books

An Amazon Prime report card: Is it really worth $79 per year?

I've been an Amazon Prime customer for nearly a year now, meaning it's time for me to decide whether to continue subscribing to the program.

In case you're unfamiliar with it, Prime works like this: For $79 annually, you get unlimited movie and TV streaming, one free borrowed e-book per month, and automatic two-day shipping on nearly everything you buy (with no minimum dollar amount).

Awesome deal, right? Maybe, and maybe not.

Let's start with the streaming. Amazon has vastly expanded its movie- and TV-show libraries over the past year, to the point where I'd … Read more

Apple cuts MacBook Pro Retina prices, bumps specs

Apple today dropped the prices in its line of MacBook Pro laptops with Retina display while boosting processor speeds.

The 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina now starts $1,499, or $200 less than before. The higher-capacity 256GB version costs $1,699, or $300 cheaper than the original price. The processor clock speed also gets boosted to 2.6 gigahertz from 2.5GHz.

The 15-inch MacBook Pro with Retina gets a speed boost, with the lower-end version getting its clock speed bumped up to 2.4GHz from 2.3GHz, and the higher-end version getting bumped up to 2.7GHz quad-core processor … Read more

The Hunger Games Adventures for iOS: Playtime in Panem

Can't get enough Katniss Everdeen? The next movie, "Catching Fire," won't hit theaters until November, but you don't have to wait until then to return to Panem.

The Hunger Games Adventures takes you there, after a fashion, challenging you to explore, battle, and, well, make money. It's kind of a quest-oriented FarmVille, and in fact the game originated on Facebook.

If that's not your thing, or you prefer more action, check out Hunger Games: Girl on Fire. It's an endless runner that's all about running, jumping, and shooting.

Here, you need … Read more

Macmillan reaches e-book pricing settlement with DOJ

The U.S. Department of Justice has reached a settlement with Macmillan in an antitrust case related to e-book pricing, leaving only Apple to battle the suit.

In an antitrust lawsuit filed last April, federal prosecutors accused Apple and five book publishers of conspiring to artificially hike prices. The same day, the Justice Department announced it had reached settlements with three publishers but said Apple and the other two publishers had opted to fight the charges. Lagardere SCA's Hachette Book Group, News Corp.'s HarperCollins Publishers, and Simon & Schuster (owned by CBS, which publishes CNET) agreed to settle. … Read more

Get a Kobo Mini e-reader for $59.99

Tablets are great and all, but if you're mostly into reading, it's hard to beat an e-reader. Eye-friendly screens, ultra-light designs, amazing battery life -- the perks go on and on.

And let's not forget price. Amazon's entry-level Kindle is now down to $69. But here's an even more wallet-friendly option: Best Buy has the Kobo Mini e-reader for $59.99 shipped (plus sales tax). That's for the white model; the black one literally sold out while I was writing this post.

So that's only a $10 difference, right? And when you factor … Read more

Amazon patents way for you to sell your digital items

Online consumers may one day be able to sell or trade their digital items to other users, at least if a new Amazon patent comes to fruition.

Granted to the retail giant on January 29, the patent dubbed "Secondary market for digital objects" describes an electronic marketplace for swapping digital items.

You'd start off by housing your purchased music, videos, apps, and e-books in your own online storage space, just as many of us do today. When you get tired of listening to the same songs or reading the same books, you can move those items to … Read more

Apple promoting iBooks Author books in iTunes

A little more than a year after introducing its self-publishing book software, Apple is heavily promoting some works that were made using it.

The company today began promoting some of those titles in a new section called "Breakout Books" which rounds up books that have high user ratings. That spans across three genres: romance; sci-fi and fantasy; and mysteries and thrillers, along with a collection of other titles.

The promotion, spotted by The New York Times, comes just days ahead of when Inkling, which was founded by former Apple executive Matt MacInnis, plans to hold an event in … Read more

The 404 1,201: Where REL comes out of the dungeon (podcast)

Leaked from today's 404 episode:

- Google Glass to use bone conduction instead of traditional headphones.

- Google searches expose racial bias, says study of names.

- Vampire Weekend announces new album details in the NY Times Classifieds section.… Read more

Rarefied Retina MacBook Pros get priced closer to earth

MacBook Pros equipped with a Retina display are not exactly priced to move. Best Buy and Amazon are trying to change that.

Best Buy, for example, is now selling the 128GB version (model MC975LL/A) of the 13.3-inch MacBook Pro Retina for $1,549.99, $150 off the regular $1,699.99 price.

Need 256GB of solid-state storage with that gorgeous Retina screen? That model (MD213LL/A) is now $1,799.99, $200 off the regular price of $1,999.99.

The pricier 15.4-inch models with 256GB and 512GB solid-state drives (MC975LL/A and MC976LL/A, respectively), also … Read more

Henge Docks offers quick and cheap MacBook docking options

If you have a laptop system, you might be familiar with the frustrations that can be involved with using it in a desktop environment where you might need to clear a space on your desk to set it up, or have it sit awkwardly to the side while you connect a keyboard, mouse, an adapter for an external display, and other peripherals.

There are several options available to help in these situations, with one that I recently outlined being the new Thunderbolt docking solutions that are beginning to enter the market. While these options reduce the number of cables to … Read more