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Amazon's Kindle sale brings the Paperwhite back to an all-time low
Amazon's latest Kindle Paperwhite is one of the nicest (and newest) e-readers out there, and you can now pick one up at an all-time low.
Kobo's new entry-level e-reader is the $100 Nia
The Kobo Nia is an entry-level reader with a six-inch, 1,024 x 758 Carta E Ink display (with Kobo’s ComfortLight front lighting), 172 gram weight, 8GB of storage and 1,000 mAh battery that will run for “weeks on end” on a single charge.
Amazon is selling Kindles at Black Friday prices
If you didn't manage to snag a Kindle on Black Friday, you have another chance to buy one at a steep discount. Amazon is currently offering $45 off the newest Kindle Paperwhite ($85) and $30 off the latest Kindle ($60). These are historic lows, and we've only seen the prices drop this much on Black Friday.
AI avatars of Chinese authors could soon narrate audiobooks
The Chinese search engine Sogou isn't stopping at AI news anchors. The company has created "lifelike" avatars of two Chinese authors, and it plans to have them narrate audiobooks in video recordings. According to the BBC, Sogou used AI, text-to-speech technology and video clips from the China Online Literature+ conference to create avatars of authors Yue Guan and Bu Xin Tian Shang Diao Xian Bing.
Google’s success story has a few forgettable chapters
In its 20-year history, Google has given, and Google has taken away. Companies of its size often dabble with new projects to see if the public will take them to their hearts. Sadly, for every Gmail and Maps, there are ten projects that felt the swing of the Mountain View ax. Sometimes these doomed projects have outlived their usefulness, didn't catch on with the public, or just didn't work as they should have. But while everyone celebrates Google's long life, let's spare a moment to remember the ones that didn't make it this far, and what happened next.
Would you pay $1,600 to replace your sheet music with a tablet?
Last year, we told you about the Gvido, a lovely double-screened tablet designed to organize and display sheet music. Created by Japanese company Terrada Music, it allows musicians to turn pages with the tap of a finger. Now, it looks like the Gvido is finally getting ready to ship. It'll be available on September 20th for a measly $1,600.
Credit card readers were hacked at MSG for nearly a year
Knicks fans have it rough. To watch last year's third-worst team, fans got to pay the league's highest ticket prices and drink the priciest beer. To add further insult, Madison Square Garden (MSG) Co. has revealed that their credit card information may have been stolen, too. Thieves tapped the magnetic card readers at merchandise and concession stands at Knicks and Rangers Games, Radio City Music Hall and other MSG locations between November 9th, 2015 and October 24th of this year, the company wrote in a special notice.
Twitter test makes Reader mode the default on iOS
For its latest experiment, Twitter has enabled the Apple-built 'Reader' feature by default inside its iOS app. As the Guardian reports, this meanssome, but not all users are seeing simplified web pages when they click on links contained within tweets. The option, which appeared in the mobile version of Safari back in 2011, removes the formatting found on almost any site, giving you a cleaner, arguably more readable layout. The drawback is that you lose the page's visual identity and sometimes, Safari will make a mess of it, giving you a broken or space-riddled article.
HTC's Vivepaper is a VR magazine stand
HTC has unveiled Vivepaper, an app that lets Vive users check out interactive, VR content from publishers like Conde Nast. After you don the headset and scan a physical AR booklet, you can peruse a virtual magazine and load up 360-degree videos, 3D content, audio and other content. The passthrough "Chaperone" camera enables augmented virtual reality (A-VR), letting you be in the virtual world and touch physical objects (the booklet) at the same time.
Amazon Japan's manga-ready Kindle has 8 times the storage
Amazon Japan has an unusual challenge with the Kindle: it not only has to cater to your typical bookworm, but to a local fondness for image-heavy (and thus storage-intensive) manga books. What it's going to do? Release a special model just for those readers, apparently. The company has introduced a manga version of the Kindle Paperwhite with 32GB of storage, or eight times as much space as the run-of-the-mill 4GB model. You could cram every single volume of Asari-chan, Kochikame and Naruto into this e-reader, Amazon says. On top of that, a 33 percent faster page turning speed promises to keep you engrossed in your comics.
Google Chrome tests out a more personal New Tab page
A recent change to the Chrome Dev build on Android could indicate a new feature coming to the browser soon. Android Police points out that users are seeing a Google Now-powered content list on their devices, and I was able to pull it up easily after installing the test version of the app on my device. Google Reader it isn't, but it does bring the personalized suggestions closer to people who might not open the Search bar as often as their browser.
Amazon's high-end Kindle Oasis is sleek, sharp and pricey
Jeff Bezos probably wasn't pleased to see his surprise spoiled this week, but e-book fans still have reason to get pumped. Amazon just pulled back the curtain on its new premium reader, the Kindle Oasis, and it's the slimmest and sleekest model the company has put out yet. Of course, with a price starting at $290 (£270), it's also one of the most expensive. As Amazon tells it, all the decisions were made with one goal in mind: to let the hardware itself almost disappear from view so that readers can lose themselves in their stories.
Square's new reader arrives to accept mobile payments and chip cards
We've known about Square's new NFC-friendly reader for a while, and now the point-of-sale gadget is available for use. Starting today, 100 merchants in "select cities" (quite a few, actually) will begin accepting NFC-driven payments like Apple Pay, Android Pay, Samsung Pay and those newfangled chip credit/debit cards. The reader is a square pad (of course) separate from the company's usual POS setups and sliding readers, allowing you to hover your phone or insert a card to complete purchase. The unit is wireless and pairs with either a countertop system or Square's free mobile app to handle the transactions. However, the new reader itself will set businesses back $49 in order to get started. For the initial rollout, look for the device at businesses in the following cities: Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, Nashville, New Orleans, New York, Miami, Minneapolis, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Sacramento, San Francisco, Santa Cruz, Seattle, St. Louis Tampa, and Washington, D.C.
Instagram won't let feed-reading apps browse your pics anymore
If you're one of the few still using a third-party app to browse Instagram feeds, you'll need to make other arrangements soon. The photo-sharing app is killing support of the feed API that allows outside apps and websites to pull in your feed as part of a larger effort to clean up its platform. With updates to its Platform Policy, Instagram will only let apps that help users share their photos access your collection of snapshots. For example, software that allows to your print your snapshots or use your Instagram photos as a profile picture will still be supported. Instagram will continue to lend a hand to advertisers and allow images and videos to be used on the web via embeds.
Hacks turn Square's reader into a card-stealing machine (updated)
As helpful as a Square Reader may be for purchases at trendy stores, you'll want to watch out -- in the right circumstances, they can also be used to steal your credit card info. Security researchers have discovered that you can physically disable the encryption the device uses to protect your financial info, turning the Reader into a tiny, portable card skimmer. There's also a way to record the signal created by your card when you swipe its magnetic stripe on an unmodified Reader, which theoretically lets evildoers charge your card without approval.
Pocket invites you to try beta features, starting with recommendations
On the heels of last month's collaboration with Mozilla, Pocket has even more tools for you to try. In fact, the save-it-for-later repository wants you to test new features before they officially arrive in the app or on the web. Pocket's Beta Channel will give you a look at what the company has been working on and the chance to offer feedback. The program is available for Android, iOS and web versions of the software and there's already a new feature to put through its paces. First up for eager testers: recommendations. The tool puts a second feed next to the list of items you've chosen to stash, pulling in "top content from the billions of items saved to Pocket." The app then makes selections for you based on your reading habits so that the chances of you missing something good are drastically reduced. Recommendations is just the first feature that's coming to beta testers, so if you opt in, expect to see more new items soon.
Kindle Paperwhite review (2015): our favorite e-reader gets even better
When Amazon's Kindle Voyage launched last year, I more or less fell in love with it right out of the gate. Sure, a handful of competitors came out with similar displays before Amazon did, but man -- with that high-resolution screen and its sleek new looks, the Voyage was the first Kindle that ever felt really high-end. I didn't stand a chance. Now, thanks to some trickle-down gadget economics, the new Kindle Paperwhite ($119 with ads, $139 without) just got a huge bump in screen resolution too. It was really only a matter of time, but now we're left with a question to ponder: Is a new screen enough to catapult an already-very-good reader into the realm of greatness? Spoiler alert: I think it is.
Google is working on a Chrome reading mode, try it out
Google wants to give your peepers a break. Google Chromium Evangelist Francois Beaufort laid out early versions of Reader Mode for Chrome desktop and mobile in a post today on Google Plus (of course). Reader Mode is designed to make on-screen text easier to absorb, by removing unnecessary pictures, boxes, buttons and ads. Safari has long featured a Reader Mode, and extensions such as Readability offer similar services for Chrome, but now Google is getting into the game itself with these Reader-friendly experiments.
The Daily Grind: Do you read gaming-related novels?
No, not the novels posted in our comments. Actual novels. Literary and pulp fiction! Gamasutra recently ran an article chronicling an author's attempt to publish and market a book aimed squarely at gamers. The writer ran into difficulties, however, because of the publishing industry's insistence that "gamers don't read books." He got his book published, but when marketing fell to him, he couldn't convince gaming outlets to cover it, and even though reviews were positive, sales were poor. Major MMOs like The Elder Scrolls Online, World of Warcraft, Guild Wars 2, and Star Wars: The Old Republic all released lore-oriented novels, but my suspicion is that such books are made to sell games, not to sell books. What do you think -- do you actually buy and read gaming-related novels? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Square's new chip card reader will make your payments more secure
There's a good reason you don't usually see Square readers outside of the US: they're built to read payment cards with magnetic stripes, not the more secure chip-and-PIN cards that are common everywhere else. All that's set to change, however. Square has revealed plans for a reader that accepts the chip-based EMV format alongside stripes, letting shops handle credit and debit cards from around the world (and the US, once it catches up). The company will only start taking pre-orders for the payment device later this year, but it could be worthwhile for stores and customers alike. Besides the greater availability, it's much harder to clone a chip card -- you shouldn't have to worry about an unscrupulous clerk (or a clever hacker) stealing your credit card and going on a shopping spree.