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Amazon FreeTime is now called Amazon Kids
FreeTime Unlimited has been renamed Amazon Kids+ too.
Amazon is discounting Echo and Fire devices for Black Friday
You're probably familiar with the 12 days of Christmas, but how about the seven days of Black Friday? Amazon is getting the savings started early by cutting the prices on its own devices starting November 16th. The sale will run through Black Friday, November 23rd, and features some pretty steep discounts on Amazon's line of smart speakers, tablets and other devices.
Osmo's coding kits for kids come to Amazon Fire tablets
More than two years since its launch as an iOS exclusive, Osmo's kids' learning system is finally coming to Android by way of Amazon's Fire tablets. For the uninitiated, the kits use reflective AI tech, fitted to your slate's camera, to integrate physical objects into a digital environment. Using Lego-style blocks, tiles, and good ol' pen and paper, children can interact with the onscreen characters to complete objectives in an open-ended world. The more creative you get in the real-world, the bigger the digital rewards.
Twitter comes to the Xbox One, Apple and Amazon TV boxes
Much like Shia LaBoeuf declaring that he isn't famous anymore, Twitter is now out and proud about not being a social network. No, instead, Twitter is now a broadcasting platform, which means that it needs to put itself in the sort of places you use to watch TV. That's why the company has announced that it's launching apps for Apple TV, Amazon's Fire TV and Microsoft's Xbox One. It'll be on these that you can watch some of the new video content that's coming to the service, including Thursday Night Football.
PayPal is killing its Windows Phone, BlackBerry and Amazon apps
On June 30th, PayPal is forcing all its Android and iOS users to update their apps to version 6 if they haven't yet. Notice how Windows Phone, BlackBerry and Android Fire users aren't included in that list? That's because the company is killing its apps for those platforms on the same day. PayPal didn't explain why it decided on shutting down its non-Android and non-iOS applications. In her announcement post, PayPal VP Joanna Lambert only mentioned that everyone can still access the mobile website and that it's still possible to send P2P payments via BBM or to send money from their inbox on Outlook.
Amazon's 7-inch Fire tablet discounted to £40 in the UK
Amazon's newest 7-inch Fire is all the tablet most people need, which is why it's such incredibly good value for money at only £50. Or it was, anyway, before Amazon decided it wasn't quite cheap enough. As of today, you can pick up the entry-level slate for just £40, or £48 if you absolutely can't bear the lock screen adverts.
Amazon makes it easier to read its Fire tablets at night
Soon you'll be able to fall asleep with Amazon's Fire tablets and still get a restful night's sleep. Starting today, Amazon is rolling out a new "Blue Shade" feature that turns down blue light on its tablets' screens, making them more comfortable to read at night. And honestly, it's about time. Scientists have been saying for some time that the blue light emitted by our devices' screens wreaks havoc on our sleep habits (some are calling for similar night modes for phones). It's for that same reason that I can't even use a computer these days without installing something like Flux, which warms up screen colors at night. Amazon says you'll be able to tweak Blue Shade's color settings as you see fit, and it also lets you read at an "ultra-low" brightness level.
Amazon Fire review: $50 of incredible value
With every passing year, Amazon finds ways to upgrade its Kindle e-readers and Fire tablets while also lowering the cost of entry. The company's Fire HD 6, launched last October, broke the sub-$100 barrier, and yet it now looks relatively expensive in comparison with the new entry-level Fire. At $50, it's pretty much the cheapest tablet money can buy, but don't let that price fool you. Compromises have been made in the race to the bottom, of course, but the pessimistic idiom "you get what you pay for" doesn't really apply here. The new Fire might only be the cost of a night out, but what you're getting in return is a perfectly capable device that sets a benchmark for budget slates.
Amazon to release a $50 tablet this year, WSJ says
Amazon is launching a new 6-inch tablet in time for the holidays, according to The Wall Street Journal, and its main selling point will apparently be its rock-bottom pricing: $50. The company's Fire HD 6 tablet costs twice as much with advertisements, so one has to wonder what its specs list will look like. It's worth noting that Amazon was forced to price its current Kindle and Fire tablet models higher than $50 -- Bezos' target retail price for them -- due to the cost of their components. That said, the device could be meant for people who want sort of a throwaway tablet for simple tasks like looking up recipes in the kitchen or for online shopping. After all, tablets at that price point typically have low-res screens, small storage spaces or poor battery life.
The Fire phone is Amazon's ultimate hardware weapon
Amazon's first phone is finally here. But what makes it such a curious little device isn't all that (lackluster) 3D, head-tracking stuff; it's Firefly, the company's new visual search engine. Amazon may have been born unto the internet as a modest bookseller, but it's now become a services company: There's the Kindle Lending Library for e-books, plus streaming services like Amazon Instant Video and Prime Music. Amazon's also a hardware maker. And this time, the company's made something that lets you text mom and use a powerful image-based search system to shop Amazon.com with one touch. It's the Fire phone, and it feels like the inevitable marriage of Amazon's device and services initiative.
Watch Jeff Bezos unveil Amazon's new Fire phone (video)
Amazon didn't provide a live stream for its festivities earlier today, but if you'd like to relive the unveiling of its first smartphone, now you can. The nearly 1 and a half hour Fire phone event video has been posted to YouTube and we've included it after the break. Don't have that time to watch Jeff Bezos explain why you'll slip this universal buying tool into your pocket? Check out all the info and our first hands-on impressions first.
Amazon's Fire phone will come with free, unlimited cloud storage for photos
Amazon just announced the much-anticipated Fire phone, and along with some solid display and camera specs, the handset offers unlimited photo storage via Cloud Drive. In an on-stage comparison with the Samsung Galaxy S5 and the iPhone 5s, the Fire's 13-megapixel rear-facing camera looked pretty capable -- especially with low-light performance -- and Amazon clearly thinks you'll be snapping up plenty of pictures. Free, unlimited photo storage definitely sets Amazon apart from Dropbox, Apple's iCloud and Microsoft's OneDrive, among other services, though Google also offers unlimited storage. Follow our liveblog for more news from the event in Seattle.
Amazon announces the Fire, its first-ever smartphone
Yep, it's a phone alright. Amazon officially unveiled the Fire today at a special press event held in Seattle. Consistent with the rumors, Amazon's first-ever handset has a 4.7-inch Gorilla Glass display with an HD-resolution screen (720p). That makes it the same size as the Moto X, which was also supposed to be a phone for the masses. It also has a rubberized frame with aluminum buttons, a quad-core 2.2GHz processor, Adreno 330 GPU and 2GB of RAM. As for the camera, there's a 13-megapixel rear-facing one equipped with an f/2.0 lens and optical image stabilization and the ability to capture 1080p video. The phone's display will have 590 nits of brightness, dynamic image contrast and a "circular polarizer," which will likely be used to combat glare. There's also a dedicated camera key and, luckily for all you amateur photogs, it'll come with free unlimited cloud storage for photos as well. Other features include global LTE and connectivity with nine bands of LTE, quad-band GSM, five bands of UMTS, 802.11ac support, WiFi channel bonding, NFC and Bluetooth. It even supposedly has great battery life, promising nearly 285 hours of standby time, 22 hours of talk time, 65 hours of audio and 11 hours of video playback. It'll be available exclusively from AT&T for $199 if you want the 32GB version, or $299 if you prefer the 64GB. Alternately, you can get the 32GB version for as little as $27 a month or the 64GB for around $31 a month if you opt for AT&T's Next program. If you'd rather go off-contract instead, you can get the phone directly from Amazon for $649 for 32GB and $749 for 64GB.
