An Open Book: Amazon Upgrades Kindle iPhone App
The update comes 10 days after Amazon unveiled a Kindle Store optimized for Safari browsers on the Apple devices. Kindle 1.1 seems a direct response to criticism that reading Kindle books without the dedicated Kindle device is a less agreeable experience, as the Kindle app now allows readers to switch the view from portrait to landscape, lock the view in either of those orientations, and change the background and text colors to have more options than black text on a white background. Kindle for iPhone users can now read using gray text on a black background, or in different shades of sepia.
Amazon's continued optimization of its Kindle platform for iPhone, which began March 4 with the first release of the app, says a lot about how it views Apple and what it considers its long-term strategy in the e-books market.
A potential new Apple device that can do e-reading as well as a Kindle, combined with a number of other features, could damage the long-term viability of the Kindle or any dedicated e-reading device. But in continuing to tweak and update Kindle's exposure on the iPhone, iPod Touch and other devices, Amazon seems to tacitly acknowledge this eventual market shift—the priority, it appears, is making Kindle synonymous with e-books and e-reading, whether the device itself, or its larger brother, the Kindle DX, stick around or not.
Amazon likely bought Lexcycle, the maker of super-popular e-reading application Stanza for iPhone, for much the same reason: making sure all its bases are covered.
"We are committed to making Kindle books available on a vast array of devices," said Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to The New York Times earlier this month. "Whether you own a Kindle or not, we want you to buy Kindle books from us. With the Kindle device, we succeed in business only on the merits of how good the device is. If we can build the best reading device, then that is how we will succeed. But if you like to read books on the iPhone we want to support that, too. We want to see Kindle books read anywhere."
