime members already enjoy the convenience of free Two-Day Shipping," said Robbie Schwietzer, vice president of Amazon Prime. "Adding unlimited instant access to thousands of movies and TV shows at no additional cost is a great way to give members even more value for their $79 annual Amazon Prime membership."

Movies and TV shows included with an Amazon Prime membership can be watched instantly on Macs, PCs and nearly 200 models of Internet-connected TVs, Blu-ray players and set-top boxes that are compatible with Amazon Instant Video.  The selection of videos available for instant streaming currently includes movies, such as "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" trilogy, "Amadeus," "Syriana," and "Chariots of Fire," noted documentaries such as "Food Inc.," "March of the Penguins" and "Ken Burns' National Parks," plus TV shows, such as "Doctor Who," "Farscape," "Fawlty Towers" and children's shows, such as "Arthur," "Caillou," "Super Why!" and "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood."
. . .
Amazon Instant Video is a digital video service that offers customers more than 90,000 commercial-free movies and television shows to buy or rent on an a la carte basis.  New-release movies are often available as soon as they are released on DVD, and many TV shows are available the day after their first broadcast.  Amazon Instant Video also offers thousands of movies and TV shows in high definition.  With Amazon Instant Video, customers can watch instantly on Macs, PCs, and nearly 200 Internet connected TVs, Blu-ray players, and set-top boxes.  To learn more about Amazon Instant Video on your TV, visit www.amazon.com/watchontv. '

They add:
  "Customers who receive Prime shipping benefits through our Amazon Student and Amazon Mom programs can upgrade to receive paid Prime benefits for just $79 a year."


Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's),   DX Graphite

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Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or highest-rated ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

Kindle software v3.1 ready to go for real page numbers and other features

Software version 3.1 is ready for delivery to all Kindle 3's.  (Full Details were given earlier in the "Preview" blog article.)

  This is the update which gives the Kindle 3  (UK: K3) "real" page numbers, extended features for sharing annotations, and some very nice enhancements to the layout of Kindle-edition newspapers and magazines.
  Here's Amazon's info page for the v3.1 software update.

Amazon has made a change in delivery in that 3G cellular wireless will not be used this time at all for over-the-air delivery.   They say:

' We have a new, free software update available for your Kindle that is being delivered via a Wi-Fi connection over the next few days.

  To receive the update, please turn your wireless on and connect to an available Wi-Fi network (learn how to set up Wi-Fi on your Kindle).  The software update will automatically download in the background and install the next time your Kindle goes into sleep mode.  You can also manually download the update to your Kindle right now '

MORE ON THE NEW FEATURES

' * Public Notes -- This feature lets Kindle users choose to make their book notes and highlights available for others to see.  Any Kindle user -- including authors, their fans, book reviewers, professors and passionate readers everywhere -- can opt-in to share their thoughts on book passages and ideas with friends, family members, colleagues, and the greater Kindle community of people who love to read... '

The private, password-protected Kindle Annotations Page which I wrote about earlier, with examples, has been expanded and has a somewhat different look.

  Our highlighting and notes made are all there but formatted somewhat differently, with more focus on the current book and a lot more options, including adding notes, editing and deleting, which I assume are then sync'd with the Kindle's annotations.

' * Real Page Numbers -- Our customers have told us they want real page numbers that match the page numbers in print books so they can easily reference and cite passages, and read alongside others in a book club or class.   We've already added real page numbers to tens of thousands of Kindle books, including the top 100 bestselling books in the Kindle Store that have matching print editions and thousands more of the most popular books.

  Page numbers will also be available on our free "Buy Once, Read Everywhere" Kindle apps in the coming months.  If a Kindle book includes page numbers, press the Menu key in an open Kindle book to display page numbers. '

  See examples of how Page Numbers will appear.

' * Before You Go ... -- When you reach the end of the book, you can immediately rate the book, share a message about the book with your social network, get personalized recommendations for what to read next, and see more books by the same author. '

That is of course an advantage for publishers, authors, and booksellers, but it's the type of social interaction that is very popular today.

' * New Newspaper and Magazine Layout -- We're introducing a new and improved layout for newspapers and magazines. This new layout gives you a quick snapshot of the news and helps you decide what you want to read first. '

As noted above, here are examples of the new layout, and it's definitely more intuitive than the previous columns of Sections alongside a 'NUMBER of articles' heading which acted as a link to the listing of articles, a function not obvious to many Kindle reviewers and owners.

All emphases above in the quotes are mine, of course.

If interested, see the earlier preview-article for questions that I hope Amazon will answer soon about software changes.

NOTE: Other information from Amazon that I had noticed later:

' Kindle books that include page numbers will list "Page Numbers Source ISBN (the print book identification number)" for the matching print edition under "Product Details" on the detail page at Amazon.com...

Because Kindle books allow you to change font size and other features, you may be able to view more than one page on your screen at once.  Only the corresponding page number for the text displayed at the top left of the screen will be shown. '

  HOW do you get the updated page numbers for e-books you already own?
    (for e-books with page numbers added currently)
  Answer: When you press the Menu button, turn your wireless ON (to make sure you can access the Amazon servers) and select "Sync & Check items," Amazon will download small auxiliary files that provide real page numbers for the books that have been updated by the publisher for that feature.  I noticed that my Hachette books had these, while HarperCollins didn't, the first week, but real page numbers are being added when they're made available.

  The expanded Notes-Sharing feature
This feature may be quite useful for book clubs.


Kindle 3's   (UK: Kindle 3's),   DX Graphite

---

Check often: Temporarily-free late-listed non-classics or recently published ones
  Guide to finding Free Kindle books and Sources.  Top 100 free bestsellers.
UK-Only: recently published non-classics, bestsellers, or highest-rated ones
    Also, UK customers should see the UK store's Top 100 free bestsellers.

Fit Club and Birthday Celebrations!

Fit Club Tuesday is here again!  It's the last one for Feb, so that means the last of the Slim Series workouts tonight  These workouts have been fun and they are truly effective workouts!  7 PM at the CJ Community Center!  Remember, there is no charge for the class, come on in and let's have fun getting fit together!  If you are not local, please sign up for a free account or a club membership and let me coach you to your BEST HEALTH YET!!!  I offer free fitness coaching and would LOVE to help you!

We had a blast at the birthday party last night.  The kids were all there, they were all chatty and laughing.  Madelyn was showing us all her "tricks".  She was laughing so hard....  I love that!   But, by the time I pulled the camera out, she was D.O.N.E. done!  Ready to go home to bed!  She was telling everyone "BYE" in her loud voice before her parents even mentioned leaving!

Uncle Jake and Mads watching Special Agent Oso!

Aunt Lauren and Mads on the comfy couch!

Not so thrilled with having her picture with the birthday boy, Grumpy!

Please, just hurry up with the pictures.....

Meredith, Chase and Nick

there might be something in your teeth Brian!

The birthday boy and the family!

Food was great - spaghetti and meatballs ( I had spaghetti and mushrooms) and the apple cobbler turned out wonderful!!

Discussion:  Do you prefer your family birthday celebrations at home or do you go out for them?

iGrow helmet

This is the oddest hair growing product I have seen. It incorporates headphones, helmet, 1 laser diodes and 30 LED lights. Apparently the lasers and LED will promote hair growth. The price is a bit steep at $695 but there is a money back guarantee.

Product Page HERE