Program information. Program name: Kindle for Mac (Productivity) Kindle for Mac allows ebooks from Amazon's store or personal ebooks to be read on a Mac. Therefore it doesn't require the user to have a Kindle device. Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing offers users of Apple Macintosh computers a number of convenient and easy-to-use methods for publishing eBooks in Kindle format. This section highlights a number of tools and techniques for publishing via KDP on a Mac operating system: Creating Kindle eBook files.
With the March 2010 release of “Kindle for Mac“, Apple users can enjoy e-books downloaded from Amazon.com. The MacIntosh version of the Kindle e-book reader means that most every major computer, cellphone and mp3 player on the market is compatible with Amazon’s Kindle.
Amazon came out with the first generation Kindle e-reader in late 2007, the device sold out 5 & 1/2 hours, and wasn’t in stock for nearly 5 months. Demand for Kindle readers, as well as improvements to the original design, led Amazon to release the Kindle 2 in February of 2009, then Kindle DX, which was released in June of 2009.
Meanwhile, “Kindle for iPhone” was released in March 2009. With this partnership in marketing the Apple’s popular iPhone Kindle app, it was only a matter of time before a “Kindle for Mac” would become available. Users of iPod Touch, the Windows PC and Research in Mobile’s BlackBerry cellular phones also interface with Amazon’s Kindle books.
What is Kindle for Mac?
Kindle for Mac lets your MacIntosh desktop computers and laptops read Kindle e-books. This gives you the ability to download over 450,000 book titles from the Amazon website, including over 100 or the 110 or so New York Times best sellers.
How Much Does Kindle for Mac Cost?
Prices ranging from $9.99 for the best selling books, and considerably lower for less popular titles. Subscriptions to downloadable versions of national newspapers or magazines are also available, with a one-month subscription to the Wall Street Journal at $14.99, the New York Times at $13.99 and USA Today at $11.99. The monthly price for most of the big name magazines, like Newsweek, Time and Forbes, are $2.99 or less.
The price to buy different Kindle devices varies. When Amazon Kindle first debuted, the device cost in the $390 or so. The price for a Kindle 2 had come down to $299 in June of 2009, but currently retails at $259, as of October 2009. Prices may be higher on Kindle for Mac for a while, but you can expect prices to fall to that $260 level pretty quickly.
What Does a Kindle For Mac Do?
Instead of buying books, magazines and newspapers to read, you can buy one of these publication’s downloads instead. This means you don’t have books and papers stack up around your home or office, or have to be thrown away or stored in the attic to make room for more stuff. Instead, you’re able to leave these books on your Kindle and read them at your leisure.Storage capacity stretches for the Kindle DX is around 3,500 non-illustrated books, while storage for the original Kindle was around 200 titles. Like a computer, you can buy an upgrade to your storage capacity that increases the memory on your Kindle device.
The Kindle books are electronic files, so the publishers aren’t out the expense to print and distribute their books, magazines and newspaper publications. This means you get e-books at a considerable discount from the price of a printed book, so those who like to read books can buy more books, once the savings on those purchases offset the $250 cost of the e-book reading device.
Is Kindle as Hard on the Eyes as Computer Screens?
No. Reading a book from a Kindle is much more like reading a paper book than it is reading off a computer monitor. Monitors have that bright light lighting the screen, so reading from a computer screen hurts a lot of people’s eyes.
On a Kindle, the words are formed by ink. The lighting is more subdued, so your eyes are bombarded by a bright white tone illuminated with a light background, but tones more akin to the off-white colors of most print books. The Kindle is about the size of the average book, so reading an Amazon Kindle is designed to be like reading a traditional book.
Kindle For Mac Read Aloud
The idea is to enhance your book reading experience, making it cheaper and easier to purchase, while getting rid of the problems of storing your book archives, or dealing with the dust and allergens that are common to books and bookshelves.
Amazon Kindle isn’t perfect yet. For instance, some users have complained that they don’t “own” a Kindle e-book, like they would a book they took home from the book store, so downloading additional copies to a second device has sometimes required additional fees or purchases. A court case or two and policy changes by Amazon have eliminated some of these complaints.
I’m sure the market is going to evolve further, as the years go by, but I can only imagine Kindle becoming easier to use, and advances in technology making the practice of downloading ebooks simpler and cheaper. Having more Kindle readers on the market, like Kindle for Mac, should only help the customer, by giving them more options.
Buying Kindle For Mac
Kindle for Mac is expected to be available in stores on April 3, 2010, so if you have an Apple computer or laptop, and you’ve wanted to be able to download Kindle e-books to your reader, the time has come when you can do that.
For more information related to the Kindle in general, see the following pages:
Sometimes you may need random information for support purposes such as the MAC address, serial number or version of the OS to your Amazon Kindle Fire tablet. There are no labels on the device with this information. You’ll need to use the menus in the OS to access them.
5th Generation Fire Models
MAC Adddress
- From the Home screen, open “Settings” > “Wi-Fi“.
- Select the menu located at the right-top corner of the screen
- Select “Advanced“, and you will be able to view the MAC address.
Serial Number
Open “Settings” > “Device Options“. The “Serial Number” is displayed on the screen.
System Version
Open “Settings” > “Device Options” > “System Updates“. The version of the Fire OS is displayed.
Older Models
- From the home screen, tap the settings gear in the upper-right corner, then tap “More“.
- Tap “Device” at the bottom of the menu list.
- The “Serial Number“, “MAC Address“, “SystemVersion” as well as other information is displayed on the screen. Note that the System Version indicates the version of the OS build specifically for the Kindle Fire and not the version of Android.
Amazon Kindle For Mac
This tutorial applies to the original Kindle Fire, as well as the HD7, HD8, HD10, and HDX models.