Amazon AdMash: Will It Catch On?

While I was looking for the next batch of books to read on Amazon, I started looking at Kindle 3G. It was right on the landing site selling one for $114 (Wi-Fi version). That sounded really cheap. It wasn't too long ago Kindle was selling for $150 or so, I thought.

It turns out I was about right. The third generation Wi-Fi Kindle was selling for $139 until early April. Amazon is marketing that Kindle is now on sale for $114 to make the e-reader even more affordable.

What's interesting is how Amazon is moving from premium to ad-based discounted model. Yes, Amazon is lowering the price of Kindle by displaying ads when Kindle is turned off or showing its home page. Usually we see many freemium to premium movement especially from small start ups looking to grow user base quickly. But it's interesting to see that Amazon is now lowering the price by introducing sponsored advertisements.

Why Facebook Gets Bad Reputation For User Data Privacy

If you are a long time Facebook user, you'll remember Facebook's humble beginning as college student network. Facebook used to operate around the networks that you belong to. Facebook user could choose school network, work network, even regional network to share private information.

To most of you all these network-centric sharing would be distant memory. And so it was with me. I have long forgotten this network-centric sharing past of Facebook, and even the fact that I entered my network as FaceTime Communications (Actiance used to be known as FaceTime Communications).