As Amazon fights off fierce competition on the e-reader front from Apple’s iPad and Barnes & Noble’s Nook, the Kindle received a much-welcomed update last week. As it turns out, according to PCmag, it was a little more than much welcomed; as of today, they have sold out on Amazon.com long before the official august 27 ship date. This sudden surge of enthusiasm for the popular e-reader is great news for a company whose only physical device is the sights of Apple and the iPad sales juggernaut. According to CEO Jeff Bezos, in an interview with Cnet, Amazon has 70-80% of e-book market share. Add a greatly successful new Kindle launch and you’ve got a recipe for a company that knows how to grow a product against fierce competition.
The new Kindle features embedded Wi-Fi, making book downloads faster and browser performance smoother. It sports a brighter screen (by e-ink standards), and has a smaller footprint. While it isn’t physically slimmer, it’s 15% lighter. New font-handling technology and page turning tweaks are introduced in the 3.0 version of the software. The Wi-Fi only version of the Kindle will sell for $139, and the regular 3G version will sell for $189.
Image Source: Amazon