Video Service Could Be Behind Amazon Glitches

Instant Video selections streamed for free by Prime members

(NEWSER) - Another blow to Netflix ? Amazon.com announced today that it will increase the number of Instant Video selections that Amazon Prime members can stream for free. The new partnership with Viacom will add TV episodes from MTV, Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, TV Land, Spike, VH1, BET, and more networks, bringing the total number of Prime Instant Videos to more than 15,000. In short, it means that Amazon Prime members will soon be able to watch past episodes of Jersey Shore for free. More»

Amazon's offering will be significantly cheaper than most tablets

(NEWSER) - Amazon is introducing its new Kindle Fire tablet in New York, but Bloomberg got some details—and Mashable got a picture—early. For one thing, the $199 price tag is lower than rumored. It will feature a 7-inch display and WiFi capability, but no 3G, camera, or microphone. A free 30-day trial of Amazon Prime, the company’s premium membership service, will be offered along with the device. More»

Facebook founder tops Steve Jobs, Rupert Murdoch

(NEWSER) - Frighteningly enough, Mark Zuckerberg tops Vanity Fair 's list of this year's most influential people of the Information Age. The top 5 of its 100:

1. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook: His company is valued at around $25 billion, has more than 500 million members, runs 176 billion banner ads a month, and is looking at $2 billion in revenue this year.
2. Steve Jobs, Apple: He's already saved the music business, now he's looking to do the same for the publishing industry with the iPad. And sales of his market-dominating iPhone will likely top $20 billion this year.

Even with iPad competition, sales of devices rise

(NEWSER) - Amazon is selling more books as Kindle downloads than as hardcovers, CNET reports . In the past month, the website sold 180 Kindle books for each 100 hardbacks. CEO Jeff Bezos calls the shift "astonishing, when you consider that we've been selling hardcover books for 15 years and Kindle books for 33 months." More»

VideoBay streams content, without that pesky copyright stuff

(NEWSER) - If YouTube's limits on copyrighted material have exhausted you, the Swedish hackers who call themselves Pirate Bay have a solution: VideoBay, a new streaming video site that's utterly indifferent to intellectual property laws. The new service, rolled out just as Pirate Bay was sold to a Swedish software company that says it plans to take the site legit by paying for content, is built exclusively with open-source technology. But the programmers say VideoBay is still in "beta extreme" and caution: "Don’t expect anything to work at all." More»