Amazon's free iPhone Kindle application has received an update with several improvements to make the app more user-friendly. Many of the features were expected by users in the first release, as they are typical to many iPhone apps.
Here are the changes:
Users can read in portrait or landscape mode.
Gesture (pinch) to zoom images in books.
Select alternate background and text colors to improve reading comfort in low light conditions.
Tap on either side of the screen or flick to turn pages.
Amazon has purchased Lexcycle, the company that developed the free iPhone eBook reader Stanza. The software is widely seen as a rival to Amazon's own Kindle application. Stanza provides free access to over 100,000 books in ePub format, which Amazon's Kindle does not support.
Details such as the cost of the acquisition were not revealed by either company. Over one million copies of Stanza were downloaded by the end of last year. Amazon's Kindle iPhone app is free, however users must pay for content. The Kindle 2 electronic reader is now priced at $349.
Now the entire Kindle library of books, magazines and newspapers is accessible without a Kindle device. All you need is your iPhone or iPod Touch, the free application released by Amazon, and your Amazon account. Just install the Kindle app, then register your iPhone with Amazon by entering your account information.
After you're in, you have access to all titles you've purchased through Amazon's website or with your Kindle. 225,000 titles are available, and $9.99 will deliver you a New York Times bestseller immediately. For $1.25 a month you can get the current issue of the Atlantic (sans pictures) delivered automatically as soon as the new issue hits newsstands.
One of the best features of the Apple iPhone is the amazing clarity and large size of it's LCD screen, particularly when compared to other mobile phones. As many have suggested, this makes the iPhone perfectly suited to reading mobile eBooks. While a few rough eBook offerings have popped up since the iPhone launched, today the first major publisher - Harper Collins - began offering eBooks on the iPhone.
The new eBooks service from Harper Collins will allow iPhone users to browse titles and read up to 10
