Amazon Kindle Paperwhite: Built-in light

Image Credit: Amazon

The latest e-reader from Amazon the Kidle Paperwhite starts shipping globally from today. One of the special features of the Paperwhite, is its built-in light. Kind of similar to Barnes and Noble glowlight. Offering readers the ability to read in any kind of light situation either night or day. The light is evenly displaced within the screen and not directed at the reader's eyes. Illuminating and e-ink screen can be quiet a task which Amazon has almost reached perfection in.

The Paperwhite comes in two versions, a 3G version for $179 and a Wi-Fi version for $119. Each Paperwhite is capable of holding 1,100 books and can can last for more than 8 weeks on a single battery charge, this even with the light on. Now this is an impressive e-reader.

So, how good is the Amazon Kindle Paperwhite's built-in light.
You will feel that the device glows when it is switched on. Unlike back-lit displays that project light out to a users' eyes. The Built-in lighting of the Paperwhite actually guides lights from above onto the whole screen. So the device has a glowing feel to it - this allows users to adjust the light to all reading conditions; sunny day at the beach or nighttime reading conditions. There is also no glare from the device when you turn it on, on a sunny day. Amazon achieved this by flattening out fiber optic cable into a sheet and nanoprinting to ensure even distribution and display of light. Thereby reducing eyestrain on the e-ink screen, as there is a balanced whiteness across the display. 
Read More: Official Amazon Kindle Paperwhite

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Sociolatte

How to send web pages, PDFs or documents to your Kindle

So if you are surfing the web and find interesting content that you might want to read later on your Kindle there is now an easy way to do so. Available for your Windows and MAC PC - Amazon's Send To Kindle desktop App makes things easy and lets you easily send stuff to your Kindle for easy reading. Once you download the app onto your PC you can then easily use functions like drag-and-drop to send articles or documents to your Kindle. You can also use the print option and choose print and then send to Kindle. Once you do this a PDF version of the webpage or document is then sent to your Kindle reader. 


How does it work


Once you download the App on your PC or MAC it installs as a virtual printer. So using that virtual printer you can choose to transfer any page to your Kindle by using that printer. Which will then transfer any web page to your kindle in PDF format. Handy if you send a lot of PDF or DOC files to your Kindle.
Or
You could select the documents you want to transfer by selecting documents in Windows Explorer or Finder on MAC, and then choose 'Send to Kindle' from the menu. The App can transfer PDFs, images, documents and text files. 


You can also use the same app to transfer documents from your desktop to devices that have the Kindle app on them. So this means you can use the same app to send documents to your Android, iPhone and iPad devices. 
Send to Kindle for PC
Send to Kindle for MAC

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Sociolatte

Best sites to download free eBooks

Your eReader is that much more fun when you have free books to read. The good thing about the internet is that there are millions of books out there, that can be downloaded and read on your device and the best part of it is that it is totally legal and pretty easy to download and read. There  have been millions of books that have been printed from the time the printing press was invented and millions of them are available as classics which come with no copyright issues.There is a vast difference between people who love reading books and those who are satisfied with blogs and articles. If you are that person who needs your books no matter what. We hope this post will definitely lead you to your pastures. These ebooks can be downloaded on your SmartPhones, Tablets and eReaders.

 List of best sites to download free eBooks online.

1. You can visit Amazon's Limited Time Offers or Amazon's Kindle Popular Classics. 

Limited time offers from Amazon has a whole lot of free books while Kindle Popular Classic has a whole list of free books that are ready for your downloading.

2. Visit Archive.org - You can download free eBooks and texts over here. The Archive has a whole lot of fiction, children's books, Academic books and history books.

3. Visit openlibrary.org - The world's classic literature at your fingertips with over a million copies available

4. Project Gutenberg - Use their topics section to browse through topics and download free books. 

5. Visit ManyBooks.net - providing the best books at the best price - free

6. You can also visit Google's Book search that has a huge collection of free ebooks available for download. 

7. You can also visit FeedBooks.com to download free books, thay have more than 3 million titles available. 

 

So the next time you are wondering where to go online to download free eBooks for your Tablet, SmartPhone or eReader we hope the list above helps. If we have missed a resource please let us know in the comments section below.

 

Mini iPad arriving in 2012 ???

Apple Insider is reporting that a mini iPad could be seen in the market in the early months of 2012. According to sources it is believed that the mini iPad is to rival and take on Amazon Kindle Fire. Amazon Kindle Fire is their first foray into the touchscreen tablet market and costs just $199. The rumor that a device somewhere between an iPod and iPad from Apple is not new. This smaller device can come with iPad functionality and sit in the $200 price range. This would make the device much more appealing to a large market segment. We had previously written about a cheap iPhone that could come from Apple. This would ensure that they get into the global prepaid smartphone market which till now is untouched. In countries like India and China the market for a prepaid iPhone would be really high and would give Apple a chance to get into the global smartphone market at a very competitive level. The market till now has been enjoyed by Nokia and BlackBerry.

A mini iPad could do just that becoming a huge hit in the global markets. China especially would have a huge market for such a device, in this price range. The US and Europe could also have big demand for products in this range. 

Read more at Apple Insider. 

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Sociolatte

How to ask an Author a question on Kindle or Amazon @Author Page

Amazon has released a new feature called @Authors and it is currently in limited beta. What it essentially allows you to do is to ask authors a question that you would like answered. So if you are reading a book from a particular author on your kindle you can ask for a clarification on any passage or clarify a doubt you might have on maybe what the author actually meant. 


With Amazon's @Auhors this is what can be done
1. Readers can ask questions directly from their Kindles
2. You can also post a question on Amazon's Author page
3. Anyone who has purchased from Amazon.com can reply to a question



How Do I Ask a Question?
Posting a question from the Kindle:
1. Place the cursor at the beginning of the passage you'd like to ask a question about using the 5-way controller, then press down to anchor it
2. Highlight the passage using the 5-way controller
3. Enter your question about the passage you highlighted, beginning with the phrase "@author". Please note that questions asked from the Kindle are limited to 100 characters. If you would like to ask a longer question, feel free to ask the question from the Amazon Author Page.
4. Select "save & share" from the options at the bottom of the note window when finished


If you don't have a Twitter account associated with your Amazon.com account, you'll have the option to press Alt + Enter to manage your social network registration before your message is posted. You can read more about posting to Twitter on our Help pages.


Source: Amazon.com

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Sociolatte

Kindle Daily Deals - go live at approximately 12:00 A.M. Pacific time

Amazon now has a daily ebook deal for all their kindle books and there is a new deal every night.

How does the Amazon Kindle Daily Deal work

Everyday there is a new kindle deal announced and you have 24 hours to claim your deal. When you reach their site you will know how many hours you have before the daily ebook deal expires and if you like the deal you can pay for it and get your ebook. Amazon has already already made it's foray into the daily deals market  with Amazon Local. Amazon Local has now come to New York.

Today's kindle daily deal is the book 'Water For Elephants' and is priced at $2.99. So to get the best deal you will need to check in everyday and find out what the best deal is. If you would like to bookmark the Kindle Daily Deals page please find the link here. 

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Sociolatte

Kindle Cloud Reader: Web App lets you read your Kindle books, instantly.

There is a reason why Amazon is calling the Kindle Cloud reader a Web App. Apple has a problem with Kindle's iPhone App and pulled the 'buy' button on the iPad App. Basically what the button did was allow users to make purchases outside of Apple's control. which meant a loss of 30% in revenue for Apple. Apple's is know for it's tight control of all Apps that enter it's App store. which has forced companies to create web based Apps that can be used on the iPhone and iPad. One of the first web-based Apps was the one from Playboy. With Apple's tight control on not allowing adult content on to it's platforms. Companies have had to innovate.


Amazon has done just that and have created and released their own web App that can be used on the iPad. it is free to use and allows users to read all their books and purchase new ones all on Amazon.


If you ask Amazon what is the Kindle Cloud Reader a brief description on the site says 'Kindle Cloud Reader is a web app that lets you read your Kindle books, instantly.' That's as simple as it gets. the kindle Cloud Reader is available on Safari for MAC and PC, Chrome and iPad (iOS 4+). With support for additional browsers coming son. Try it out now. 

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Sociolatte

Kindle now let's you share on Facebook and Twitter

Amazon has announced a major software upgrade for the kindle. Version 2.5 of Kindle's software is being rolled out automatically on a limited basis. Adds Facebook and Twitter features to the ereader. Users can now highlight a passage from a book they are reading and hen share the same with their friends on Facebook and Twitter.

The version firmware 2.5 also boasts a bevy of other features like crisper text, larger fonts, organize books into collections, PDF docs get zoom and pan features and password protection.

With competition heating up from the Nook and the release of the iPad. Amazon has had to come up with new features. We can be sure that future updates are going to come with more sharing options for social sites.

Currently users can share content from a book on Twitter and Facebook but with devices like the iPad you get more options and Kindle might well get full social features in the future.

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Sociolatte

Audible menus and bigger font for Kindle

Amazon has announced that it will add two new features that would make it's Kindle e-book reader more accessible to blind and vision-impaired suers.

"Monday's announcement comes a month after Syracuse University in Syracuse, N.Y., and the University of Wisconsin-Madison said they would not consider widely deploying the device as an alternative to paper textbooks until Amazon makes it easier for blind students to use. Both universities bought some Kindles to test this fall."

So with it's new feature of Text-To-Speech, Amazon will make it more vision-impaired friendly and stand by it's commitment to improving the device for the visualy challenged.

"The update will be available during the "summer" of 2010 and was prompted by feedback from Amazon users.


"The Kindle will have a read-aloud feature that could be advantageous to blind students and those with other disabilities including dyslexia, but getting to that point is a problem. The turn the Kindle on, users have to navigate through screens of text menu"

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Sociolatte

e-readers upgrading for 2010

Yeah the news is out Amazon's kindle2 now offering PDF support. e-readers maybe the way to go in 2010. Manufactures have now got the price right and books are good to read. With Barnes and Nobel's Nook, Sony Reader and a whole number of lesser know manufactures. e-readers are set to be the big thing for 2010. They also make a great gift and help your friends read more. With Google's effort to digitize public domain books there are thousands of classifieds out there for your to read.
"The technology is improving. This year brought a lot of essential enhancements to e-readers, including touchscreens (Sony), bigger screens (Sony Reader and Kindle DX), longer battery life (Kindle 2), a color LCD (Nook), and PDF support. Storage is plentiful too. With its SD card slot, the Nook can hold more than 17,000 books--more than anyone would read in a lifetime."

If only their pricing could come even further down they might achieve greater success.

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Sociolatte