| Will AT&T Kill the Golden Goose of Mobile Industry Competition? Is innovation at risk in what could be the most innovative sector in the history of the United States? Fresh off the news that AT&T seeks to acquire T-Mobile for $39 billion, that was the question at the center of conversation this morning as the CEOs of the 3 largest mobile companies in the United States took the stage with MSNBC's Jim Cramer to kick off the CTIA conference in Orlando, Florida. It was a moment of high drama and the players didn't dissapoint. When asked point blank about the consequences for innovation of the deal AT&T's Ralph de la Vega focused on the positive and Verizon's Dan Mead yawned at the supposed threat. Sprint CEO, underdog and the Chairman of CTIA itself Dan Hesse, however, was quite explicit in sounding the alarm.
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Amazon Appstore for Android, Now Open For Business As expected, Amazon has opened its new Appstore for Android today, letting Android users purchase and download apps via the website or through a new native Android app. As Sarah Perez noted yesterday in her report on the store's launch, the new marketplace for Android apps may be an important step forward for both Android users and developers. The Amazon store will compete directly with the official Google Marketplace, often criticized for poor search and discovery - a drawback for those looking to buy and build Android apps.
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Apple Says Other App Stores Can't Be Called App Stores, Sues Amazon The curated marketplace of categorized and user-rated software available for instant download, a paradigm made wildly popular by Apple with its iTunes App Store, may not in its many other incarnations be referred to as an app store, Apple said in a lawsuit filed today against Amazon for its soon-to-launch Amazon App Store. Apple points out in the suit that other competitors, such as Microsoft, have found words like Marketplace to use instead. It's hard not to see this as Apple looking a gift horse in the mouth, while the barn door was left open months ago for it to run out and propagate itself across every farm in the land. Apple could have voiced this concern about the Google Chrome Web App Store, the Verizon VCast App Store, the Nokia App Store, or others.
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Amazon Shuts Down E-Book Loans Via Lendle Since Amazon gave Kindle users the ability to loan their e-books in December, we've seen a number of startups launch in the e-book lending space, creating networks to help readers find someone who is willing to let them borrow an e-book title. There haven't been any moves to crack down on these exchanges (other than the requirement that the Kindle Lending Club rebrand). But now it appears that Amazon has shut down one such site, Lendle. The company's website went down briefly today, and Lendle tweeted that Amazon has revoked its access to the API.
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What Forward-Looking Web Lovers Can Watch For at CTIA One of the biggest mobile technology conferences in the world, CTIA, is about to begin in Orlando, Florida and ReadWriteWeb's Sarah Perez and I are on the scene to find out what's hot for mobile device power users, mobile developers, the Internet of Things and more. Mobile is no doubt the future of the consumer computing experience and a world of connected devices are sure to make huge new sets of data available for developers to play with. The movement of mainstream markets will open up new possibilities for experimentation, too. Here's what I'll be looking to see at this giant event.
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Propose Your Session for the ReadWriteWeb 2WAY Summit NYC As you may have read recently, we're having our next great event, the two-day ReadWriteWeb 2WAY Summit on June 13-14 in New York City. While programming for day one is all but set with awesome speakers including danah boyd, Jason Calacanis, Andy Carvin, Nick Denton and Fred Wilson, day two will feature many breakout sessions covering a wide variety of Web topics. That's where you come in.
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Germany Rules Google Street View Legal Germany led the charge in investigating Google for harvesting personal information via their Street View service. Dozens of countries and individuals followed in Germany's wake, launching investigations and prosecuting lawsuits against the company. When Street View finally debuted in Germany, over 240,000 residents opted out. But the lawsuits continued. Now, however, a Berlin court has ruled definitively that, however odious the service may be to many, it is, in fact legal in Germany.
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Check-Ins Coming to Facebook Events Facebook is testing a new feature that would let users check-in to their Facebook events. AllFacebook.com first caught wind of the feature today, noting that some iPhone users are now seeing the option to check-in to events they're attending. A Facebook spokesperson says that "We're currently testing this and it will be available with the next iPhone release." According to AllFacebook.com, the check-in option shows up only for items you've confirmed you'll be attending and only when you arrive within the event's geographic area.
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Twitter Releases New Video To Celebrate Its 5th Birthday As Twitter celebrates its fifth birthday today, it has unveiled a new site discover.twitter.com, featuring some of its most prominent users and a video with their explanation of how they use the service. "Follow your interests. Discover your world," says Twitter, and its new video calls upon famous Twitter users to discuss how Twitter fits with their interests -- who they follow and what they do on the site. The list of Twitter celebrities includes Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, rapper Snoop Dogg, tennis star Serena Williams, astronaut Paolo Nespoli and others.
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Amazon's Android App Store Launching Tomorrow (Report) Amazon may be launching its Android App Store tomorrow, according to a new report, just in time to kick off this week's CTIA Wireless 2011 conference in Orlando, Florida. An unnamed "trusted source" told Wired that the store will launch Tuesday, March 22. Customers will be able to purchase apps both online via the Amazon website and through a native application designed for Android devices. Thanks to a post on the Amazon AppStore Developer blog, we already know that the store's launch will come with at least one major exclusive: the latest in Rovio's Angry Birds lineup, Angry Birds Rio, will launch first in the Amazon App Store before being distributed to other online outlets.
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