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With the announcement of latest Amazon Kindle, the largest online retailer, Amazon, conveys a message that it is pretty much in scene of electronic reading device. In spite of fears that iPad will take-over the e-reading platform, Kindle is selling like a hot cake, thanks to the recent price cuts.

Kindle – 3, the latest dedicated electronic reading device of Amazon, will be released on August 27th, 2010.

It is true that Amazon is afraid of iPad and such devices but it is still strong in terms of ebook inventory and market penetration.The Amazon online store has 10 times more books (630,000 vs 60,000) when compared to iTunes. The latest release is smaller, faster, last longer, and doesn’t cost much when compared to iPad.

Too bad, it doesn’t have the touch screen and color display. But it seems, bookworms think the feature is not in their priority list. At least, not yet!

Here are some of the new Kindle 3 features:

• 21% smaller but, with same 6-inch screen
• 15% lighter than previous model
• Electronic-ink screen has 50% better contrast
• 20% fast while turning pages, with improved fonts
• 2X Battery life – up to one month (wireless off)
• 2X storage 3,500 books
• Built in Wi-Fi
• Newly designed buttons and button layout
• Improved PDF reader
• Text-to-speech

It looks like a keyless keyboard, nearly 80 percent larger than the built-in trackpad on the MacBook Pro, and looks same as previously leaked photos of the device.

Priced at $69, the gesture based device is a new category of input device for Apple desktop and laptops. The trackpad is expected to get popular among people who prefer better interaction with their computer applications.

Swiping through pages on screen is just like flipping through pages in a magazine, and inertial scrolling senses the momentum in your fingers as you move up and down a page.

The new device is made with wear-resistant glass, with entire surface of Magic Trackpad working like a a button, one can click on objects in similar ways like mouse.

The Magic Trackpad interacts with Mac computers via Bluetooth wireless technology that can maintain a reliable and secure connection up to 33 feet away from the computer.  The device powered by two AA batteries requires a Mac computer with Bluetooth wireless technology, Mac OS X v10.6.4 or later to work properly.

Despite the antenna problem, Apple is releasing iPhone 4 in 17 more countries on Friday, July 30.

Apple will release the smartphone in both retail and online stores in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, New Zealand, Singapore, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.

In Canada, the unlocked version of iPhone will also be available in Apple stores. The unlocked phone works in the network any of the three mobile phone providers (Rogers, Bell, or Telus) in Canada. The catch however is the price. The unlocked 16-gigabyte iPhone will sell for $659 while the 32-GB version will cost $779.

After the report published by Consumer Reports about the iPhone 4 antenna problem, it seems, Apple has taken the issue a bit more seriously. After the iPhone 4 press conference last week, Apple has posted a few new pages on the issue in its website including, new antenna performance page. The page highlights how several other smartphones experience similar attenuation (decreases of signal bars) to that of the iPhone 4.

The performance page initially featured smartphones of Research in Motion (RIM), HTC, Samsung, and it’s own iPhone 3GS. Recently, Apple added the Nokia N97 mini to the page. It looks like, Apple has no plans of stopping, Apple has posted signal attenuation video of Motorola’s recent release Droid X in the page and also in the YouTube site. The description on the video reads:

In our tests, the Motorola Droid X dropped from 3 bars to 0 bars when held in a way that attenuated the signal.

Droid X, a Google Android phone, has been seen as the latest and strong competitor for the iPhone.

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Apple’s latest antenna target – Droid X

Facebook, the social networking site created in the dormitories of Harvard  in February 2004, said that it now has 500 million members.

In the company blog on Wednesday, July 22, the 26-year-old chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, said, that it was an ‘an important milestone‘ for Facebook.

According to the site, ‘50% of the active users log on to Facebook in any given day,’ and an average user has 130 friends.

Facebook says that people spend 500 billion minutes per month on Facebook. That makes each members spend in average 1400 minutes (about a full, 24 hours) a month in the site.

Sharing photos is one of the most popular thing people do in Facebook. People upload 30 billion photographs every months. That makes, everybody is sharing about 60 photos a month.

The popularity of Facebook has created real threat to the sites like Google.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs is not used to being said what to do with his device.

When people started telling that his device was not good enough, he was outraged. He started telling how they need to hold the ‘magic device’. Consumer Reports was the one to blame for all these hassles. That was why he was ‘stunned and embarrassed’.

Some points to prove that he wasn’t at ease in the press meet:

• Admitting "We’re not perfect” shouldn’t have been easy for Jobs. That is why he started his presentation by admitting the truth.
• He was still in defensive mood – repeatedly calling out the press for blowing the problem out of proportion.
• Saying and trying to prove, the antenna problem isn’t unique to Apple.

And yes, nobody cared! As long as they can get their hand on the $29 ‘bumper,’ for free!

Those, who heard of the the Apple engineers knowing about the problem beforehand, are asking, ‘Is Apple staffed with people afraid to tell the truth?’

If you still like those old-fashioned hard- or soft-cover books, it is time to consider yourself old-fashioned if Amazon.com is to be believed.

Amazon’s chief executive Jeff Bezos says, "The Kindle format has now overtaken the hardcover format." Data from the past three months reveal that Amazon has sold 143 Kindle e-books for every 100 hardcover books. That is a big margin.

But, is that the full story? What about the real facts?

The Amazon site has about 630,000 e-books for a price, and numerous titles that are available as free downloads. About 80% of the priced e-books are sold for $9.99 or less, significantly lower than the hardcover books that average to $25.

The ebook sale is also fueled by a drastic cut in the price of the Kindle reader. The book reader sales tripled after Amazon cut the price to $189 from $259, last month. Kindle reader has been Amazon’s top-selling single item for the last two years.

Top 10 bestselling books list on Amazon.com, on July 19, 2010, has only two Kindle eBooks. It is interesting that e-books, "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" ranked 6th, and "Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland," ranked 9th both are free downloads.

Whatever they say, I still love the sweet smell of those old fashioned books … and I am sure I am not outdated!

A mystery Apple hardware has appeared in the U.S. Federal Communications Commission’s online database.

It appears to be the "Magic Trackpad" or "Magic Slate" device that has been rumored since last year. Last month Engadget posted some photos of similar device.

The hardware looks more like Apple keyboard sans keys.

Is it another example of Steve Jobs’ detest of buttons?

I am waiting for Jobs to start wearing the blue jeans with elastic band instead of the button.

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Apple Trackpad FCC approved ?

By the end of this week, Apple iPads will also be sold in 9 more countries in addition to the 10 countries where iPads are currently sold.

The new addition to the ‘iPad available’ countries are Austria, Belgium, Hong Kong, Ireland, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand and Singapore. According to a press release dated July 19, Apple will start selling iPads in those countries on Friday, July 29.

Adding the 9 countries to the countries iPad is currently available (Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland, the UK and the US), residents of 19 countries will be able to purchase iPads next week. iPad during its release (January 27) was only available in the US. Apple started selling iPads in 9 more countries on May 28.

Residents of remaining hundreds of countries might also get hold of the iPad as the company says, the iPad will be made available in "many more" countries later this year.

Two high school buddies, both named Steven, founded Apple Computer in 1976. Since then, Apple Computer has repeatedly been at the forefront of technology design and innovation. Some key mile-stones in the company’s history are listed below:

1976 – Apple Computer is founded on April 1 by Steven Wozniak and Steven Jobs. The Apple I goes on sale for 666.66 dollars.

1977 – Apple launches the Apple II, which sells 250,000 units and helps launch the personal computer revolution. It was the first personal computer in a plastic case with color graphics.

1980 – Apple goes public with 4.6 million shares, each priced at 22 dollars.

1983 – Apple starts selling the "Lisa," a desktop computer for businesses with a graphical user interface

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Apple computer – time-line (1976 – 2010)