Amazon announced today that the Kindle Fire HD and Kindle Fire HD 8.9″ will start shipping to over 170 countries in June. If you don’t believe them, pre-orders are open now in all those countries.

“Kindle Fire HD is the #1 best-selling item in the world for Amazon since its launch, and we’re thrilled to make it available to even more customers around the globe today,” said Dave Limp, Vice President, Amazon Kindle. “Not only does Kindle Fire feature advanced hardware, it’s also a service. When combined with our content ecosystem, great email and browsing and top-rated customer service, we hope people around the world will agree that Kindle Fire HD is the best tablet for an incredible price.”

Coinciding with the announcement, Amazon also announced that its Appstore for Android is now open for business in over 200 countries. Those getting a Kindle Fire next month can start downloading the very best Kindle has to offer while those who already own Android devices can start taking advantage of Amazon’s free app of the day, among other promotions.

Speaking of which, Amazon will be making Fruit Ninja and Cut the Rope: Experiments available as free downloads on its Appstore on May 23 and May 24 respectively to celebrate the launch. The offer is available to everybody who has access to Amazon’s Appstore for Android.

“We are thrilled to be expanding the reach of our global app distribution to nearly 200 countries. We think our customers will love the app selection we have to offer and also find features such as Free App of the Day and personalized recommendations very helpful as they discover and explore new apps and games,” said Mike George, Vice President of Apps and Games at Amazon. “By further expanding the distribution of apps to millions of customers around the world, we are continuing to make it easy for customers to enjoy their Amazon apps on Kindle Fire and any Android device.”

This is a pretty big deal for Amazon. It can now compete on a global level with other device manufacturers, like Apple, who have been selling tablets for years now. The cheap price of the Kindle Fire HD has the potential to undercut Apple, Samsung and more around the world.

Needless to say, it will be very interesting to see how the global tablet market reacts to this news.

Amazon announced Kindle Worlds today – a new publishing platform that licenses popular series and then allows amateur authors to publish fan fiction based on those series. Right out of the gate, Amazon has secured the rights to Gossip Girl, Pretty Little Liars and Vampire Diaries. I can already see the latter inspiring plenty of fan fiction.

“At Kindle, we’re not only inventing on the hardware and software side of the business, we’re inventing new ways to create books,” said Philip Patrick, Director, Business Development and Publisher of Kindle Worlds. “Our goal with Kindle Worlds is to create a home for authors to build on the Worlds we license, and give readers more stories from the Worlds they enjoy. We look forward to announcing additional World licensing deals in the coming weeks.”

So, how will the payment system work? Here’s how Amazon describes it:

Amazon Publishing will pay royalties to both the rights holders of the Worlds and the author. The standard author’s royalty rate (for works of at least 10,000 words) will be 35% of net revenue. As with all titles from Amazon Publishing, Kindle Worlds will base net revenue off of sales price—rather than the lower, industry standard of wholesale price—and royalties will be paid monthly.

In addition, with the launch of Kindle Worlds, Amazon Publishing will pilot an experimental new program for particularly short works—between 5,000 and 10,000 words. For these short stories—typically priced under one dollar—Amazon will pay the royalties for the World’s rights holder and pay authors a digital royalty of 20%.

It’s not a bad deal for something that people generally write while expecting no monetary return. It might even be a great platform for an aspiring author to launch their own career. There’s numerous stories out there of fan fiction authors getting their big break after somebody discovered their work.

Kindle Worlds will officially launch in June with over 50 commissioned works from famous authors. After that, anybody can submit their fan fictions to the Kindle Worlds publishing portal. To get a head start, head over to the official site to learn more.

The news was tweeted out by series writer/producer Rhett Reese, who went on to say that viewers “hated it out of existence.” Reese also worked on the film of the same name that inspired the Amazon series.

Our Zombieland series will not be moving forward on Amazon.Sad for everyone involved.

— Rhett Reese (@RhettReese) May 17, 2013

I’ll never understand the vehement hate the pilot received from die-hard Zombieland fans.You guys successfully hated it out of existence.

— Rhett Reese (@RhettReese) May 17, 2013

Anyway, we did our best, and we’re very proud of our team.

— Rhett Reese (@RhettReese) May 17, 2013

Zombieland was part of big push from Amazon into the original content game, spearheaded by their Amazon Studios division. Back in April, Amazon released 14 pilots (both comedy and kids shows) and asked fans to submit their feedback. Amazon said that fan feedback would determine which pilots were picked up for full series runs, but didn’t go into any more specifics.

The other shows include Alpha House, Betas, Browsers, Dark Minions, Onion News Empire, Supanatural, Those Who Can’t, Annebots, Creative Galaxy, Positively Ozitively, Sara Solves It, Teeny Tiny Dogs, and Tumbleaf.

The Zombieland pilot, which has been available for all Amazon user to stream for just under a month, currently sits with a 3.5 star rating out of 5 with 5,500 reviews. Did you watch the Zombieland pilot? What did you think?

Starting today, subscribers will get access to prior seasons of NBC’s Grimm, Hannibal, and Smash, USA’s Suits and Covert Affairs, and SyFy’s Defiance, Alphas, Eureka, and Warehouse 13.

“We listen carefully to our customers to find out which TV shows and movies they find the most entertaining,” said Brad Beale, Director of Digital Video Content Acquisition for Amazon. “Our expanded agreement with NBCUniversal gives Prime members access to even more exclusive content that they can stream instantly, at no additional cost. Compelling shows like Covert Affairs, Defiance, Grimm, Hannibal and Suits are big wins for our customers and we look forward to adding more titles soon.”

The deal also bring a couple of kids shows to Kindle FreeTime Unlimited – Curious George and The Land Before Time.

Earlier this year, Amazon Prime added Food Network and Travel Channel shows, as well as FX’s hit series Justified and PBS’ Downton Abbey (which they nabbed exclusive rights to, snatching it away from Netflix and Hulu). Last month, Amazon released a series of pilots produced by Amazon Studios. Viewer feedback will determine which of the 14 shows are given a full run.

Customers can now start using the currency in any app from the Amazon Appstore.

To celebrate, the company is giving away 500 free coins to all Kindle Fire customers in the U.S. This is the equivalent of $5. The coins are being automatically deposited in users’ accounts.

“Today we are giving Kindle Fire owners $5 worth of Coins to spend on new apps and games, or to purchase in-app items, such as recipes in iCookbook, song collections in SongPop or mighty falcon bundles in Angry Birds Star Wars. And with discounts of up to 10% when you buy Coins, this is a great way for customers to save money when they buy apps, games and in-app items,” said Mike George, Vice President of Apps and Games at Amazon. “We will continue to add more ways to earn and spend Coins on a wider range of content and activities—today is Day One for Coins.”

Developers will continue to earn the standard 70% revenue share, and Amazon will continue to support real currency as well. Amazon is encouraging the use of Amazon Coins, however, by letting customers get discounts of up to 10%.

The one smartphone would be able to display 3D images without users having to wear glasses, and would use retina-tracking technology to let people use their eyes to navigate through content, which would appear to float above the screen like a hologram, according to the report. The device would reportedly support 4G LTE and would come with Qualcomm chips.

Finally, the Journal’s sources suggested that Amazon’s efforts could lead to a streaming music service that would compete with the likes of Pandora and Spotify, and presumably accompany the aforementioned audio-streaming device. They also indicated that the company wants to release some of the offerings in the coming months, but they could be abandoned if financial or performance concerns become too great.

We’ve been hearing rumors about Amazon smartphones for quite some time. Speculation has been happening for years. Frankly, it would make a great deal of sense alongside its Kindle and Kindle Fire devices as the company increasingly competes with Apple and Google.

In March, rumors heated up that Amazon planned to launch a Kindle Phone in Q2.

The update includes a new design and interface, and easy access to samples.

“Customers have told us they love the UI of Kindle Fire and how easy it is to access and navigate their digital content,” a spokesperson for Amazon tells WebProNews “We’re extending this design to Kindle for Android by optimizing the Kindle Store for tablets, improving the library interface, redesigning the home screen, and simplifying navigation through the app.”

“For customers who are new to Kindle or Kindle apps, we’re making samples of many of the best sellers even easier to find, to help them get started,” the spokesperson adds. “Customers will find the samples on the home screen of their Kindle app.”

The app gives users acccess to over 1.5 million books in the Kindle Store, including 300,000 exclusive titles.

The update can be downloaded from the Amazon Appstore for Android or from Google Play.

Operating cash flow was up 39% year-over-year to $4.25 billion for the trailing twelve months. Free cash flow was down 85% to $177 million for the trailing twelve months. This includes purchases of corporate office space and property in Seattle. Operating income was down 6% to $181 million in the first quarter, compared with $192 million in first quarter of 2012. Net income decreased 37% to $82 million in the quarter.

Amazon is excited about its original content business moving forward.

CEO Jeff Bezos said, “Amazon Studios is working on a new way to greenlight TV shows. The pilots are out in the open where everyone can have a say. I have my personal picks and so do members of the Amazon Studios team, but the exciting thing about our approach is that our opinions don’t matter. Our customers will determine what goes into full-season production. We hope Amazon Originals can become yet another way for us to create value for Prime members.”

There is also talk of a pending Amazon ad network that would take on the likes of Google and Facebook, not to mention set-top boxes.

Stock is up in after hours trading.

Here’s the release in its entirety:

SEATTLE–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Apr. 25, 2013– Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) today announced financial results for its first quarter ended March 31, 2013.

Source: Amazon.com, Inc.

That’s the word from Bloomberg Businessweek, who quotes three sources familiar with the matter. According to the sources, the ‘Kindle TV’ (name uncertain) will be available this Fall.

Amazon’s new set-top box would work just like any internet-connected streaming device for your television – it would plug into your TV and let users stream internet content. Nothing revolutionary, of course, but Amazon has never offered a product like this before.

Naturally, sources say that the set-top box would let users stream Amazon Video on Demand, as well as Prime Instant Video offerings for Prime subscribers. The benefit for Amazon in manufacturing and operating its own set-top box is that the company would be able to point users in the right direction when it comes to content (watch it on Prime Instant, not Netflix!). Plus, it would give Amazon another way to showcase original content from Amazon Studios, which we saw get a huge kickstart earlier this week from a series of new pilots.

According to the report, the new set-top box is being developed by Amazon’s Lab126 division in Cupertino, and is being helmed by former VP of video products at Cisco Systems Malachy Moynihan.

Right out of the gate, Amazon would be competing with Apple TV, Roku, and consoles like the Xbox 360, which all offer the same deal – streaming internet content on your TV.

The first and most obvious question regarding an Amazon set-top box (other than price, of course), is which apps it would support. For instance, would it launch with a Netflix app, considering that they are a huge competitor in terms of battling for streaming eyes. You would have to imagine that it would, considering Amazon has been able to play nice with other video apps like Netflix on their other devices, like the Kindle Fire tablet.

While number one is the same as it was last year, there are some differences. Cambridge, for example, fell from number 2 to number 4. Berkley fell from number 3 to number 7. Boulder, which was last year’s number 5, is not even on the list this year.

Here’s the list:

1. Alexandria, Va.
2. Knoxville, Tenn.
3. Miami, Fla.
4. Cambridge, Mass.
5. Orlando, Fla.
6. Ann Arbor, Mich.
7. Berkeley, Calif.
8. Cincinnati, Ohio
9. Columbia, S.C.
10. Pittsburgh, Penn.
11. St. Louis, Mo.
12. Salt Lake City, Utah
13. Seattle, Wash.
14. Vancouver, Wash.
15. Gainesville, Fla.
16. Atlanta, Ga.
17. Dayton, Ohio
18. Richmond, Va.
19. Clearwater, Fla.
20. Tallahassee, Fla.

For comparison, here’s last year’s.

New additions include: Vancouver, Dayton, Clearwater,and Tallahassee.

“The results of our annual Most Well-Read Cities list is proof that people across the country are reading, and also that we’re still seeing the popularity of Fifty Shades of Grey,” said Sara Nelson, Editorial Director of Books and Kindle. “It’s fun for us to see facts like the citizens of Cambridge are buying the most books in the business category or that one of our favorite novels of 2012, Gone Girl, is the best-selling book in the Most Well-Read City, Alexandria.”

Ranking was determined by compiling sales data of books, magazines and newspapers in print and Kindle format since June 1, 2012, on a per capita basis, in cities with over 100,000 residents.

Did your city make the list?