UPDATED 14:12 EDT / DECEMBER 10 2010

Amazon Aims at Being an Interactive E-Reader, Launches the first of its So-Called ActiveBooks

Still striving to be recognized as a feasible platform for a large number of developers, Amazon today announced the addition of a new native app called Puzzles Unbound, an interactive game pretty much the same as the puzzles you get off airports, bookstores and drugstores. The new app is from Puzzazz and will cost $3.99 at the Kindle Store.

“This is big. People will look back at this and really see this as a big change in puzzle delivery,” said Roy Leban, CTO and founder of Puzzazz, in an AllThingsD interview.

Puzzle Unbound is one of the first games from Puzzazz. The company has five employees and is self-funded by Leban who does consulting to support his team. He is also a puzzle enthusiast who was featured in the New York Times and was part of 8 tech start ups before. Leban claims that he can revolutionize Kindle games as he stress out that the approach to the Kindle is wrong, for it is an e-reader, not a gaming platform. His so-called “puzzle book” is a fit for it than Solitaire, Blackjack and Minesweeper.

As a puzzle book, you can start the game with one puzzle, then move on to another page without finish it, and just come back to the one you skipped later on. You can set the difficulty to your desired level. The game is developed by humans with some help of algorithms.

While this might sound silly at first, Leban hopes this to be an even bigger idea. Kindle and iPad also aim at delivering college textbooks, and Leban wants this books to be more interactive. “The publishing world is so old school and they don’t have imaginations. They need a kick and we think we serve as a kick.”

Kindle has been announcing three new games over the past two months. While it is not yet apparent what Kindle’s standing is in today’s market, it’s also a puzzle what’s there for Leban other than a 70% cut on the puzzle book sales.

Amazon is aiming at making more interactive books, not necessarily mobile games. This is something that will happen across all mobile devices now used as e-readers. But it demonstrates the importance of apps, how they’re developing as an economy, and how businesses will be able to incorporate these trends moving forward.  Read here for some additional insight as to how mobile devices and their apps are driving these trends around the personal cloud, and benefitting from them as well.


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