Daily Archives: November 29, 2016

Daily Links and Deals: Amazon’s next-gen Echo may be a giant speaker with a touchscreen

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daily_links_1Daily Links for Tuesday, November 29,  2016:

Amazon’s next-gen Echo may be a giant speaker with a touchscreen (PC World) I could enjoy this. Then,  I wouldn’t have to stop the music and say, “Alexa, what song is this?”

$89 Linux laptop? Check out the new Pinebook from Raspberry Pi rival Pine (ZD Net) I’ve never used Linux, but I would give this a try when its available….

Playing with Fire: Hacking Amazon’s $50 Fire tablet (Lilputing) If you want to try hacking your tablet but are afraid of bricking it, you may want to start with the $50 version.

AT&T launches streaming TV service to compete with Vue, Sling (ComputerWorld) Another service aimed at cord-cutters. And, the pricing may not be as clear cut as it seems.

AT&T just declared war on an open internet (and us) (The Verge) Related to the piece above. This sounds like a net neutrality nightmare.

Deals of the Day:

Amazon’s selection of Kindle Daily Deals includes Not So Much, Said the Cat by Michael Swanwick. You can also find The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year by Jonathan Strahan for $1.99.

Today’s Deals include slippers, pajamas and Back to the Future movies. I am sensing a trend here….

 

The Barnes and Noble Nook Daily Find is Seveneves by Neal Stephenson. The Romance Daily Find is A Virgin River Christmas (Virgin River Series #4) by Robyn Carr.

Barnes and Noble also has a selection of NOOK Books Under $2.99.

Kobo’s Daily Deal is Furiously Happy A Funny Book About Horrible Things by Jenny Lawson. The Extra Daily Deal is The Tourist by Robert Dickinson.

You can buy 2, get 1 free and save on Fern Michaels’ holiday romance titles until November 30.

There is also a selection of Great Reads Under $5 and Bargain Reads in Fiction, in Mystery and other genres. The Kobo Aura One (and the Aura Edition 2 e-readers are now available for order at the Kobo store. Get free shipping through December 31, 2016 on devices. (The Aura One is still out of stock until early 2017.)

iTunes’ still has a collection of limited-time deals that includes A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin.

Google Books has a selection of Topsellers Under $10.

(A note on Daily Deals: All prices current at the time of posting and subject to change. Most items marked Daily Deals are good for only the day posted.

Many large promotions have discount pricing that is set by the publisher. This usually means that titles can be found at a discount price across most platforms (with iTunes sometimes being the exception). If you have a favorite retailer you like to patronize, check the title on that website. There is a good chance that they will be matching the sale price.)

Daily Links are interesting links I discover as I go about my online day. The frequency and number of links posted depend upon the daily news. I also post other, different links of interest on Twitter, Facebook, and on the Google Plus eBook Evangelist Page.

More Fire de-registration issues for children’s tablets

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kids_freetime_xSeveral times this year, owners of Fire tablets have had issues with Amazon Fire tablets spontaneously unregistering. This happened in back in April and in June (see here and here). The problem seemed to be especially prevalent in Fires that had Freetime installed.

Well, it seems that the issue has been happening again over the past week. I’ve had a number of Fire users reach out to me here on the blog trying to find out if there has been a fix for the problem. Just like in June, the problems seem to be related to Fires running Freetime under child profiles. The Fires de-register and all app data is lost. Since most of these are tablets used by children, it is particularly frustrating for parents and children alike.

The bad news, from what I can find, is that Amazon still does not seem to have an explanation for the problem.

While your best bet for assistance is to call Amazon Kindle support, there are several threads on this issue on Amazon forums that may be helpful:

You can stay updated on the issue by clicking the “Track this discussion” button located on the right side of the screen on any of the forums.

Many parents are complaining that Amazon isn’t being helpful on the issue. More on this to come….