amazon

Finally -- MacBook tops Amazon's bestselling computer list

Say what you will, but as I've said numerous times on these pages, the MacBook is easily one of the best notebooks in the world. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it's probably one of the best I've ever used.

And while I still have numerous issues with Windows and my utter distrust for a company that can't even release an operating system that's final knows no bounds, I truly believe the average consumer should go out and find themselves a Mac.

Luckily for us, it seems like most people tend to agree. As of this writing, theresults of Amazon's bestseller list shows Apple's 13.3-inch MacBook leads the pack of any and all PCs and computer hardware.

Sure, the results may not mean much to some and saying it has sold the best may not necessarily indicate that Windows PCs are on the slide and Macs are slowly making a trek to the top, but can you remember a time in recent history when a Windows machine wasn't sitting atop a list of bestselling computers?Regardless of how you feel about it, Macs are coming on strong and 2008 could be the year of the Mac.… Read more

Amazon reports its best holiday season ever

Online shopping was more prevalent than ever this holiday season and Amazon was right there to cash in. Today, Amazon issued a press release, with some interesting numbers and facts about its "best season ever."

Their busiest day was December 10th, on which they sold 5.4 million items, that's 62.5 items sold per second. Amazon also shipped items out to over 200 countries this season. Here's some more interesting facts and bestsellers that Amazon shares with us.… Read more

The EC2 Firefox Extension is now Open Source

If you are using or experimenting with the Amazon EC2 services this new extension for Firefox is a great addition, providing management features directly from the browser. The news is that it's now open source and readily available. As we have all seen over the last few years open source is key to distributed innovation.

ElasticFox provides basic Amazon EC2 management features within Mozilla Firefox.

List available AMIs List your running instances Launch new instances of an AMI Manage security groups and launch permissions associated with your instances Use the packaged .xpi file to easily install the plugin in … Read more

Amazon and Google battle over snippets and blurbs?

Nick Carr has a funny, but potentially prescient, post on two apparently competing patents that Amazon ("blurbs") and Google ("snippets") were just granted.

What happens...when Google tries to snippetize a blurb? It could be the defining epistemological debate of out time.

At least it continues to call into question the US Patent and Trademark Office's ability to grok and process the myriad patent applications it receives. I mean, surely someone should have noticed the similarity between snippets and blurbs?

Or not. :-)

Gift guide: What Web addicts want

We bet you know someone who does everything online, from banking to making friends, to kicking back. If you're stuck trying to find great gifts for the constant blogger, video vulture, or online socialite in your life, take a look at this virtual gift guide that shows you get it, and you care.

The looming battle between old economy (Microsoft) and new economy (Google)

For those who have spent years wringing their hands over Microsoft's desktop dominance, have no fear: competition is on its way. It's called Google, and it promises to dramatically shake up the computing market by shifting the battle to the Internet, as an article in The New York Times insightfully states.

We should have seen this coming. The cause of Microsoft's weakness is its overreliance on its strengths, a classic "innovator's dilemma." In other words, Microsoft's fetish for the desktop metaphor threatens to leave it with dominance of yesterday's kingdom just as … Read more

Auctioneers ask for double Kindle's retail price

Auctioneers at eBay were asking for more than double the retail price of Amazon's Kindle e-Reader on Friday.

A check of eBay at 2:45 p.m. PST showed prices for the e-Book reader went as high as $930. TechCrunch reported that a Kindle, which retails for $399, was bid up to $1,500 earlier in the week.

Has Amazon really discovered untapped consumer demand for digital-book readers?

The e-tailer, dabbling in electronics manufacturing for the first time, sold out of Kindles soon after introducing them last month. The device connects to the Web to download books--a feature that … Read more

Amazon opens testing for in-cloud database

Update 2:20 p.m. PST: I added some more details and a reaction.

Amazon.com has begun publicly testing a third element to its online computing services: a database capability called SimpleDB.

The new Web service joins two others the online retailer launched in 2006 that anyone can pay to use: computing horsepower called the Elastic Computing Cloud (EC2) and data storage called Simple Storage Service (S3). SimpleDB works in conjunction with those services, letting customers store, modify, and query data, the company said Friday.

"Amazon SimpleDB provides quick, efficient storage and retrieval of your data to support … Read more

Amazon invests in Bill Me Later. Our advice: Say no now

Amazon has invested in the alternative payment processing company Bill Me Later, a very clever system that makes it easy for consumers to acquire items at online stores without entering an account or credit card number. The system only asks for your birth date and the last four digits of your social security number. From that information it determines if you're an acceptable credit risk, and if you are, it completes the purchase and signs you up for billing and for the plan's credit terms.

Bill Me Later is an extraordinarily easy way to pay for a product … Read more

SFWA's Spider-Man steps down

Last Friday, not long after I posted my comments about the controversy associated with the appointment of Dr. Andrew Burt as chairman of the Copyright Committee at SFWA (the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America), Dr. Burt stepped down. He was replaced by Russell Davis, a member of SFWA's board and a former chairman of SFWA's Electronic Piracy Committee.

The statement by SFWA president Michael Capobianco announcing the change, as well as a statement from Davis explaining his plans for the committee, has been posted on LiveJournal.

It sounds like Davis will be effective in this position, … Read more