Articles about Amazon

Tablet manufacturers are forever trying to deliver the lightest and thinnest products, and today Amazon introduces a new Kindle which is designed to feel almost weightless.

The Kindle Oasis isn’t simply light, weighing in at just 131 grams, it’s also very thin, at just 3.4 mm at its slimmest point. That makes it 30 percent thinner on average than any other Kindle. It also offers an ergonomic grip to shift the center of gravity to your palm, making it perfect for reading one handed. The built-in accelerometer automatically detects whether you are reading left or right handed, and rotates the page and page turn buttons accordingly.

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Online file sharing company Box today announced a new service, allowing businesses to store their cloud data across Europe and Asia.

The service, announced at the Box World Tour Europe, is called Box Zones, and it will allow Box customers to choose whether they want to store their data in Germany, Ireland, Singapore or Japan.

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There are many USB Type-C cables on the market, but, as it has been pointed out numerous times, not all are standard compliant. Even the cable that ships with OnePlus 2, one of the few smartphones that support USB Type-C, is out of spec, and may not work flawlessly with other handsets. And this is a serious problem.

Cables that do not comply with the USB Type-C standard can cause permanent damage, as Google's Benson Leung has explained in his reviews of various options available on the market. Amazon has taken notice, banning such products that do not comply with the official standard.

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The Amazon Kindle has been around since 2007, and plenty of updates have been made to both hardware software during the years since it was released. If you have an older model then it still works just fine and, while Amazon would almost certainly like to sell you a new one, the company is still content to sell you books for older models.

All models released prior to 2013 are now at risk of losing internet connectivity and the company is notifying customers still utilizing those devices.

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It seems as though there is a constant flow of new features and capabilities arriving on Amazon's voice-enabled platform Echo. You can play Jeopardy, listen to music and podcasts, even control your lights and thermostat.

Now the system is partnering up with Fitbit to allow Alexa to tell you about your activity. There is a new series of questions that you simply ask the device and get your answers.

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Look at Dropbox, all grown up and moving away from home. The company has announced that it is now using, almost entirely, its own custom-built infrastructure to hold data.

Dropbox says this is an important milestone, as it moves away from Amazon Web Services it relied on before. Still, it will continue to partner with Amazon, when "it makes sense for our users", Dropbox says.

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We've grown accustomed to security breaches, from Target to Home Depot and pretty much everywhere in between. It seems like daily news lately, but sometimes it seems companies are so hush-mouth that we just don't know. It's obviously in their best interest to not let word get out – bad for business, and all.

Today a story surfaced about Amazon sending some customers emails requesting that they reset their passwords. The message itself is a bit cryptic, so it's hard to say what really happened. There is also the (slim) possibility it was a scam. We say slim because there are no links to click on, the message seems legit and a carbon copy of one sent by the company before.

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Amazon has came out in support of encryption, following Apple's recent legal battles with the US government, saying that it "plays a very, very important role" in protecting customer data.

But you might be surprised to learn that Amazon has also decided to quietly drop support for full disk encryption on its Android-based Kindle Fire tablets. Since it is portraying itself as an encryption and consumer advocate, its decision to go in the opposite direction strikes me as sheer hypocrisy.

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We've covered the Amazon Echo extensively and the company has been running a series of ads as of late, featuring several amusing spots with Alec Baldwin, which began at the Super Bowl with Dan Marino featured in that particular one.

Now the company is trying to further its inroads into everyone's home with two new companion products for its popular device, even as it continues to push updates to the current offering.

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For many people, walking around with a water bottle all day is a way of life. Not only is it reassuring that your thirst can always be quenched, but it is very healthy too. Once you get away from all of the sugar-filled drinks, and even worse, the artificially sweetened beverages, you may feel much healthier.

Unfortunately, water bottles can be very bad for the environment. While some can be recycled, a good amount of them can end up in landfills. Not to mention, the process of making the plastic can have a large carbon footprint. A good solution is opting for an in-home water filter and carrying reusable bottles. Today, Amazon announces a very high-tech filtration pitcher -- the Wi-Fi-enabled Brita Infinity. Yes, it connects to the Internet. Why? To re-order filters through Amazon Dash, of course!

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Earlier today we told you about Amazon's latest roll out of updates, bringing new software to both the first generation Fire TV and the Kindle reader. While Kindle adds a new home screen, Fire TV introduces both Amazon Echo control, though it isn't quite what you think, and a new video section to guide you along the way.

While the new software improves things quite a bit, there can be a dark side to these updates. Sometimes they just simply break things, mostly in unexpected ways.

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We knew updates were on the way to various Amazon products, but with a gradual roll out it was hard to say when things would arrive. Today the waiting is over, as both Fire TV and Kindle picked up the latest updates from the retail giant.

So what is in the cards for these updates? Well, lots of cool things that can prove useful to the company's multitude of customers.

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If you want to qualify for free shipping on your next Amazon order, you might find that you have to stick a few extra items in the basket. The online retailer is upping the threshold for free shipping from $35 to $49.

US customers who do not pay for Amazon Prime will have to shell out an additional $14 if they want to avoid shipping costs... unless they are buying books, that is. To qualify for free shipping on books, a spend of just $25 is needed, but the increase is part of a push to encourage more people to sign up for Prime.

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Amazon Web Services, Amazon's cloud computing arm, has bought the Italian software and service company NICE for an undisclosed sum. AWS is after NICE’s 2D and 3D desktop cloud virtualization software that allows 3D developers and game designers access to work remotely from any type of computer.

This works because the hardware required to render the 3D images is supplied by the cloud not the computer that the developer is using to access their designs.

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In any discussion about cloud computing, it is becoming harder and harder to ignore Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3), the massively scalable, cost-effective cloud storage solution developed specifically to house the huge influx of data created by organizations worldwide.

Amazon S3 commands twice the market share of all its closest competitors combined and is likely to be the storage platform of choice for on-premise hybrid or private cloud deployments for some time to come.

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