New Kindle Fire and One Million Dollar Question

Kindle Fire, Full Color 7″ Multi-touch Display, Wi-Fi Amazon

$199.00

Amazon announced its new tablet in September for US customers only. The price is competitive as expected but for me the million dollar question is how this tablet adds on to one’s reading experience. Color is the big improvement for me so children’s books, magazines and your pdf documents can be read in color now.

Personally, I hate multi-functioning gadgets since they quickly become watered down versions of mp3 players, Kindle readers, video players, tablet PC’s, etc. all in one. Therefore, I carry a simple mp3 player to listen songs or books, a cell phone only to communicate urgent issues and my Kindle 3G for reading. I am not interested going online when I am mobile. I rather read a book or call a friend.

Amazon should not forget its readers as I advocated here. Again, only time will tell where this strategy will take Amazon.

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Famine in Somalia

I received the following e-mail from my friend Rushdy Chaushev today. 

Dear friends,

I am writing to you in regards to the crisis in East Africa which has been affected by the worst famine in the last 60 years. 30,000 children under the age of 5 have already died in the last 4 weeks and more are dying every single day. THE CHILDREN NEED OUR HELP!!!

Liz Jones of the UK has visited a refugee camp in Somalia and vividly describes the devastating drought that has hit Somalia. You can read her post here.

Also, please donate whatever you can to help save at least one child’s life and make a difference in someone’s life. You can click here to donate via the SaveTheChildren fund.

Please forward thispost to as many people as you can.

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Amazon Tablet is Now Confirmed by Wall Street Journal

Yesterday, I posted about a possibility of a new Amazon tablet release very soon here since refurbished models of Kindle 3 reduced in price.

It is now confirmed by Wall Street Journal that Amazon plans to release a tablet computer by October, people familiar with the matter said, intensifying its rivalry with Apple’s iPad.

Read more on Wall Street Journal Online.

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Is Amazon’s Kindle Store Being Hit by Spam Content?

I think so. As part of my publishing efforts for OrangeSky Project on Kindle Store and fishing always for quality free books or deals for Best Kindle Reads, I am seeing increasingly more  useless content on Amazon’s Kindle Store nowadays.

I also made a Google search about the topic and found an interesting Reuters article published last month supporting what I saw first hand.

It is not hard to see that left to its own dynamic, Self Publishing is going to lead inevitably to spam at some point due to entrophy. That some point seems to be now.

It just proves that why sites like Best Kindle Reads is needed more and more to sort through this information overload and fight against natural selection of rubbish over quality content online in general and in systems like Amazon’s Kindle Store in particular.

As Umberto Eco postulated in one of his articles in 1990′s, we may very well face rubbish like porn eredicating philosophical texts in the near future. I invite everybody to join the fight today since real knowledge is not infinite and it only increases by sharing.

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One Million Kindle eBooks Exceeded on Amazon Kindle Store

There are more than one million Kindle eBooks now on Amazon Bookstore.  This is a substantial number and it continues to increase faster than ever thanks to Amazon’s Self Publishing Program.

43,654 ebooks were added to Amazon Kindle Store in the last 30 days. The number is 134,960 for the last 90 days.

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Top 10,000 New Reviewer’s List on Amazon

My new reviewer rank on Amazon is now 9,916  9,794 9,204 9,149

The review process is going slower than I wanted but I will continue to add more reviews going foraward on Amazon.

I would like to thank all voters for their support.

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2 New Free Kindle Games and Free Weather Application

Update: They seem to be no longer available. I downloaded them last night for free but now they are not on Amazon Kindle Shop anymore.

AccuWeather

Wheather Application for Kindle. Works only in US and needs 3G for better performance.

Flash Cards: Alphabet Digi Ronin Games

There are two modes: Alphabet and Spelling. Each mode has three difficulty levels:

1) Easy: No input required in both modes. Only picture is shown and you say the answer aloud with your child and press the space bar for the correct answer.

2) Medium: Multiple Choice. You select A,B,C or D which represents different letters in alphabet mode. In spelling mode, full words are shown as A,B,C or D.

3) Hard: Input the correct answer. For example, if the picture is a goose in the alphabet mode, you enter “g” and correct and press the center of the 5-way controller. You need to speel the whole word in spelling mode.

Pictures are not the best, but these flash cards are free for now. If you have a small kid like mine you will definetely enjoy this application. My son enjoyed the animals on Kindle screen.

Test release notes Anand Krish

I just downloaded the game and played as normal. There are different modes you can select such as Claasic, Wrap Around (allows you to go off one edge of the maze and come back onto another) or Cubetastic (Maze is on the sides of a cube).

If you select Harder for next maze options than next maze will get harder and harder to solvewhich I recommend. You can also hide bread crumbs (dots that show the path of your mouse’s footsteps.

There is a Guide which shows controls of the game.

Great free game. Enjoy.

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Oprah style: Every Tweeter Subscriber to Best Kindle Reads wins Complete Works of Mark Twain

“The man who doesn’t read good books has no advantage over the man who can’t read them.”
~ Mark Twain ~

You are not reading the title wrong. Every Tweeter subscriber to Best Kindle Reads at the end of July including all past subscribers (80 at my last count) will win a free copy of special OrangeSky Project “The Complete Works of Mark Twain” Kindle eBook with active Table of Contents.  This is the great surprise that I mentioned before. This book will not be sold anywhere else.

You need to send your e-mail address and Tweeter Username using subject title: “BKR – Mark Twain offer”  to webmaster@mehmetgok.com in order to receive this book. If anybody comes up with a better way to receive this book please let me know by commenting here or by sending an e-mail.

Kindle file is around 6MB so please make sure your e-mail inbox handles this size. I will start sending the book soon until 31 July midnight to subscribers on Tweeter who sent their e-mail addresses to webmaster@mehmetgok.com

You don’t need a Kindle to read this book. You can read it on your PC, iPad, iPod or Android phone using one of the free reading applications here.

Mark Twain needs no introduction. This huge book is 5,300 pages which makes it an incredible value for everyone. 

Please spread the word to anyone you know.  Blue subscription button with the bird is on the right panel for Tweeter.

Last but not least, why am I doing this? Because I want to thank all my subscribers and honor a great writer at the same time. Excuse me for not thinking a better way of doing this.

 This offer ends 31 July 2011 midnight for logistical reasons.

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Peter Falk, the immortal “Columbo” (Sept. 16, 1927 – June 23, 2011)

via Chessbase

Peter Michael Falk was an American actor, best known for his role as Lieutenant Columbo in the television series “Columbo”. He appeared in numerous films such as The Princess Bride, The Great Race and Next, and television guest roles and was nominated for an Academy Award twice (for 1960′s Murder, Inc. and 1961′s Pocketful of Miracles), and won the Emmy Award on five occasions (four for Columbo) and the Golden Globe award once. In 1968, he starred with Gene Barry in a ninety-minute television pilot about a highly-skilled, laid-back detective. Columbo eventually became part of an anthology series titled The NBC Mystery Movie, which stayed on NBC from 1971 to 1978, took a respite, and returned occasionally on ABC from 1989 to 2003.

Falk was “everyone’s favorite rumpled television detective”, wrote the historian David Fantle. Describing his role, the Variety columnist Howard Prouty wrote, “The joy of all this is watching Columbo dissemble the fiendishly clever cover stories of the loathsome rats who consider themselves his better.”

Peter Falk died at his Beverly Hills home on June 23, 2011, at the age of 83. He was survived by his wife and two daughters, who said they would remember his “wisdom and humor”.

Falk was also a chess aficionado who took chess lessons and was spotted as a spectator at the American Open in Santa Monica, California, in November 1972, and at the U.S. Open in Pasadena, California, in August 1983. One of the people who met him is Yasser Seirawan, who kindly sent us his recollections.

Falk and chess

By Yasser Seirawan

Although it was a long time ago my memory was of meeting Peter Falk at the 1983 US Open in Pasadena, California. Alongside the event there was to be the Candidates’ Match between Victor Kortchnoi and Garry Kasparov. In 1980, the US boycotted the IOC Olympic games in Moscow to protest the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. A favor the Soviet’s would return for the 1984 IOC Olympic games in Los Angeles. In the Soviet case a pretext for boycotting the Los Angeles Olympiad would be more tricky. Through its announcements the Soviets claimed that the US couldn’t guarantee the “security” of their athletes, a strange claim to be sure but the Cold War was a time of much strangeness. As Pasadena is a neighboring city to Los Angeles it would have been inconsistent, to say the least, that Kasparov, a Soviet citizen, would go and safely compete in Pasadena on the one hand while their athletes had to skip competing in Los Angeles. In the end Kasparov was denied his travel visa and would forfeit his Candidates’ Match. A replay took place in London the following year. Victor Kortchnoi stayed to compete in the US Open. I have a bad memory of trailing Victor and being paired against him as black in the last round where I needed to win. Victor won our game smoothly, as well as the tournament.

Peter Falk and Yasser Seirawan analyse Yasser’s game. The above
picture appeared on the front cover of the December 1983 Chess Life.

The cover also had a smaller photograph of Falk in conversation with Viktor Korchnoi

Chess Life December 1983 had a further photograph, whose
caption stated that the actor was ‘a frequent spectator in Pasadena’

While analyzing my last round loss, Peter Falk of the detective series “Columbo” joined the players and kibitzers. It was quite a treat, as I was a fan of two popular detective shows at the time, “Baretta” as well as “Columbo.” Peter Falk, of course, played the lead role of a disheveled, discombobulated, self-deprecating detective who solves murders with insightful probing questions. When the suspect was sure that he had answered all of Columbo’s questions successfully, there would always be a “gotcha” question. Columbo would just about be out of the door, stop and turn and begin with, “Oh, just one more thing… I really can’t get my mind around this one…” And zap out would pop a question that would neatly undo the suspect’s explanations. These gotcha questions were always a great crowd pleaser as the suspect would be caught in a web of his own deceit. Invariably, the suspect would offer some lame explanation which would be barely plausible, after which Columbo would be his solicitous charming best by explaining, “Thank you that is a great load off my mind.”

One other thing about the Columbo series I enjoyed was the near cult like status accorded to “Mrs. Columbo.” Peter Falk would always invoke the “missus” with a “Mrs. Columbo always says…” and then the zap gotcha question hits once more based on Mrs. Columbo’s folksy wisdom. The point though is that the viewers never saw Mrs. Columbo in any episode. We would therefore muse over whether she existed or not. In American parlance someone who was never seen would be likened to Mrs. Columbo.

Peter was really perfect for the role, in voice, style, body language, it was as if the part of detective Columbo was tailor made for him. I was certainly charmed by him and I think my colleagues and kibitzers felt the same. As for his chess strength, that was hard to tell. He certainly knew all the pieces and how they moved, and his questions were always pertinent to the position. Usually a very good sign.

By the way, in a near Twilight Zone irony, the show Baretta had as its theme song the lyrics, “…If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime. Don’t do it!…” The star of the show, Robert Blake was tried but acquitted for the 2001 murder of his wife. However, in 2005 he was found liable in civil court for her wrongful death. Whether he did the crime or not he didn’t have to do the time.

Page 71 of the February 1973 Chess Life & Review had a shot of Falk with an unidentified player at the Eighth American Open, Santa Monica, 1972. John Donaldson (Berkeley, CA, USA) and Charles Sullivan (Davis, CA, USA) informed Chess Historian Edward Winter in Chess Notes that the player with Peter Falk who was left unidentified by Chess Life & Review is Dennis Waterman, now a well-known poker player. Mr Donaldson added: “Waterman gave Peter Falk lessons in the early 1970s. He played in the first Lone Pine tournaments but gave up chess in the early 1980s.”

Columbo – The Most Dangerous Match (1973)

American grandmaster Emmett Clayton’s world championship title (and his ego) are threatened when his ex-girlfriend convinces retired Soviet GM Tomlin Dudek to challenge him. Dudek meets Clayton by chance in a restaurant, and the two use salt and pepper shakers to start an impromptu chess game – which later continues in Clayton’s apartment. Dudek wins and it becomes clear to the American that the portly, mild-mannered Russian is clearly his superior in chess. Clayton decides he must murder Dudek and concocts a scheme in which Dudek seems to have met with a fatal accident in the hotel’s trash compactor. Lt. Columbo Lt. Columbo must outwit the super-intelligent, ruthless killer, which he does in his trademark style.

White moves and wins in 4 moves.

In the above clip Clayton (played by Laurence Harvey) analyses with Dudek (Jack Kruschen) in his apartment. We were unfortunately only able to locate a version that has been dubbed into Italian. If any of our readers knows of an English version please send us the link and we will replace the above video. In the 1980s Edward Winter’s Chess Notes discussed the original game which was used in the Columbo episode and a C.N. reader, the late Jack O’Keefe, tracked it down to a game played just after the Second World War.

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2 Subscribers Won Free Kindle Book from OrangeSky Project

Two Tweeter June subscribers of Best Kindle Reads won a free Kindle book of their choice from OrangeSky Project catalog. Congratulations.

Nellbq Agueda Carbonell & tho_hub Thomas Huber

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