Tag: smartphone

FYI Amazon Announcing New & Probably Low Cost Smartphone Today

Linda Reimer

Hi everyone, just FYI Amazon is holding a press conference as I’m writing this at 1:47 p.m. EST — and is widely expected to announce a brand new and low cost smartphone.

They’ll be a ton of news coverage about this new phone — but just to sum it up — here’s a link to a brief USA Today article on the subject:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/06/18/amazon-smartphone/10751663/

Have a great day!

Linda R.

SSCL

P.S. Update at 3:14 p.m. — Amazon has indeed launched a new smartphone called the Fire Phone — here’s a link to the Amazon Fire Phone description page where you can find more details:

http://goo.gl/LG95Ap

And a link a recorded Re/code blogging of the Amazon Press conference that announced the even earlier today:

http://recode.net/2014/06/18/coming-up-amazons-smartphone-unveiling-liveblog/

Microsoft Reportedly Negotiating To Buy B&N’s Nook E-Book Division, Amazon Is Working On A 3D Cell Phone! & The PBS App Comes To Roku

Linda Reimer

Microsoft Reportedly Negotiating To Buy B&N’s Nook E-Book Division: Microsoft, which previously invested more than $605 million dollars in the Nook division, has reportedly offered Barnes & Noble one billion dollars to purchase the Nook division which would include both the Nook e-readers and tablets and the Nook e-books. And those few facts are interesting to begin with; however, what I find even more interesting is that it is also being reported that if the deal goes through Microsoft will can the Nook series of e-readers and tablets and make the Nook e-books available on Microsoft tablets, smartphones and computers. So if you’re thinking of buying a new e-reader or tablet – you may want to wait or think about buying an e-reader or tablet!*

Here’s a link to a Forbes editorial on the subject, authored by one of their tech columnists Jeremy Greenfield, titled Microsoft To Buy Nook? What It Could Mean:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeremygreenfield/2013/05/09/commentary-microsoft-to-buy-nook-what-it-could-mean/

Amazon Is Working On A 3D Cell Phone! If you’re of an age that recalls going to see the very first Star Wars film in 1977, which was by-the-way – years before our current high tech revolution really kicked off, then you’ll probably recall the scene that features Luke and Obi-Wan Kenobi try and get R2D2 to reply the SOS message Princess Leia recorded – and presto a 3D image of Princess Leia appeared and Luke and Obi-Wan discovered she was in trouble! That 3D message was cool and that type of technology will soon be coming to an Amazon smartphone near you! Amazon isn’t commenting on this news but according to a Wall Street Journal article it is so!

And, naturally, here is a link to that Wall Street Journal article which is titled Amazon Is Developing Smartphone With 3-D Screen and subtitled New Gadgets, Including Audio-Only Device, Is Bid to Expand Beyond Kindle Fire:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324744104578473081373377170.html

And if you have a Roku Player, as I do! You’ll want to check out the newly introduced PBS app – a chance to now watch all that PBS content you couldn’t stream directly through Roku before! Cool stuff!

And here’s a link to an engadet article on the subject titled Roku can now tell you how to get, how to get to Sesame Street with new PBS channels:

Have a great evening!

Linda R.

*The Google Nexus is an outstanding 7” tablet that you can read e-books from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other e-book sellers upon – it cost $199 and in fact I’d recommend it over a Kindle or Nook in that price range because it is a fully fledged tablet and doesn’t lock you into the Amazon or B&N ecosystem. If you’d like to sit down and try out a Google Nexus 7 tablet – stop by the library – we have one here!

References

Bensinger, Greg. (2013, May 9). Amazon Is Developing Smartphone With 3-D Screen. Wall Street Journal. Online.

Gilbert, Ben. (2013, May 8). Roku can now tell you how to get, how to get to Sesame Street with new PBS channels. Engadget. Online.

Greenfield, Jeremy. (2013, May 9). Commentary: Microsoft To Buy Nook? What It Could Mean? Forbes. Online.

Library E-Books Part III: How to Download Free Library E-Books to Smartphones & Tablets

Linda Reimer

As you may be aware the Southeast Steuben County Library in Corning, NY is a member of the Southern Tier Library system. And Southern Tier Library System member libraries buy e-books for the Digital Catalog through the library e-book vendor OverDrive.

And OverDrive has created an app for all Apple, Android and Windows smartphones and tablets. You can find the app, which is officially called “OverDrive Media Console” in your respective app store.

Once you obtain the app and set it up, which requires you to register for a free Adobe Digital Editions account; you will check out library e-books by:

  1. Opening the app on your smartphone or tablet*
  1. Selecting the Southeast Steuben County Library as your library to obtain e-books from – this will then re-direct you to the STLS Digital Catalog where you can search for e-books or audio books to download*2
  1. Search for an available e-book you’d like to read (if the e-book is available there will be a button to the right of the title that says “Add to cart. If the e-book is checked out; instead, you’ll see a button that says “Place a hold” and you can click that button to be emailed when the title is available for you to download)
  1. Click the Add to Cart link (and the My Cart page will display)
  1. Click the Proceed to Check Out link on the My Cart page (and the Sign in page will display)
  1. Select the Southern Tier Library System (instead of Penn Yan Public Library) from the drop down box in the Library field*2 (just click on the down arrow to the right of the word Library.)
  1. Enter your Library card number in the library card number field.
  1. Enter your PIN number in the PIN field (this is by default the last four digits of your telephone number)
  1. Click the Log In button on that same Sign in page (The Check Out page will display)
  1. Click on the Confirm Check Out button (on the Check Out page and the download page will display)
  1. Click the download button and the e-book should start to download into the OverDrive library within your app. E-books download in a matter of seconds – and you’ll see a download status bar fill with color as the download process unfolds and completes
  1. Read your library e-book!

Tomorrow I’ll discuss how you download library e-books to Nooks and one of next weeks’ postings will be on how you download audio books and media (music and videos) from the Digital Catalog.

Have a great day!

Linda R.

*1) If your tablet is a Wi-Fi only model you will have to be within range of a Wi-Fi network in order to download library e-books.

*2) You can download MP3 audio books to all Windows, Android and Apple smartphones and tablets; however, WMA (Windows Media Player) audio books can only be directly downloaded to Windows smartphones and tablets. If you have another wireless device you should be able to download the PC version of OverDrive Media Console to your computer, download WMA audio books to it and then transfer those to Apple or Android mobile devices. Unfortunately if your main computer is a Mac – you cannot download WMA audio books to it and transfer them to mobile devices; the process will only work if you’re using a Windows PC.