Already a better reading experience via its applications on the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch, Amazon’s (AMZN) Kindle upgraded its mobile app for Apple (AAPL) devices to include embedded video and audio clips. Also in today’s App Industry Roundup, we detail how Apple is selling 6.5 iPhones per second and ask what the New York Times’ has against smartphones.
Amazon creates its own Kindle-killer
Although the Kindle eReader continues to be among Amazon’s top-selling products, Kindle’s real worth to the company and avid readers across the globe is as a universal application. Last week Amazon revealed a major update within its iPhone/iPad/iPod touch application which now incorporates embedded video and audio clips within Kindle.
Installing multimedia services within external applications allows Amazon to please its multiple constituencies. While traditionalists can still embrace the black ink on white pages feel of books by reading them on the recently discounted $189 Kindle, new worlds of book consumption and creation can now be explored and Apple’s mobile devices (and eventually Android-powered phones when the upgrade is extended to that platform.)
Eventually, and perhaps controversially, the entire notion of a book will no longer be confined to the written word. Already titles including Rick Steves’ London and Terry Golway’s Together We Cannot Fail are available in multimedia form. As consumers further embrace watching video and listening to complementary audio clips while turning the virtual page, expect authors and other media creators to develop content with new consumption matters in mind.
In a related story, independent eReader Stanza also just released a new update that supports the iPhone 4 and multitasking capabilities.
Apple sells 1.7 million iPhone 4s in three days
Antenna issues apparently are having no impact on the sales reception of the iPhone 4, as Apple reported today that it sold 1.7 million new devices in their first day of availability.
To put those figures into context, it took nearly two months for Apple to sell two million iPads earlier this year. The iPhone 3GS, unveiled a year ago, sold approximately 1 million units its first weekend while just over 500,000 iPhone 3Gs were sold over its first few days of availability.
The New York Times has a beef with smartphones
Picking up the printed version of the New York Times’ Week in Review section this week, it was impossible not to notice two columns warning of the evils and danger associated with using a smartphone.
Death by Gadget by Nicholas Kristof and Are Cells the New Cigarettes by Maureen Dowd were concerned with more than the smartphone’s impact on the newspaper industry. Kristof dug into why the material tantalum – used to manufacture all sorts of electronic devices – is a “conflict mineral” people are killing each other over during the civil war in the Congo. Dowd showcased San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom’s efforts to publish radiation emission levels when purchasing cell phones in his city.
What wasn’t discussed is how much either columnist’s reporting is now done via the use of mobile devices (or what percentage of readers now find them there).
