Amazon selling over a million Kindles a week

Amazon has revealed that the Kindle family of devices are selling at over one million each week in the run up to Christmas.

The sales figures include the new Kindle Fire tablet which the company says has been the best-selling item across the entire site since it became available for pre-order 11 weeks ago.

"Kindle Fire is the most successful product we've ever launched," said Kindle VP Dave Limp.

"it's the bestselling product across all of Amazon for 11 straight weeks, we've already sold millions of units, and we're building millions more to meet the high demand."

The $199 tablet, only available in the US, may have been selling the lion's share, but the $79 Kindle reader, $99 Kindle Touch and $149 Kindle 3G have also been selling well ahead of Christmas.

Unusual move

The online retailer is usually coy about revealing sales figures, but it seems this was just too good of an opportunity to boast about its own-branded range of readers and tablets.

Despite the sales surge, the last couple of weeks haven't been too kind on the Kindle Fire, with a number of complaints about Wi-Fi reliability, sluggish navigation and the lack of privacy the device offers.

A software update to clear-up these perceived ills is set to launch within the next two weeks.

Samsung sells 300 million phones in 2011

Someone call Guinness, we've got a new record – a new internal record that is, as Samsung announces it's sold 300 million mobile handsets in 2011, the most it's ever sold in a year.

In 2010, aka the year of the Samsung Galaxy S, the manufacturer sold around 280 million handsets. This year, the company sold 10 million Samsung Galaxy S2 handsets, which made a significant contribution to its record-breaking results.

"We look forward to extending this success going into 2012," said JK Shin, president and head of Samsung's mobile communications business, wholly unsurprisingly.

Phone wars

The results will be one in the eye for HTC, which recently revised its profit estimates for the year down by 20 per cent, and reported a 30 per cent drop in handset sales in November.

If we were being flippant, we'd say Samsung was the Ebeneezer Scrooge to HTC's Bob Cratchit here – who knows, maybe JK Shin will show up at Peter Chou's house on 25 December with the biggest goose a street urchin could find him and toys for Tiny Tim.

Either that, or the two companies will continue to battle for smartphone dominance in 2012; we're expecting big quad-core things from both manufacturers to launch at CES 2012 and Mobile World Congress 2012. It might not be as heart-warming but we'll get some great new phones out of it so we'll be happy, at least.

Mac App Store hits 100 million app downloads

Who puts the App in Apple? Well, Apple. But with good reason – not only has the fruit-flavoured tech company announced that it has 500,000 apps in its mobile App Store but it has also hit 100 million downloads from its Mac App Store.

That's a lot of apps, considering that the Mac App Store has only been live since January 2011.

Phil Schiller, Apple's senior VP of marketing, was on hand to offer his two typically sensationalised cents: "In just three years the App Store changed how people get mobile apps, and now the Mac App Store is changing the traditional PC software industry.

"With more than 100 million downloads in less than a year, the Mac App Store is the largest and fastest growing PC software store in the world."

App avalanche

Apple's release also casually reiterated the fact that the iOS App Store has seen over 18 billion apps downloaded, at a rate of around 1 billion a month, which suggests that pace hasn't changed much since early October when it first mentioned that fact at the iPhone 4S launch. But surely it should be up to over 19 billion now?

We love a good app round up almost as much as we love app stats, so feast your eyes on our top ten free apps for iPhone in the video below:

brightcove : 968441173001

Spotify: We've paid $150 million back to music industry

Spotify has revealed that it has paid $150 million back to music labels since it launched three years ago.

The company's founder and CEO, Daniel Ek, took to the stage in New York to announce Spotify's new music app store, where he also talked about Spotify's successes to date.

As well as explaining that the company has paid its music industry dues, he added that Spotify is now second only to iTunes in terms of creating revenue from digital music in Europe.

Stat attack

Other juicy stats announced include the fact that Spotify is still adding around 20,000 songs to its catalogue a day – news that will go some way to reassure those who were shifting uncomfortably in their seats as 200 independent labels ditched the streaming service earlier this month.

"It would take someone 100 years – literally a life-time – to listen to all the music in the Spotify catalogue," said Ek.

As revealed earlier in the week, Spotify has benefited hugely from its partnership with Facebook, having added 7 million new users since it was unveiled in September.

The company has seen playlists as the key component to the Facebook integration, with Ek excitedly exclaiming, "Playlists are really the new mixtape."

They're certainly quicker and easier to make, with 500 million playlists having been made in Spotify, a number that has doubled since July.

"We want music to be like water," Ek explained. "Available everywhere, available seamlessly."

Spotify: We've paid $150 million back to music industry

Spotify has revealed that it has paid $150 million back to music labels since it launched three years ago.

The company's founder and CEO, Daniel Ek, took to the stage in New York to announce Spotify's new music app store, where he also talked about Spotify's successes to date.

As well as explaining that the company has paid its music industry dues, he added that Spotify is now second only to iTunes in terms of creating revenue from digital music in Europe.

Stat attack

Other juicy stats announced include the fact that Spotify is still adding around 20,000 songs to its catalogue a day – news that will go some way to reassure those who were shifting uncomfortably in their seats as 200 independent labels ditched the streaming service earlier this month.

"It would take someone 100 years – literally a life-time – to listen to all the music in the Spotify catalogue," said Ek.

As revealed earlier in the week, Spotify has benefited hugely from its partnership with Facebook, having added 7 million new users since it was unveiled in September.

The company has seen playlists as the key component to the Facebook integration, with Ek excitedly exclaiming, "Playlists are really the new mixtape."

They're certainly quicker and easier to make, with 500 million playlists having been made in Spotify, a number that has doubled since July.

"We want music to be like water," Ek explained. "Available everywhere, available seamlessly."

Spotify: We've paid $150 million back to music industry

Spotify has revealed that it has paid $150 million back to music labels since it launched three years ago.

The company's founder and CEO, Daniel Ek, took to the stage in New York to announce Spotify's new music app store, where he also talked about Spotify's successes to date.

As well as explaining that the company has paid its music industry dues, he added that Spotify is now second only to iTunes in terms of creating revenue from digital music in Europe.

Stat attack

Other juicy stats announced include the fact that Spotify is still adding around 20,000 songs to its catalogue a day – news that will go some way to reassure those who were shifting uncomfortably in their seats as 200 independent labels ditched the streaming service earlier this month.

"It would take someone 100 years – literally a life-time – to listen to all the music in the Spotify catalogue," said Ek.

As revealed earlier in the week, Spotify has benefited hugely from its partnership with Facebook, having added 7 million new users since it was unveiled in September.

The company has seen playlists as the key component to the Facebook integration, with Ek excitedly exclaiming, "Playlists are really the new mixtape."

They're certainly quicker and easier to make, with 500 million playlists having been made in Spotify, a number that has doubled since July.

"We want music to be like water," Ek explained. "Available everywhere, available seamlessly."

iPhone 4S surpasses four million sales in three days

Apple's iPhone 4S sales break previous iPhone 4 three day record

Apple has announced the sale of over four million new iPhone 4S handsets in the three days since the device launched.

The new smartphone has initially released in the UK, the US, France, Germany, Canada, Australia and Japan. Similarly high sales are expected when the iPhone 4S launches in a further 22 countries by the end of October and over 70 countries in total by the end of December.

The previous model iPhone 4, which launched in June last year, achieved record sales in its first three days, but this has been smashed by the new iPhone 4S which has more than doubled the figures of its predecessor.

Apple fans are clamouring for the iPhone 4S’ enhanced features, including a dual core processor on the iPad 2’s A5 chipset, an improved 8-megapixel camera with updated optics and the unique voice activated Siri assistant.

Customer reception of the iPhone 4S has been positive on the whole, despite negative reactions at first from analysts and commentators who expected the much-rumoured iPhone 5 instead.

Apple has, however, been experiencing some trouble with its new operating system update, iOS 5, which launched in tandem with the iPhone 4S. Some users of previous iPhones have found the update wipes their music, photos and even contacts.

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Samsung sells 30 million Galaxy S and Galaxy S2 phones

Samsung has announced 30 million Galaxy S and Galaxy S2 have been sold worldwide

Samsung has announced that it has passed the 30 million global sales mark for its Galaxy S and Galaxy S2 smartphones.

The news follows reports from September that the company had sold 10 million Galaxy S2’s since the handset launched in Europe and Asia in April this year, leading Samsung to describe the phone in July as its fastest selling device ever.

The debut of the Galaxy S2 in the US in September, under carriers AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint, has further boosted sales since launch. In a press release announcing the record sales, Samsung was keen to point out the original Galaxy S is still seeing strong sales despite the arrival of its successor.

‘Since its launch only five months ago, GALAXY S2 has seen tremendous sales success and garnered enthusiastic reviews from consumers and mobile industry watchers across the globe,’ said JK Shin, president of Samsung mobile communications.

‘This is in addition to the continued sales momentum behind GALAXY S, which we launched at Mobile World Congress 2010 as continues to be a run-away success with consumers.’

Apple also announced that sales of its new iPhone 4S have broken its previous records for the opening weekend. If sales continue at this rate, it will outsell the Galaxy S2 in short order.

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Ubuntu One Hits The One Million Users Mark – Upgrades Free Plan To 5 GB

Roberta Nilerud of Canonical has announced that their cloud storage service – Ubuntu One – has hit the one million users mark.

Ubuntu One is a cloud storage service from Canonical that is very tightly integrated into Ubuntu. Although Ubuntu One is installed by default in Ubuntu, it is also available on Windows and Android. Ubuntu One is also used to store the music bought from the Ubuntu One Music Store.

Announcing the milestone, Canonical has also decided to change the plans on offer. Initially, 2 GB of storage was provided to everyone for free. Now, they have announced that they are more than doubling that to 5 GB. Current users of Ubuntu One will see their store size upgraded automatically.

Canonical has also changed the earlier Mobile plan to the Music Streaming plan. With the Music Streaming plan, users will get 20 GB of storage and unlimited music streaming to their Android and iOS device for $3.99/month. The Android app is already available in the Market (check out our review of the app here) and the iOS app is coming soon.

Samsung Galaxy S II sells over 5 million units in three months

The Galaxy S II first arrived in South Korea on April 29, 2011. The following month, it was released in other Asian and European countries, including Japan and the UK. Last week, the smartphone debuted in China.

Samsung's long-term, worldwide ambitions for the Galaxy S II are relatively modest: 10 million units in all of 2011, which is the number it sold of the original Galaxy S in 2010. At this rate though, the company will break that number very quickly.

The Galaxy S II runs Android 2.3 (codenamed Gingerbread) and features a dual-core 1.2GHz processor. It is the first handset to offer Samsung's Super AMOLED Plus screen technology (4.27-inch display, 800x480 resolution), and is the company's thinnest phone at 8.49mm, with a weight of just 116g. The device also features an 8MP primary camera with 1080p video capture, and a 2MP camera in the front, as well as integrated NFC support on some versions. It also has BlueTooth 3.0+HS and HSPA+ connectivity.

The device's new Live Panel allows you to aggregate web, social networking, and app content to a single customizable home screen. You'll be able to switch between three adjacent home screens by simply pressing and holding on the screen. The phone will come with four new content and entertainment hubs: music, games, e-reading, and social networking.