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Amazon Kindle To Get Apps and EA Games

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the in-glorious-greyscale dept.

Lanxon writes "Amazon currently encourages publishers and authors to sell their books and magazines digitally, but the upcoming Kindle Development Kit (KDK), which goes into beta next month, says Wired, will allow software developers to create a variety of different applications. Amazon has already confirmed a Zagat guide for restaurant reviews from Hallmark and a selection of word games and puzzles, such as Sudoku, from Sonic Boom. EA Mobile is also set to release games on the Kindle."The kit itself is expected to be available next month.

33 of 111 comments (clear)

  1. Convergence by djdavetrouble · · Score: 4, Funny

    Can we get on with it already? I have a drawer full of devices.....

    --
    music lover since 1969
    1. Re:Convergence by XxtraLarGe · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Just wait until January 27th. I hope you have about $1000 to drop. Or you could just get an iPhone now.

      --
      Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
    2. Re:Convergence by FatdogHaiku · · Score: 4, Funny

      Wait, it gets better! Next iteration of Kindle will have extra circuitry, a microphone and speaker so you can... MAKE PHONE CALLS!!!

      Oh to be alive in such an age of wonders..

      --
      You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
  2. No "generic readers"? by argent · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Voice over IP functionality, advertising, offensive materials, collection of customer information without express customer knowledge and consent, or usage of the Amazon or Kindle brand in any way are not allowed. In addition, active content must meet all Amazon technical requirements, not be a generic reader, and not contain malicious code.

    So if you want to add support for a file format the Kindle doesn't currently support you're out of luck?

    1. Re:No "generic readers"? by fermion · · Score: 2, Insightful
      It pretty much sounds like the Apple iPhone limitations. They won't allow something that simply duplicates the functionality of the Kindle, which is a generic reader. Apps have to do something more.

      I also see offensive material, which again is the iPhone catchall for 'if we don't like, it won't be on the device.' I wonder if they are going to be as liberal in the active content evaluation as they are for books.

      --
      "She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
  3. games? by rhainman · · Score: 4, Funny

    With the refresh rate of the Kindle, and FPS will involve you shooting at the place where the bad guy was 5 seconds before.

    1. Re:games? by happy_place · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I'm hoping the first game is entitled "DRM Busters".

      --
      http://www.beanleafpress.com
    2. Re:games? by Deag · · Score: 3, Informative

      I agree any app that has any sort of interactivity will be sluggish. It does sequential reading well

      The refresh rate on current models will really limit this. Might be ok for crossword puzzles and sudoku.

      Although the current way it allows books to be read is fairly limited, (table of contents, basic search) the article mentioned more interactive books, such as cookbooks. And this might be where it will be useful.

    3. Re:games? by aicrules · · Score: 5, Funny

      Kindle's version will be a turn-based FPS.

  4. One step closer to jailbreak by goldaryn · · Score: 4, Informative

    People can already SSH into their Kindles. If I were Amazon, I would be worried about this kind of support making jailbreaks more attractive, possibly putting a nail into the coffin of their future ebook sales.

    1. Re:One step closer to jailbreak by Ephemeriis · · Score: 4, Insightful

      People can already SSH into their Kindles. If I were Amazon, I would be worried about this kind of support making jailbreaks more attractive, possibly putting a nail into the coffin of their future ebook sales.

      Actually... I think that opening the platform up (be it intentionally, or by jailbreaking) will eventually be what makes ereaders a real, viable alternative to printed books.

      Right now, if you get a Kindle you're largely stuck buying your books from Amazon. You can't just go to any ebook retailer and pick up whatever you want.

      Right now, if you get a nook you're largely stuck buying your books from Barnes & Noble. You can't just go to any ebook retailer and pick up whatever you want.

      If they can open up the platform (either with a jailbreak, or an official update, or an app, or whatever) then you'll be able to buy your ebooks wherever you want. Amazon will lose it's vendor lock-in... But they'll pick up sales from folks with nooks and Sonys and whatever else.

      --
      "Work is the curse of the drinking classes." -Oscar Wilde
    2. Re:One step closer to jailbreak by donovansmith · · Score: 4, Informative

      Right now, if you get a nook you're largely stuck buying your books from Barnes & Noble. You can't just go to any ebook retailer and pick up whatever you want.

      Actually, since the Nook supports Adobe Digital Editions you can go to any store that uses ADE to purchase books. The Sony Reader Store and BooksOnBoard I believe are two of the larger ones. Also, it allows you to check out ebooks from libraries that use the Overdrive system. The Nook also supports the eReader PDB format and DRM scheme, which opens up the eReader and Fictionwise stores. The Nook probably has the broadest DRM format support of any ebook reader out right now.

      If they can open up the platform (either with a jailbreak, or an official update, or an app, or whatever) then you'll be able to buy your ebooks wherever you want. Amazon will lose it's vendor lock-in... But they'll pick up sales from folks with nooks and Sonys and whatever else.

      The problem is that each major ebook manufacturer is using both a different format and different DRM scheme for their books. Kindle uses either Mobipocket DRM files or their own Topaz format. The Nook appears to use the old eReader/Peanut Press DRM scheme with the EPUB file format. Sony uses the closest thing to a standard in DRM'd ebooks: Adobe Digital Editions protected EPUB. So neither the Nook nor the Sony Readers can use files purchased from the Kindle store and that won't change unless Amazon licenses their software to other companies, which I doubt will happen.

    3. Re:One step closer to jailbreak by Ephemeriis · · Score: 2, Informative

      But the specs say that the Nook supports any eReader (FKA Palm eReader) file, and any ePub file (even with Adobe's DRM).

      I have a nook.

      It handles EPUB files just fine - most of my library is in EPUB format.

      But it doesn't read Kindle format. So, while you've got some more options... You still can't go out and buy your ebooks from any place you want.

      --
      "Work is the curse of the drinking classes." -Oscar Wilde
    4. Re:One step closer to jailbreak by Ephemeriis · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Hopefully it will be the Nooks & Sonys and whatever else which bury the Kindle, or at least see Amazon open up the device. Proprietary as most other devices are in some respect, it seems that they have rallied around EPUB + optional Adobe DRM. If DRM has to exist at least it should be device and vendor neutral.

      My nook can certainly handle EPUB stuff just fine... And Barnes & Noble claims they're going to move their entire library over to EPUB eventually... But I don't know how open and friendly the Barnes & Noble store actually is. EPUB lets you embed whatever DRM you might want. I don't know that a B&N DRMed EPUB would actually work on anything besides a nook.

      The fly in the ointment is Apple and what they intend to do. They're not exactly known for embracing standards except as a bait and switch for their own proprietary ones, so they may well support EPUB, but not the DRM everyone else is gravitating around. After all, that would let their users buy their books from anywhere and Apple simply can't allow that.

      Apple has enough market penetration that they might just be able to force a kind of "lowest common denominator" as standard... Like it did with MP3s.

      Everyone was playing around with their own weird DRM and file formats and everything... And then iTunes came along. And while Apple does do their own DRM thing, and their own file format, it's very easy to convert them to MP3. And everyone else got scared. You couldn't very well release your songs in a format that wouldn't work with iTunes and iPods, because they were everywhere. So you either dumped your stuff into iTunes, or you released it in some way that converted to MP3 without too much trouble.

      --
      "Work is the curse of the drinking classes." -Oscar Wilde
    5. Re:One step closer to jailbreak by cdrguru · · Score: 2, Informative

      There is nothing to prevent you from putting non-Amazon content on a Kindle already. The device is completely "open" as far as that is concerned.

      You can even (gasp!) download books using the Amazon-provided wireless connection from places like manybooks.net for free. At least half of the books on my Kindle have been either downloaded free from non-Amazon sites or placed on the device through the USB connection.

      People that think the Kindle is somehow locked down for Amazon only have been reading some conspiracy theory web site rather than getting an uncomfortable dose of reality.

      The latest Kindle software now supports some PDF documents (not all of them) but the viewing is so incredibly difficult that nobody is going to want to do it unless they absolutely have to. Not that this is any big surprise. PDF is a page-description language and if you aren't displaying on a screen big enough to hold a page you are pretty much out of luck. The Kindle (rightfully) doesn't scroll around a zoomed page view - they just let you rotate the screen to get a "landscape" width of the page rather than the standard "portrait" view. It works, but it isn't great. And it can't be great with PDF unless the PDF was originally designed for a reader device. Which is what other PDF-displaying Adobe based devices are counting on as well.

      No, I do not believe the Kindle supports locked-down Adobe content.

  5. EA games on the Kindle? by alen · · Score: 2, Funny

    Madden 2011 in black and white? is it 3d accelerated like on the iphone?

    1. Re:EA games on the Kindle? by clickclickdrone · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Madden would be ideal - no action for a few mins then it all happens real fast then nothing again for a bit. Just get the user to enter the moves/plan, show the end result every couple of minutes, jobs done.

      --
      I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
  6. Wait, what? by Drethon · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the kindle (and E Ink in general) most efficient as displaying the same thing? Why would I want something with a frame rate killing my kindle battery?

    Just my bent $0.02

    1. Re:Wait, what? by Nimey · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The designers will have to keep the display in mind - for example, a Solitaire game would only refresh after you make a move, and same for Sudoku.

      Tetris would probably be right out, though.

      --
      Hail Eris, full of mischief...

      E pluribus sanguinem
    2. Re:Wait, what? by Brandee07 · · Score: 2, Informative

      Zagat guides are already available on the Kindle, so I presume they're looking to update the book content. I really can't see what else they'd want to do.

      As you say, games are going to be pretty basic. The Kindle already has minesweeper, and that pushes it's abilities.

      Developers are in for a major challenge, and many of them are likely going to decide, and rightly so, that the Kindle isn't the right platform for them.

  7. Interesting timing by nscheffey · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Wonder if it has anything to do with this?

  8. Interesting, but I'm skeptical by Brandee07 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm excited about the possibilities, but worried that some developers will port their apps to Kindle because they can, without considering if it's a good match for Kindle. The Kindle really is a content consumption platform, not a content creation platform (you read, not write, on it). I can see a Twitter client working, however, since 140 characters is about the most I'd ever want to type on a Kindle keyboard. I think Amazon is conscious of this, as they are avoiding the term "app" in favor of "active content."

    In any case, the Kindle's very slow refresh rate poses UI challenges that haven't really been faced before. I'm interested to see how developers contend with it. Another possible issue is battery life. The Kindle's battery is actually very, very small. The reason it lasts so long is that only page turns draw current, and even then only a small amount of current, and then you have to read a whole page before you draw current again. If you're refreshing every three seconds instead of every two minutes, you're going to see a serious drop in battery life, especially if the apps expect wireless connectivity. My two week Kindle battery could drop to two days easily.

    The Kindle for me is still just for reading. While it CAN do email and web browsing and minesweeper, I use my iPhone for all those things. And while my iPhone CAN read my Kindle books, I use my Kindle for that. Reading is so central a part of my life that I'm not willing to sacrifice the quality of the experience on a convergence device- especially one that will start ringing or flash push notifications in the middle of a very suspenseful book.

    But really, the whole thing reeks of Apple envy. This and the royalties change tells me that they feel VERY threatened by the Apple tablet.

    1. Re:Interesting, but I'm skeptical by Brandee07 · · Score: 2, Informative

      Because it didn't make it to /. but is relevant: Amazon's Press Release about Royalty Hikes from yesterday.

      Matching Apple's 70% royalties is another major sign of Amazon's Apple envy- but also a strong financial incentive for authors and publishers to be "well behaved" when pricing their Kindle books, as in keep prices lower than paper, offer TTS, etc.

  9. Re:Text adventures by argent · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Would a Z-code interpreter count as a "generic reader" do you suppose?

  10. Re:Apple Competition by mdwh2 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Yes, no handheld device ever ran applications before the Apple "Islate" came along. This vaporware is so good, it can travel back in time, and beat all the phones that were doing it 5+ years ago...

    Really though, the whole of the last decade has been a continual trend of convergence (and even that word was a buzzword for years in the '90s).

    And even if you mean in the sense of people making up claims that the "Islate" will be a colour e-reader, there are already models out there doing that (e.g., the Fujitsu Flepia, released last year). By that, I mean ones actually released, not "rumuoured".

  11. Ob Colossal Cave by djdavetrouble · · Score: 2, Funny

    You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.

    --
    music lover since 1969
  12. With Kindle you can read Txt files - Nook -Epubs by gadlaw · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Having both platforms I 'get around' the buy only from Amazon for the Kindle and only buy from Barnes and Noble for the Nook by the fact that the Kindle reads and displays Txt files, reading some Larry Niven right now for the tenth time on my Kindle via a txt file book. (gotta love the Moties books). I can open up the Calibre software and change txt files to epub files that work on the Nook or visa versa. It's all good, neither one is actually locked down when you have Calibre.

    --
    Enjoy your Karma, after all you earned it. Feel your Karma Joe, feel it burn.
  13. You're Wrong by MozeeToby · · Score: 2, Informative

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_kindle#Content_sources

    1. Re:You're Wrong by Ephemeriis · · Score: 3, Informative

      You're Wrong

      No I'm not.

      I said "if you get a Kindle you're largely stuck buying your books from Amazon."

      Look at that link you provided.

      Project Gutenberg is free public domain books... FreeKindleBooks is just the Gutenberg stuff reformatted for Kindle. PDFBooks is the Gutenberg stuff in PDF for the Kindle. World Public Library is just that - a library. The disclaimer on Mobipocket indicates that only demos and free books can be read on the Kindle. ManyBooks is again the Gutenberg stuff. Munseys is more free stuff. MobileRead is free out-of-copyright books. Zinepal is just RSS converted to Kindle.

      So, of that list you provided... You can buy your books from Amazon (380,000 titles) or Fictionwise (no indication of how many titles are available) or Webscriptions (1,000 titles) or Feedbooks (4,000 titles) or Christian Classics Ethereal Library (no indication of how many titles are available).

      Which means that by far the largest retailer of Kindle ebooks is Amazon. You'll notice that there's no mention of any other big-name book retailers on that page, because the Kindle can't read ebooks from Barnes & Noble, nor can it read ebooks from Borders. So, if you've got a Kindle, you're largely stuck buying your ebooks from them.

      Sure, if I just want a copy of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea I've got plenty of choices. I can download it for free from any number of places.

      But if I want to purchase a copy of a new book like Under the Dome, I have to buy it from Amazon.

      --
      "Work is the curse of the drinking classes." -Oscar Wilde
  14. What about opening the Java application? by Giordano · · Score: 2, Informative

    One thing that is an absolute pain is that the Kindle has no folder management, and as such, no way to organize the books that are downloaded. Sure, it'll hold 3000 e-books, but try paging through the list. And the startup time is proportional to the length of the list.

    Opening up the e-book application interface would go a long way to getting features that Amazon seems disinclined to provide themselves.

  15. Simple apps, but this could be good. by bhartman34 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I see EA Games maybe releasing Scrabble, but I think the big draw for the development kit will be things like notes applications, calendars, and the like. Hopefully a decent e-mail client, too (although I wonder how much they'll allow with the Internet connection, since they're currently footing the bill for Internet charges on the cell radio).

  16. I Don't Believe It by ideonexus · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Let me get this straight. My Kindle doesn't have the functionality to store my library in categories, meaning I have to hack in metatags on all my ebooks using the note-taking feature and search that if I wan't find just my books on Computer Science or Science Fiction, the recent upgrade to my Kindle allows me to view PDF files, but not zoom in on their page content, meaning I still can't read PDF's on it unless I pack a magnifying glass, and I have no way of exporting the personal notes I take on it to a text file or other non-kindle-readable format.

    I don't mind these shortcomings, because the whole point of my Kindle is not having to reading books on my cellphone or computer monitor, but now I'm supposed to believe I will soon be getting games on this device currently lacking so many basic features? I'm not drinking this kool aide.

    --
    i ~ Celebrating Science, Cyberspace, Speculation
  17. Re:Language? by pcosta · · Score: 3, Informative

    The Kindle application framework is Java based. You write "booklets" that work like Java applets. Under the hood the Kindle runs a Linux kernel, so in theory you could just write native C apps, but I doubt Amazon will give developers access to that.
    Some more info about hacking your Kindle:

    http://igorsk.blogspot.com/2007/12/hacking-kindle-part-3-root-shell-and.html