Updates available for Kindle Fire HD (7.2.1) and Kindle Fire 2nd Generation (10.2.1)

Updates available for Kindle Fire HD (7.2.1) and Kindle Fire 2nd Generation (10.2.1)

Amazon Kindle community thread

for the heads-up!

The updates for the Kindle Fire HD 7″, Dolby Audio, Dual-Band Wi-Fi, 16 GB and the Kindle Fire 7″ SD have been posted!

You can always go to:

http://www.amazon.com/kindlesoftwareupdates

to check for software updates for any of your devices.

Here are the specific ones:

Kindle Fire HD 7″ Software Update Version 7.2.1

Kindle Fire (2nd Generation) Software Update Version 10.2.1

These updates bring three main changes:

• Kindle FreeTime
• Default device languages (German, English UK, English USA, Spanish, French, Italian)
• The ability to turn off the recommendations

I’ve downloaded it and installed it, and will start experimenting with it, then write more.

I downloaded it using my Fire itself, then using ES File Explorer to more the file from my Download folder to my Kindleupdates folder.

I’m seeing a few things already, but I better get this out so you can do the update.

If you want to wait, you can…it will update automatically if you do that.

Update: here are the basics on these three features:

Kindle FreeTime:

This is an app, and you’ll actually find it on the Apps tab. It is not under Parental Controls in the settings.

First, it does exactly what people have wanted for a long time for the Kindle! You can “whitelist” what specific files you want available on the device to profiles you create. You can choose exactly what e-books, videos, and apps you want available to each child. These come from the ones you have already purchased and are already in the Cloud.

You can not set controls based on ratings (you can’t say no R rated movies, for example).

It requires you to enter a birthdate and gender to set up a profile for someone…some people aren’t going to like that. Could that be used for marketing purposes by Amazon? Sure, that’s possible.

It appears that the parent has to be the one to switch the profiles. That will irritate some folks. You can’t let the children pass the device back and forth, picking their own profiles: the parent has to be involved in-between.

The biggest negative is that you have to put in your password…a lot. Once you get to Parent Settings (which you do by swiping down from the top when you are in a “child’s profile”, it should probably accept that you’ve entered the password until you leave that part. As it is, every time you want to do anything, you have to enter it again.

You can choose an avatar for a child: it says “photos” which will probably make people think they can use their own photos.

You can set daily time limits for each child. How much time each day they can read books, watch videos, use apps, and total screen time. People will like that.

There are some things you can download (like free e-books) within the child’s profile. Some people will like it, some won’t like that books and apps are being offered to their children without their intervention.

Overall, FreeTime has some great basic functionality, and could use tweaks to the UI (User Interface).

Languages

Swipe down to get to settings – More – Language & Keyboard – Language

Once you choose the language, the switch happens right away.

When you use look up for a word, you can easily switch between dictionaries to change the default.

The dictionary did take a minute to load, though.

Show/Hide recommendations

Maybe it’s somewhere else, but I found it this way:

Swipe down to get to Settings – More – Applications  - Amazon Home Recommendations, then you can choose to Show or Hide

—

One other note I’ve mentioned before about Updates: they are huge files. This one is 535.96 MB. I’ll use that ES File Explorer I mentioned above (which is free) to remove it.

Update: wooooo-hooooo! The problem with the Bluetooth keyboard repeating letters appears to be fixed! That’s marvelous, and it will likely mean that I generally retire the netbook from my use. I can blog on my Kindle, I can blog on my Kindle!

Update: This just occurred to me this morning. Although the set-up would be clunky, you could use FreeTime to create “Collections” on your Fire! You would create a profile for a “child” named “Mystery”, one named “Romance”, and so on. It wouldn’t be smooth to use, since you have to enter your password so often switching between, but it would certainly work. That would also mean that you could have related e-books, movies, and apps all in the same Collection.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

New Fire update in coming weeks: languages, turn off “Customers Also Bought”

New Fire update in coming weeks: languages, turn off “Customers Also Bought”

Thanks to TuxGirl, who alerted me to a change in this

FAQ: Kindle Paperwhite and Kindle Fire HD

that has these two key passages (it was updated September 25):

“Q: Will I be able to configure my Kindle Fire (2nd Generation) and Kindle Fire HD so recommendations do not appear under the carousel?
A: Yes. In the coming weeks, a new, free software update for Kindle Fire and Kindle Fire HD will add a setting to let customers control whether or not personalized recommendations appear below the carousel on the device homepage.”

“Q: What languages do the new devices support?
A: The new Kindle Fire and Kindle Fire HD currently supports US English. In the coming weeks, a new free software update will enable customers to set their device default language to one of six languages, including English (US), English (UK), German, French, Italian, and Spanish. Free dictionaries for each language will also be available. This software update will be delivered automatically to your Kindle Fire.”

We got pretty frequent updates on the KF1 (Kindle Fire 1st generation), and it looks like that might continue.

By the way, when it says “Kindle Fire” in those quotations, I assume they are referring to what I call the KFSD (Kindle Fire 7″ SD), and that they are not talking about the KF1. That doesn’t mean that the KF1 will never get any more updates, but I don’t think they are discussing it her.

Thanks also to *~*Pineapple*~*.

Update: I forgot to mention…if you don’t like the “Customers Also Bought” (CAB) recommendations, try looking at the Carousel in landscape mode (wider than it is tall).

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Two cool things about the Kindle Fire HD

Twoool things about the Kindle Fire HD

I’ve been using my Kindle Fire HD 7″ 16 GB (KFHD) for several days now. I’ve already given you my first impressions.

I’ve used it at home (including over a weekend) and at work, and although I haven’t gone through it systematically yet, I’m finding some cool things. I thought I’d take this post and share a couple of  them with you:

Ivona text-to-speech (TTS)

As regular readers know, I’m a big fan of text-to-speech (TTS). I’ve been listening to it, typically for hours a week, since the Kindle 2.

With the Kindle Fire 1st Generation, there wasn’t TTS that worked with Kindle store books (although I did use it with free books in text format from Project Gutenberg).

Well, the KFHD has the

IVONA

TTS app, and I believe the specific voice is Salli.

I listened to We Bought a Zoo, the basis for the movie with Matt Damon.

I was impressed!

Sallie is considerably better than Tom (one of the voices on the RSKs…Reflective Screen Kindles).

Salli was smoother and more natural sounding. If you listened to TTS a few years ago and rejected it, I’d give it another try. It’s not perfect…a “parking COM-plex” was pronounced as a “parking com-PLEX”. It used the pronunciation for something that was complicated.

That’s a minor thing.

There were some pretty complicated (or should I say, “com-PLEX”) words, and they were handled well. The only problem I had was that there was also quite a bit of French…I’m not sure if I would have known how to pronounce if I had sight-read it (my linguist kid says I use a stage French accent…sure, I learned it from Maurice Chevalier and Pepe Le Pew). Those were just proper nouns, for the most part, and didn’t impede it.

Something that disconcerted me at first, but that I like now, is that, when you turn your KFHD from portrait to landscape, the TTS stops. That could be a convenient way to cut off something when someone walks into the room…maybe something you’d rather not share.

With the previous TTS, some people with print disabilities wanted faster speeds…well, you have them now.  You can go up to 4 times speed, which is too fast for me for convenient listening.

I can also see the impact of the improved battery charge life…TTS is a gobbler, and the KFHD handles it better than the KF1.

Overall, an improved feature I’ll use frequently.

To start TTS:

Tap towards the top middle of the screen, then tap Aa.

Turn TTS on.

You’ll get a play button, and you can start playing. To stop it playing, just tilt the device…if you started in landscape (wider than it is tall), go to portrait (taller than it is wide), and vice versa.

The camera

Yes, it’s a front-facing camera (it is looking at you when you are looking at the screen), so it’s designed more for video calls for taking pictures of other people.  You can certainly do that, though…you just have to get used to looking the opposite direction of the thing that you are photographing. It’s like brushing your hair in the mirror.

There doesn’t seem to be a built-in way to use the camera, which is a bit odd, but easily remedied.

You can use this free app from the Amazon Appstore:

PicShop Lite

When you open it up, there is a handy little instruction about where to click…it’s on a picture in your bottom left corner of the screen. You can then choose

Camera

(although you can also choose Gallery or Facebook if you just want to edit).

There’s a slider on the screen which is the zoom, and a blue button which is the shutter.

There is also something that looks like three sliders, like on an equalizer for sound. Tap that, and you can adjust the exposure, the mode, and all that stuff.

Once you take the picture, you can discard it with an X, or save it and work on it with a checkmark.

If you use the checkmark, you get edits and filters…there are more things, but they are locked in the free edition.

If you want to save it, there is what now seems to be a common symbol for saving…what looks like a 3.5″ floppy diskette. I wonder how many people have no idea what that is? You can then just save it (only low quality in the free edition), tweet it or send it to Facebook.

I haven’t found an easy place to find it from the app: it says it is in the “camera roll”, but I don’t know where that is. I’ve asked them, and I’ll let you know what I hear back.

I find them using the free

ES File Explorer

app, which I highly recommend. They are in the DCIM folder.

ES File Explorer can also access the camera…and very well!

Launch ES File Explorer, and tap AppMgr at the top of the screen.

Tap Category, and choose System Apps.

Then, tap Camera, and choose Open (rather than Detail).

Now, you can use all three functions of the camera app…still pictures, video, and panorama.

From there, you can use it with apps, including with the built in e-mail app.

That panorama thing is fun…you slowly turn the KFHD, and you get a big sweeping panorama…something they were touting on the iPhone 5.

I’ve also used

Audio, Photo, Video to E-Mail LITE

It does what it says. You can record audio, video, or take a picture, and easily e-mail it.

It’s an ad-supported app (free, but ads appear in it), and I’ll need to use it a bit more to do a real report.

One of my favorite apps works on the KFHD:

Paper Camera

It makes the world look like different things…my favorite is a pencil sketch. If you do take a picture with that, it shows up in the Photos tab…and you can also e-mail from there.

I also did buy (for $2.99) the

Juice for Roku

app.

You need to have a Roku to use this, and you need to install a free channel.

Once you’ve done that, though, you can “throw” pictures wirelessly from your KFHD to your TV!

It’s a bit slow establishing the connection, but from there, it was pretty easy. You can also send videos, but I think only your personal videos…I still need to test that one.

One last thing about images, and this was found by Tink-erbell ♛, one of the Kindle Forum Pros.

You can take a screenshot!

Hold down the lower volume button (the one nearest the middle of the device) and the power button at the same time for about a second, and it will take a picture of whatever is on the screen (I’ve heard it does not work with video).

The picture then shows up in Photos.

Well, there you go! Two cool things (with some “sub-things”) about the KFHD.

I know some of this was a bit sketchy…if you have any questions, feel free to ask. Found anything else cool? My readers and I would appreciate you commenting on this post.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Kindle Fire HD: first impressions

Kindle Fire HD: first impressions

First, a little background:

I’ve had Kindles since the original Kindle 1, and I’ve been using a Kindle Fire First Generation (KF1) since its release.

For disclosure, Amazon gave me this Kindle Fire HD 7″ 16 GB. That is not because I’m a blogger, and it didn’t affect whether I would have gotten it or not. I actually had ordered one before I knew I was being given one for my help on the Amazon Kindle forums. I am not an Amazon employee, and I don’t believe that having been given it will affect these first impressions.

The first thing I’d say I noticed is the change in shape. The KFHD is not as thick, but is considerably wider. It’s wide enough that I can see how holding it with one hand with the thumb on one side and the fingers grasping the other is going to be difficult for some people.

It’s odd, but it actually makes the screen look bigger…I’m not sure why.

I found the physical on button more difficult. It is out of the way more, and some people had problems with accidentally putting it to sleep before. This will resolve that, and I think I’ll get used to it…but initially, it’s harder to use.

Update: this issue may matter less with a cover that automatically sleeps it and wakes it. Amazon makes those, but only with leather, which I don’t use. I ordered a non-leather third party one (thanks to the heads-up from reader Jands1515):

rooCASE Ultra-Slim (Black) Vegan Leather Folio Case for Amazon Kindle Fire HD 7 Inch Tablet – Slim Profile 17mm – Support Landscape / Portrait / Typing Stand / Auto Sleep and Wake

It was under $10 including shipping when I ordered it, and it is cheaper now. I should have it on Wednesday, and we’ll see how that feels.

There are physical buttons for the volume control…those work fine.

The screen looks much better! It’s sharper, and the illumination seems more even somehow. That’s definitely a plus.

One weird thing: the screen rotates even before you wake it up…no big deal, and some people will like that.

Oh, and it updated by itself very quickly after I got it…my guess was that it was getting the Special Offers, which showed after that.

It came at about 65% charged. I did buy the

Amazon Kindle PowerFast for Accelerated Charging (for all Kindle Fire models, not included with device)

and it didn’t take it two hours to charge from that point.

The homescreen navigation has significantly changed from the KF1.

There is no Settings Gear…you now swipe down from the top to get to those features.

The Carousel, oddly, started out just showing me e-books. As I opened other types of things, though, they did appear there.

The tabs at the top have changed:

• Shop
• Games
• Apps
• Books
• Music
• Videos
• Newsstand
• Audiobooks
• Web
• Photos
• Docs
• Offers

That “Photos” one was a big improvement over the Gallery app. My photos from the Cloud just appeared there…easy to use.

No Favorites shelves on the homescreen…instead, you get “Customers who bought this also bought”. I don’t see any way to turn that off at this point…some folks will definitely be irritated by that one!

You can add things to Favorites by “long pressing” the icon. You can then access the Favorites many places (not just on the homescreen) by tapping a star in the corner of the screen. Again, that may confuse people…they may think they are tapping the star to add something to Favorites.

When I did check apps and games I downloaded, none of them seemed to have brought over game progress, favorites, that kind of thing.

I checked the text-to-speech right away. You do that with the Aa button. First, you turn it on, then you press play. It appears to be the female voice from Vocalizer…only one voice is available….however, you can move the speed up to four times the speed. I just checked in the Applications…this seems to be Ivona. I’ll research that later.

One problem: it appeared that once I had bought the audiobook, for an e-book I owned, I couldn’t use text-to-speech…only the audiobook. For me, that’s a considerable disappointment, since I prefer text-to-speech. I’ll have to check that out more.

The sound, by the way, is greatly improved…much louder and clearer.

I tried Skype, but I’m not a regular user…and I didn’t have anybody with whom to Skype. I couldn’t see an easy way to test the camera with that, so I switched to one of my favorite apps from my SmartPhone, Paper Camera. It changes the appearance of the world so that it looks like a comic book, or a pencil sketch (my favorite), or more. That looked fine.

Downloading does seem faster…for me, a movie was about three seconds per minute.

I have not been able to get X-Ray for Movies to work, despite trying it on Men in Black, which it tells me it should have the feature.

Let’s take a look at the menus, then I’ll do a brief tour of the tabs…I’ll write more about the device after I’ve had more time with it.

Swiping down from the top (the equivalent of the Settings Gear) gives you:

• Locked
• Volume
• Brightness (this has an Auto Brightness setting when you tap it)
• Wireless (tapping this gives you easy access to Airplane Mode, Bluetooth, Wi-fi On and Off, and Connect to a Network)
• Sync
• More

More gives you

• Help & Feedback (your User Guide is here)
• My Account
• Applications
• Parental Controls (at this point this is similar to what we have on the KF1…FreeTime is coming later. E-mail, Contact, and Calendar have their own place to be blocked)
• Sounds & Display (this includes an Auto Brightness setting)
• Wireless
• Device (Storage is here, and is broken down by category, which is nice…it does not appear that the Apps & Games have a separated memory…it seems to all be the same. It takes it a while to calculate the memory usage, though…seconds for sure)
• Location-based Services (you can turn this on or off)
• Keyboard
• Sound on Keypress
• Auto Correction
• Show correction Suggestions
• Spelling Suggestions
• Security
• Legal & Compliance

Now, for a quick run through the tabs:

• Shop (this is greatly improved, at least in appearance…the ad here scrolls on its own, showing you different “play now”/”watch now” options. You can really see the improved interface here. It’s fast and smooth)
• Games
• Apps (this also includes games…it’s easy to switch to List View, by the way. That was sort of hidden on the KF1)
• Music
• Newsstand
• Audiobooks (nice to have these separated out and easy to find)
• Web (this now was a “Trending Now” section)
• Photos
• Docs
• Offers

Overall?

It’s a more elegant device, certainly…it’s cooler. The image is so much better (I’ll test out the glare factor), and the sound is better.

The interface will take some getting used to. One thing that throws me off is that the screen spins when it switches (on its own) from landscape to portrait. It doesn’t do 360s, but it’s some sort of effect.

Having text-to-speech for Kindle store books is great!

The keyboard has some new odd things. They’ve named the “enter” key “return”…so I think people will think it takes them back somewhere. I had a point where I could not get the keyboard to get off the screen…I had to hit the new tiny menu button, then hit back. That was not intuitive.

I’ll play with it more over the next few days, and I do think I’ll be carrying this one rather than my KF1 as my standard.

If you have any specific question, let me know, and if you want to share your impressions of yours, that would be great…just comment on this post.

Update: I know some of you are wondering what I’ve named it. I’ve listed the names for my other Kindles before. This one is Lucas, after George Lucas…wait, HD does stand for Howard the Duck, right?

Update: I am now typing this part with a Bluetooth (wireless) full-size keyboard. That is really going to work, although it does take a bit of  adjustment. Sometimes, it types several of the same letter, but that’s just going to take a minute or two, I think, to get the feel of it. I got the Microsoft Bluetooth Mobile Keyboard 5000. I like the size and the feel of it…I haven’t used a Bluetooth keyboard before. I don’t particularly like that it needs batteries, but it was recognized reasonably easily (I had to type a code on it twice, but I think I might have waited too long the first time). It’s going to be small enough to take on trips…I do have a pocket into which I can put it in my “utility vest”, but most people wouldn’t.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Kindle Fire update 6.3

Kindle Fire update 6.3

I reported a Kindle Fire update earlier today, along with some non-Fire news (for those of you keeping score). I said I’d give you a fuller report when I had a chance to work with it, and I’m going to do that now. I’ll also update my book, Love Your Kindle Fire. That may take a few days…I have to do that in a neater fashion, and I also want to add some how-tos. After I update, I’ll ask Amazon to offer the update to previous buyers.

Let me also mention here that I’m doing this with the advantage of being able to compare two Kindle Fires side-by-side, one which has been updated and one which hasn’t. My Significant Other is off at the gym, and a reflective screen Kindle got that assignment.

First, your Kindle Fire should update on its own. You’d have to be connected to  wi-fi for it to get the download for the update, and then it would need to install the update. When I’m trying to get a Kindle of mine to do that, I typically sync with Amazon

Settings Gear – Sync

then turn off the Kindle (hold down the power button for a couple of seconds…it will ask you if you want to shut down) and then restart it.

However, I didn’t want to wait in this case, and you might not want to wait, either.

You can go to

http://www.amazon.com/kindlesoftwareupdates

and then pick the Fire, or go directly to

Kindle Fire Software Update Version 6.3

Again, that shouldn’t be necessary…it’s just if you are in a hurry.

They have pretty good instructions there…if you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Here are things I’ve noticed about the upgrade:

The Keyboard

This is a picture with the old version on top, the new version on the bottom. The top is “shifted” to capitals, by the way….

It’s different! The “hide button” has moved from your right to your left. If “long press” (hold your finger or stylus on it for about a second) the period, you’ll get a bunch of other punctuation…that’s a nice touch. There is now a “Next button” (I was comparing this in the native e-mail app on the Fire).  There was a .com button in this situation, which I really like.

The Settings Menu

This has really changed! It’s the same when you tap the Settings Gear, but when you tap More, they’ve certainly rearranged things

The old version was this:

• Help & Feedback
• My Account
• Restrictions
• Sounds
• Display
• Security
• Applications
• Date & Time
• Wireless Network
• Kindle Keyboard
• Device
• Legal Notices
• Terms of Use

The new version (I’m comparing each choice, and if they are different, I’ll let you know):

• Help & Feedback
• My Account
• Parental controls (this was called ‘Restrictions” before)
• Sounds
• Display
• Applications (these are different on our two devices, but the options look like they are the same)
• Date & Time
• Wireless Network
• Kindle Keyboard
• Device
• Legal Notices
• Terms of Use

Web

What you may notice right away here is a little “glasses” icon at the bottom of the screen. That puts a web page into “article” mode. I wanted to test it, but interestingly, as I went to many webpages, the icon was gone. It did look nice on one page where I found it to work. You had to click a little x in your top right corner to get out of it…I was afraid that would close the webpage, but it didn’t.

I did check the settings for the Web…no different options.

Next, I went down the features they’d announced.

Sharing

I used The Hunger Games for these tests, figuring that if anything has been annotated and social mediaized, this would be it.

I highlighted a passage, and in addition to Note, Highlight, Share, and Search. On the old version, it’s Note, Highlight, and More…(with More…giving you Search in Book, Search Wikipedia, Search Google).

Choosing Share was fascinating! I immediately saw a choice to share the highlight with “the Kindle Community”, and also to share to Twitter and Facebook. There was a blue “options” link I didn’t find stood out. Tapping that let me set up my Twitter and/or Facebook accounts, and showed samples.

More interestingly, I saw a series of other comments, when they were uploaded, and by whom (although many said by “Unknown”).  Clearly, there were forum like threads. They didn’t seem to be tied to a specific place in the book.

I entered something, and it also included my highlighted section, which is going to be confusing (since I just highlighted something at random).Still, this has real potential.

Oh, got it! There is a little word balloon, like in a comic book, on the menu…you can tap that and share without highlighting.

Yow! Must tear my eyes away! That’s going to be super-addictive. I think it’s generally better than some other technology based additions (this is, after all, literary), but I can also see people meeting up in a book to chat, oddly. Hmm, that’s an idea which I may use. Set up a date and time for people to chat with you…excellent idea for authors and experts!

This is a super winner for Amazon…amazing social. It could blow up like Twitter, but again, based on books. Not as big, of course, but I can absolutely see how people could disappear into it for hours at a time. Book clubs, here you  go! The only thing is that you can’t limit the group at this point…but it wouldn’t surprise me if Amazon let people set up groups of friends in the future. I’m also not quite sure what happens to…what to call them? Hm, maybe “tweads” because you are tweeting while you are reading? Okay, I’ll go with that…I’m not sure what happen to tweads over time…can you go back and read a thousand of them? Can you search them? Will they appear online somewhere?

Hmm…my highlight and the note I made with the highlight show up at

http://kindle.amazon.com

but not the twead I made without a highlight.

Book Extras

Bring up the menu in a book, and you’ll see Book Extras. No need for X-Ray for the Fire…well, no, it’s not the same, but very, very valuable. Characters, glossary, organizations…another big winner!

Archives of Personal Documents

I love this! You can go to the Docs tab, and you may need to sync. Then, you’ll see the documents you’ve sent through the personal document service (by e-mailing them to a Kindle). You’ll need to be on the Cloud tab. Tap one and it downloads.

You can also search on this page! I’m liking this.

They’ve said it will sync, meaning you could use books from Gutenberg, for example, or work documents, and start on one device and pick up on another.  I tested it by opening Just So Stories on my Fire, going to a spot, syncing, opening it on my Samsung Captivate (after syncing)…perfect! I’m impressed!

Print Replica Textbooks

Untested at this point

Movie Rentals

Not something I need to test, but it changes it so that the rental period (often 48 hours) from Amazon Instant Video doesn’t start as soon as you download to the Fire, but after you start watching it (you probably have to start watching within thirty days).

All in all…wow! These are major advancements.

I am noticing an oddness in response: I seem to end up on the Home page when I don’t mean to do that. It may just be more sensitive and I have to get used to it, but we’ll see. Let me know if you notice that.

Anything else you’ve noticed? Any questions? Feel free to comment on this post.

Update: I’ve written a post on ”tweading” from the independent authors’ point of view in The Writer’s Guide to E-Publishing. I really think this could be a breakout method for connecting authors and readers.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Use your computer’s files on your Fire with Tonido

Use your computer’s files on your Fire with Tonido

Thanks to my reader, Deb Schmalz, for the heads-up on this one!

Many of us have desktop computers with a lot of files on them. They might be pictures, music, Excel spreadsheets…all kinds of things.

We simply aren’t going to take all of them and put them on a Kindle Fire. For one thing, there is only 5.36 GB of memory available on Amazon’s table for that sort of thing.

On the other hand, it would be great to be able to quickly and simply show off those pictures, listen to that music, and consult that spreadsheet with the easy portability of the Fire.

Well, Tonido lets you do that…for free.

I didn’t write about it until I’d had time to test it a bit. While there are some limitations to it, I’m very pleased with it.

Let’s go over the concept first.

You are going to set up a free account using your computer, and download software to that computer. That software is necessary to turn your computer into a “broadcaster”. When you install it, you’ll be given a server name for that computer.

Then, you download a free app to your Kindle Fire that enables it to be a “receiver”. You enter the server name for your computer and log into the account.

That gives you access to your computer’s files.

Built into the app you download is a music player and a picture viewer.

For other files, like Excel spreadsheets, you’ll need an app on your Kindle Fire that can open them (just as you would if you put the file on your Kindle Fire using your USB cable or by e-mailing it to the device).

The process was all pretty easy…I was able to listen to music, see pictures…and edit an Excel spreadsheet with an app (I tested the last one at Starbucks).

Okay, here’s the process:

Go to

http://www.tonido.com/

on your computer (not your Fire).

Download and install the software (they have different versions for different operating systems, including Macs).

Once you install it and set up the account, you’ll have a server name and a password. You’ll need those for your Kindle Fire app. One nice thing: the app will remember the account credentials, so you won’t have to enter it every time you want to use it.

Next, get this free app in the Amazon Appstore:

Tonido

You want to install that one as well.

If you are on your Fire, go to the Apps tab. Tap on Cloud. You may need to do

Settings Gear – Sync

to get it to show up.

When you log in, remember that the server name and the password are the ones you got at the Tonido site…not your wi-fi.

Once you get in, you’ll see your computer’s folders. Tap a folder to open it, tap a file to launch it.

To go back up a level, use your Kindle Fire’s normal Back arrow at the bottom of your screen. That is a change I’d like to see: some indicator to go back a level on the screen in the app, and a way to go back to Home easily. There is what looks like a home icon, but it didn’t seem to work for me. However, it is easy enough to just use the arrow key.

When you open a file, it may ask you which of a list of programs you want to use to open it.

At the bottom of the screen, there is a toolbar. Your choices are

• Files
• Favorites
• Music
• Downloads
• Status

To listen to music, you need to first open a folder on your computer that has music. That may be the biggest negative I saw: no search capability.

Tap a song. You’ll see the music player open up. You can play it, or skip to the next song with the double chevrons (arrows with out the sticks) on your right. The songs will play in the order that they are in your folder. I didn’t see any option for a shuffle mode, Tap the Files button at the bottom to get out of the music player..your music will continue to play. If you want to stop the music, you do that within the player. If you go Home on your Fire, the music still plays. You’ll see the notification number at the top of your Kindle Fire screen near the name of your Kindle. Swipe down, then tap the Tonido banner…that will take you back into the app so you can stop the music.

To see pictures, first open a folder that has pictures.Then, you can either tap a picture to open, and then swipe to your left to see the next picture, or tap Menu at the bottom of the screen (horizontal lines in a box) and then tap Photo Gallery. You’ll get little incomplete thumbnails, but I could tell what they were.

You can add individual files or folders to your Favorites within Tonido by “long pressing” them (hold your fingertip on stylus on it for about a second. That makes it much easier to get back to a pictures or music folder, for example. You just tap Favorites at the bottom of the screen.

You can also download files…that’s great! You’ll find your downloads within your Tonido app…you do not need to be connected to wi-fi to use them.

I’ve been using it with

OfficeSuite Pro 5

I got it as a Free App of the Day: it’s currently $9.99. You don’t need to have it to make Tonido work, but if you want to edit or view Office programs, you’ll need something.

Overall, I think this is impressive. Unlike

Splashtop Remote Desktop

which I’ve reviewed previously and lets you actually use the applications on the other computer, this didn’t seem laggy at all. Splashtop does more, but honestly, it was an effort to use.

I can see huge possibilities for this. I’ll have to see if they will let me install it on my work laptop. I would so love to be able to show a (handheld) PowerPoint to somebody on my Fire! I tested that from home computer to my Fire with OfficeSuite…it was cool! It even let me mark up the slide (draw a red circle, for example) while the show was running.

Well, if you do try it out, feel free to let me know what you think! My Fire just got a lot more useful. Thanks, Deb!

Update: one of my regular readers and commenters (and an invaluable resource on the Amazon Kindle forums) logically asked about security concerns with Tonido. I’m going to reproduce my response here, since I know not all of you see the comments and this is an important point:

“When I worked with people designing databases and such, I would always tell them that there is a balance between security and convenience. Generally, the more secure something is, the less convenient it is to use.

For example, most people send e-mail without encrypting it…which means that it can be read by many people you don’t intend (as it bounces off their servers). Even encrypting it certainly doesn’t prevent unwanted eyes.

In the case of Tonido, they address this openly…and some research shows that they have a pretty good rep on that.

Here’s some of their information on it:

http://www.tonido.com/support/display/docs/Tonido+Security+Features

I also think this one is helpful:

http://www.tonido.com/communitywiki/doku.php?id=generalinfo:faq

It includes:

“How secure is Tonido?

Tonido has been built with security and privacy in mind. Tonido has been audited and tested by a independent security firm that specializes in application security. Furthermore, Tonido is constantly updated to protect against any potential vulnerabilities. Tonido UI is accessed via HTTP protocol and, for a fee, SSL certificate for HTTPS access is also available allowing secure access to Tonido. Tonido to Tonido communication using P2P engine is completely encrypted using AES 256 bit encryption.”

Naturally, if you use a weak password, you are more vulnerable to someone hacking your account (not hacking Tonido). If someone steals your Kindle Fire, you could be in real trouble (since you don’t have to enter your password each time).

Ideally, of course, you don’t keep any crucial confidential information on an internet-connected computer. For example, if you do your taxes on the computer, save your files on an SD card or jump drive, and disconnect it from the computer. You are still vulnerable to physical theft, of course. Another simple thing: don’t leave your computer connected to the internet when you aren’t there or while you are sleeping.”

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Read DRM EPUB books on your Kindle Fire

Read DRM EPUB books on your Kindle Fire

“…except for the Kindle Fire.”

See, that’s the problem about having named the Fire a Kindle. It’s very different from what I’ve had to retronym* RSKs (Reflective Screen Kindles).

One of the standard Kindle comments on the forums is that you can’t read EPUB books with DRM (Digital Rights Management) on a Kindle.

Well, now we’ll have to add that “…except for the Kindle Fire.”

Let me explain that a little bit more.

EPUB is an e-book format made by Adobe. DRM is a way to control the use of a digital file. On RSKs, there isn’t the necessary software to “unlock” an EPUB file with DRM. RSKs also couldn’t read EPUBs without DRM…unless you converted them to a Kindle friendly format. One way to do that is with the free software

 Calibre

Calibre is a great program, and used by lots of people.

Perfectly reasonably, though, Calibre does not strip DRM from files…that could be illegal, and they don’t want to do anything which is illegal (and which, by the way, could get them shut down).

You couldn’t install software to legally read an EPUB with DRM on your RSK, so you couldn’t read those without first (probably) illegally stripping that DRM.

So, here’s why I can now legally read DRM EPUB books on my Kindle Fire.

The Kindle Fire does have the Pico text-to-speech (TTS), but it’s not very sophisticated. From my RSKs, I’ve gotten really used to listening to TTS in my car.

Point one:

If Amazon had included a more sophisticated TTS (like Vocalizer, the software they licensed for the Kindle Keyboard and Kindle Touch), I would have been satisfied with my Kindle Fire in the car and wouldn’t have been looking for something else to which to listen.

Point 2:

Amazon hasn’t approved the Zinio magazine reading app in the Amazon Appstore for my Kindle Fire. I got a magazine subscription as a gift that needed Zinio. That’s what broke down my resistance to putting a third party app on my Kindle Fire. I really like how Amazon set that up: they vet and approve Kindle Fire apps in their Appstore, but allow us to install apps from outside sources if we take responsibility for them:

Settings Gear – More – Device – Allow Installation of Applications From Unknown Sources (ON)

If the Zinio app had been approved for my Kindle Fire in the appstore, I might never have installed an app from outside Amazon. I trusted Zinio (a large established company) and they told me their app would work on my Fire. It has, and I’ve been very happy with my subscription.

So, those two things combine in the next step.

I decided to install the Overdrive.com app on my Kindle Fire…so I could borrow MP3 format audiobooks from my public library directly from my Fire. I don’t like audiobooks as well as I like text-to-speech (I know…weirdo) , but I like them better than talk radio.

I switched the setting on my Kindle Fire to allow the installation of an outside device, and went to

http://www.overdrive.com/

on my KF.

I tapped on Get Overdrive Media Console.

I tapped on Android on my right, which then let me tap on “download OverDrive Media Console for Android from OverDrive.”

As usual, my Kindle Fire gave me the notification in my top left corner of the screen that it was downloading something.

When it was finished, I tapped on that and told it to install.

When that was done, I opened it.

Remember, I was doing this to get audiobooks from my public library…because I wasn’t satisfied with the Pico TTS on my Fire.

When it opened up, it told me I could also install the ability to read EPUB.

I knew that DRM EPUB books could be used with OverDrive, but I hadn’t realized it had the ability to decode them.

I did have to get an ID from Adobe. That was easy…no credit card or anything, just identifying myself. It did seem a bit odd that they seemed to think I was doing it for commercial purposes (I was supposed to identify my job title and industry).

Once I had that, I downloaded an EPUB from my public library through the app…it works just fine.

I also got an audiobook, since that was sort of the point. I won’t have any trouble getting through them both in 14 days, I think. My library gives me that (and seven days) as an option…yours may not, that’s up to the library.

This was good to discover, even though I don’t know how much I’ll use the EPUB part. I like to be able to read on my RSKs, and that’s not an option when I do this.

However, I’ve seen a couple of people (including one of my readers, Lisa Brown) noticing lately that there were e-books from Random House in their public library in EPUB format and not in Kindle format. I think they may also be true of Penguin. In the RH case, it’s recently published books, by the way…I don’t know if that’s policy, or if they just need to be converted.

The app has some nice features:

• An audiobook snooze timer
• The ability to return the audiobook when you are done (my library limits the number of items I can have out at one time…your probably does as well)
• Description of the book
• Lookup dictionary (long press the word…hold your finger on it for a bout a second)…although it only works when you are online
• The ability to set the screen timeout up to twenty minutes
• Tap to see book progress…including chapter percentage

A few of those would be nice with the Kindle app on the Fire.

Well, there you go. If you decide to do it, I think you’ll find it easy and it will give you options. Amazon warns you about it…it’s up to you. I do turn off the “applications from unknown sources” choice afterwards.

It’s just interesting to me: if Amazon had TTS on the Fire or if they had approved Zinio for the Fire, I probably would never have done this.

If you try it and have feedback about your experience with it, please feel free to comment on this post.

* A “retronym” is a change to an existing term that happens in response to a later development, to differentiate the old situation from the new one. We didn’t have to call it an “analog watch” before we had digital watches, for example…it was just a watch.

By the way, I took the screenshot from my computer, not my Kindle Fire. The KF doesn’t, as far as I know, do a screenshot without altering it to enable it. I did check to see that it matched, though.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Give Amazon feedback on their new Kindle Fire help tool

Give Amazon feedback on their new Kindle Fire help tool

This is something I like about Amazon.

They are working on a new website that will help people set up and use their Kindle Fires.

While that in and of itself is a good idea, Amazon has actually asked people in the Kindle community for their input on the design and useability of the site.

You can let them know what you think (I’ve been pretty specific) in this

Amazon Kindle community thread

If you just want to look at the site, that’s here:

http://kindle.simplyinteractiveguides.com/fire-guide/

I don’t want to say too much about it, so I don’t prejudice your opinion of it, but I can’t resist pointing out one thing.

They explain one help category by saying, “Covering the basic functionality of your device.”

It’s a great example of being formal when you should be informal to be able to reach more people.

Why use the word “functionality”? Why say “your device” instead of “your Kindle Fire”? I do often say “device”, but that’s when I’m including the Kindle reader apps, so I am talking about a lot of different devices: Blackberrys, iPads, Android phones, Kindles, and so on.

I would write that as “How to use your Kindle Fire”.

I thought it was great when banks fixed that formality issue with ATMs (Automated Teller Machines). I have talked about it when I’ve spoken to people about program design and business writing.

The ATMs used to end with something like “Do you desire another transaction?”

Now, they say “Is there anything else I can do for you?”

That’s much better…you aren’t going to be graded on your thesis, you want people to understand you. That might be people for whom English is a second language, if they are your customers.

You can use most versions of Microsoft Word to check the reading level of something you’ve written. I tell people that for items that are going to be read by the general public, shoot for the fifth grade. Yes, most people read above that level…but there is a large enough segment of people who don’t who can still use and pay for your services that it is worth including them.

Obviously, that’s not true for all writing in all situations. I’m just talking about general business writing, where anybody might be reading it. If your audience is only chemical engineers or Shakespearean scholars, feel free to add a few syllables.

Well, I just thought you might be interested in helping shape the future of…help.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Round up #65: Firestorm #4

Round up #65: Firestorm #4

The ILMK Round ups are short pieces which may or may not be expanded later. The Firestorm designation is to indicate that these will be stories about the Kindle Fire. I am being careful to mix up the stories, so I don’t overwhelm people with one topic. Some of my readers are, understandably, not interested in the Fire (after all, it’s not very like the Kindle I loved when I started this blog)…but there are others that are. I figure by identifying this as a Fire based post, that should help. Not interested in the Fire? Read the previous post…or the next one. 

Paying for 5-star reviews

I’ve recently written about reviews on Amazon and polled my readers about how they use them.

More than 75% of my respondents said that reviews are important to their buying decisions (31.98%) or “I rely on them: I don’t buy without looking at them” (44.16%).

Obviously, there is a lot of motivation to get five-star reviews.

I won’t kid you: I love seeing five-star reviews for my works. I also like seeing lower ranked ones that tell my why…I have learned valuable things from those.

However, I always tell people I want them to write reviews that are honest and specific.

Allegedly, there is at least one entity out there that doesn’t share my love for honesty.

I’m not talking about “sock puppet” reviews, where people connected to the author/publisher of the book write glowing five-star reviews (without disclosing the connection). You know, “Oh, I happened to find this wonderful book! It’s the best book…I’ve ever read! You have to get it! It’s a total coincidence that my kid wrote it.” Of course, you don’t see that last line.

No, according to this

New York Times article

by David Streitfeld, a company rebated people what they paid for their product…if the buyers wrote a review on Amazon.

They didn’t specifically require a five-star review…but did say they really wanted them.

According to the article, when Amazon was informed of this situation, they removed the reviews…which had been overwhelmingly five-star.

The product is a Kindle Fire case, which is why this is in a Firestorm round up.

As a blogger, I’m required to reveal if somebody gave me something when I write a review. I think I’ve always done that, even before I was aware of the rule. It actually complicates things if somebody gives me something…I’d rather just be directed to it, and I’ll buy it if I want. Oh, but Amazon, I’d love to get review copies of Kindles early…I don’t mind returning them, and I’m probably going to buy one any way.

I recommend you read the article…but it might make you mad.

Fire Consumes the Galaxy!

I could not resist that headline.

This is a

Business Insider graph

you have to see.

It shows the shift in share of application usage on Android tabs from November of 2011 to January 2012.

Here is the key statistic:

In November, the Samsung Galaxy Tab was 63% of the app usage tracked by Flurry.

I would certainly have considered a Galaxy if the Fire hadn’t been out there. I’m quite happy with my Samsung Captivate phone.

The Kindle Fire was out for about ten days in November.

In January (which isn’t over yet, of course), the Galaxy had dropped from 63% to 36% (a drop of 27% of the share).

Where did it go?

The Fire in November was 3%…in January, it was 36% (the same as the Galaxy tab).

Found it!

Obviously, there was a bit more shuffling, but I think that’s the main shift. No other tab had much of the Android market at that point.

Android takes ten percent of the tablet market from the iPad

Clearly, the Fire was part of this.

Comparing Q4 (fourth quarter) share of the market from 2010 to 2011, iOS (the iPads) went from a 68.2% share of the global tablet market to a 57.6% (dropping 10.6%) while Android tablets went from 29.0% to 39.1%.

Does that mean that Android will have more than half of the market by the end of 2012?

Not necessarily.

If Apple releases an iPad 3 (which seems likely), that will be a flush of sales for iOS.

On the other hand, I expect Amazon to release more than one new Android tablet this year…that could really pump up Android.

Failure of other Android models, though, could weaken Android’s share.

We’ll keep an eye on it, but certainly, the iPad isn’t the dominant power it was at this point.

Strategy Analytics press release

Microsoft releases free Hotmail app for the Kindle Fire

I like the e-mail app on the Kindle Fire, but it does have some limitations. I don’t see an easy way to import my contacts, and you can’t change the text size.

Microsoft has put a free app in the Amazon Appstore specifically for the Kindle Fire:

Hotmail

I don’t know at this point if it addresses the text size issue, but it does let you use your Hotmail contacts.

Hotmail is free, by the way, if you want to sign up for an account to use this:

http://explore.live.com/hotmail-get-started

It has improved over time: it allows for an integrated inbox with other e-mail (including AOL) and using contacts from other services.

Feel free to tell me what you think about any of these stories…

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Round up #64: Firestorm #3

Round up #64: Firestorm #3

Reports blame iPad 3 for cut in Kindle Fire orders…

…but they’re wrong.

One of the fairly reliable sources we have is

Digitimes

It’s an Asian news source, plugged into the supply side of electronics.

They’ve recently reported that orders from Amazon for the Kindle Fire for the first quarter of 2012 are half of what they were in the last quarter of 2011 (going down to about three million):

Digitimes article

Several news sources headlined this story as the cuts being made in front of the rumored iPad 3 launch from Apple.

Chronologically correct, but it would have been a big shock if Amazon didn’t sell twice as many Fires during the holiday season as they did the quarter following.

This doesn’t at all suggest that sales were disappointing, and it’s important to note that the report doesn’t say that Amazon canceled orders…just that they placed fewer orders.

Unfortunately, if it’s unrelated to an iPad 3, it’s also unrelated to a Kindle Fire 2 (whatever it might be called…I like the “Phoenix”, personally). I’m looking forward to the next models (I think there may be at least two in the fairly near future…larger screen option and/or more features ((including cameras for video chat and GPS…and I do think they would be more money).

The Kindle Fire is now part of my life

Honestly, it took much longer for me to embrace the Kindle Fire than it did for me to integrate my Kindle 1 into my life.

In part, I think that’s because there was no question that reading was going to be part of my daily life. The Kindle simply stepped into an existing activity, and  did it better than the technology I had at the time (paperbooks).

The Fire, on the other hand, is having me do new things, or old things in new ways, at new times, and in new places. Not surprisingly, that’s more of an adjustment.

I’ve written before about a “Day in the Life of a Kindleer”.

I thought I’d give you a similar idea about how I use the Kindle Fire.

In the morning, I’m checking my blogs and newsfeeds using the Pulse app. I keep up with Kindle Nation Daily, A Kindle World, iReaderReview and more, all on one page.

I also check my consolidated e-mail using the e-mail app. It’s easier than on a netbook! Writing e-mails would be harder, though, but this lets me deal with the accounts I don’t use very often. It’s mostly just getting rid of things I don’t want.

In the car on the way to work, I’m listening to a free audiobook I downloaded. How I wish this was text-to-speech! Not only would I rather be listening to something I’m currently sight-reading, but unlike most people, I greatly prefer the streaming text-to-speech to the recording of an audiobook. I’m a former actor, and I find it distracting questioning the actor’s choices. On the other hand, I have far greater respect for Lou Diamond Phillips after listening to him read Dead or Alive by Tom Clancy (and Grant Blackwood). It’s very difficult to play tens of characters over the course of many hours. I was impressed with him being able to do different voices with Arabic accents, and Russian accents. He did reasonably well with female characters, not making them into cartoons or trying too hard. I was amused that the accent with which he seemed to have the most difficulty was…British. Many Americans find that relatively easy. Still, it’s better than talk radio. I’m still holding out hope for text-to-speech on the Fire this year.

At work, I may use it for documents I’ve put on there…I teach, so I may have curricula on it, for example. However, I also spend a lot of time in clinics walking around helping people. I use the Kindle Fire there to take notes about who I helped with what. I do it in ColorNote Notepad Notes.

At lunch, I’m reading. It might be a book, but it might also be a magazine. My Significant Other (SO) got me Fortean Times for our anniversary. That’s not available in the Kindle store, so we got it from Zinio.com. Unfortunately, the Zinio reader is not currently approved for the Kindle Fire (or at least, it ‘s not in the Amazon Appstore for the Fire…Zinio says it has been approved). So, for the first time, I did install a third-party app on  my Fire.

I must say, that was a snap! I really like that Amazon sets it up in such a way that you can stay with the apps that they’ve tested (by getting them from the Amazon appstore), or install apps from “unknown sources’. They do warn you, properly in my opinion, that you are responsible for whatever those outside apps might do to the Fire.

To install that outside app, you just have to do

Settings Gear – More – Device, Allow Installation of Apps from Unknown Sources

I did that, followed Zinio’s instructions to install it, then turned that setting back off. I was curious if that would prevent it from working, but it didn’t. Turn the setting on, install an app, and you can turn it back off.

The Zinio app works pretty well, by the way. It remembers where I was in the magazine (the Kindle store magazines haven’t been doing that). I do end up doing “pan and scan” (sliding around the screen like a camera panning, since not enough words fit on the screen at once), because I have to increase the size of the text to read it comfortably. I can get about a column in there at a time comfortably, not the full page. Still, that’s easy enough.

I also have a subscription for National Geographic Magazine, which looks great. I read it in the “text mode”, rather than having it simulate the print edition. It still has those famous pictures that way. For $1.99 a month, I think it’s a great deal…the same as many blogs in the Kindle store, by the way.

The other magazine I’ve read regularly on it has been Entertainment Weekly: I get a Fire edition free with my print subscription.

I had tried the Wired app…since I couldn’t increase the text size, it didn’t work for me, unfortunately.

When I’m home at night or on the weekend, I may use the Fire for video. For example, the other day, I had one of the political debates going on my Fire while I was working on a netbook. The YouTube recording looked just fine. I use this case

Elsse (TM) Premium Folio Case for Kindle Fire Cover – Black (Extreme Value Buy)

and it holds it at a good angle for viewing. Why wasn’t I watching it on the TV? I had forgotten to record it, and I couldn’t find it on demand. Watching it on YouTube on my Fire worked very well for me.

Those are my main uses for the Fire. My Significant Other uses it many nights to play apps, I think mostly

• Angry Birds (Ad-Free)
• Dabble HD – The Fast Thinking Word Game, Tablet Edition
• TETRIS

Those are our typical uses…it’s enough to make it so a day would seem abnormal without the Fire in it.

How do you use your Kindle Fire poll results?

But enough about me.

Not too long ago, I polled my readers about how often they use the various features of the Kindle Fire.

I don’t cut off the polls so the results are never final, but what I have so far is interesting!

Here are the features in order of most ranked as being used regularly:

1. Apps 66.01%
2. The Web 61.81%
3. Books 47.33%
4. Video 19.68%
5. The Newsstand 16.84%
6. Music 8.08%
7. Docs 6.07%

Here are the rankings for the least used features, based on the percentage of respondents choosing “Never”:

1. Docs 49.39%
2. The Newsstand 42.46%
3. Music 34.62%
4. Video 14.46%
5. Books 5.32%
6. Apps 2.77%
7. Web 1.97%

So, almost everybody uses the web on a Fire, although people use apps more regularly. Even the least used feature (Docs) is used by more than half the people.

For more details, see the post I linked. Thanks to everyone who took the poll(s)!

RBC Capital analyst: Kindle Fire more profitable than expected

According to this

Forbes Article

and many other sources, Russ Sandler, an analyst for RBC Capital, has come up with some figures for how a Kindle Fire profits Amazon.

There was a lot of reporting that they cost more to make than Amazon gets when they sell one. The idea was that they’d make it up on sales of content.

Well, the article certainly seems to indicate that is the case. I haven’t seen the full analysis (it may not be available for free), but the Forbes article has some interesting figures on purchases related to the Fire. Just to give you one, he Sandler estimates (based on surveys) that people buy five e-books a quarter. At about $10 ASP (Average Sales Price) (their estimate, not mine), that would be about $15 in revenue for books under the Agency model (Amazon gets 30% of the revenue under that system).

The Forbes article doesn’t mention the sale of Kindle Fire accessories, like covers, and it doesn’t mention new Prime converts. It will take a while before we see the impact of that, but I think that Amazon thinks that’s the real money maker with the Fire…enticing people to become Prime members by letting them borrow books and watch free streaming videos. Prime is to get you to buy physical goods with the free shipping, which is where the profit really is in e-tailing, I think. As I like to say, “it’s about diapers and windshield wipers.”

Feel free to comment on any of these stories. I’m particularly interested in other ways you might use your Fire.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.