At a press event today Target CEO Greg Steinhafel unveiled the new initiative, which will see the retailer match the prices displayed online by a number of companies including Amazon, Walmart, Best Buy, Toys R Us, and of course, Target.com.

The in-store price matching currently does not include Target.com:

“If you find an item in a competitor’s printed ad that is priced lower than it is at your Target store, we will match the price. The competitor’s ad must be local and current, and the product must be the identical item, brand name, quantity and model number. Target.com is excluded from our price matching policy. Competitor catalogs can also be ad matched as long as the catalog displays a valid date and meets all other qualifications,” says the company on their current “Low Price Promise” page.

The current price-match policy excludes “promotions or products advertised on another company’s web or mobile sites, even those advertising in-store prices” as well, so this is a big change for the company.

It’s not permanent, however, as Target will only price-match these select online retailers from November 1st to December 16th (the prime holiday shopping period).

Target told Mashable that the Amazon price-matching will not include third-party sellers housed on Amazon Marketplace.

What Target and Best Buy are fighting is showrooming, the now-ubiquitous practice of finding a product you want, snapping a picture or jotting is down in your notes, and then returning home to buy it (sometimes for cheaper) online. Basically, it’s using brick and mortar retailers like Best Buy and Target as your own personal showroom – something they clearly aren’t fans of.

Target hopes that this will get people in the door, but more importantly make sure they actually walk out with something in the cart.

Yes, candy corn. The cookie, which is a buttery golden color rather than the standard chocolate, is filled with orange and yellow cream for the Halloween season, and although initial reactions range from confused to “Groooooooss!”, I for one am excited to give ‘em a whirl.

Apparently the filling just has a hint of candy-corn flavor but tastes mostly like icing, which can’t be a bad thing. They went up for grabs at Target locations everywhere yesterday for the low-low price of $3.59, but if they don’t prove to be your thing, try candy corn mixed with salted peanuts. It’s a staple in my house in the fall and tastes sort of like a sweeter Payday.

The group of retailers behind MCX, which will grow, seems to think that they have an edge over mobile payments competitors (like Google, Isis, etc.), in that they are retail, and therefore understand customers habits better. They will use this knowledge of customers to run their kinds of offers and promotions.

“MCX will leverage mobile technology to give consumers a faster and more convenient shopping experience while eliminating unnecessary costs for all stakeholders,” said Mike Cook, corporate vice president and assistant treasurer at Walmart. “The MCX platform will employ secure technology to deliver an efficiency-enhancing mobile solution available to all merchant categories, including retail stores, casual dining, petroleum and e-commerce.”

“We believe MCX is uniquely qualified to offer the most comprehensive mobile payment options for consumers,” said Terry Scully, president of financial and retail services at Target. “By participating in MCX, merchants are in a position to effectively deliver innovative payment approaches that aren’t available today.”

“As merchants, no one understands our customers’ shopping and payment experience better than we do, and we’re confident that together we can develop a technology solution that makes that experience more engaging, convenient and efficient,” said Mark Williams, president of financial services for Best Buy.

There’s no launch date or CEO for the MCX yet, but the companies are reportedly looking for a leader. The group says it expects to announce additional members during the coming months.

Polyvore is continuing this tradition now, and has released a bunch of outfits that are styled after the Avengers. From the Hulk to Iron Man you can get a real sense of ho exactly they are styled after. The items in the outfits are all for sale individually and vary in price. The Captain America outfit for examples features a $13 top from Target and a $190 pair of shoes from John Lewis.

Captain America

Hulk

Iron Man

Thor

With the new update, version 6.3.1, password protection can be applied to purchases, to the Silk web browser, and can limit access to certain libraries stored in the device. The update can be downloaded and installed manually, or users can wait for it to be automatically pushed to the device whenever a wifi signal is established.

Other features of the update include:

Sharing: Easily share favorite passages and notes from books directly from Kindle Fire. Simply highlight a passage and select “Share,” add a note, and choose which social network youd like to post to.
Book Extras: Powered by Shelfari, Amazon’s community of book lovers, Book Extras make it easy to see supplemental material about the book you are reading, without leaving the book. View descriptions of characters, a glossary of common terms used in the book, information on the authors and common locations referenced in the book, and more. To view Book Extras within your book, tap the bottom of the screen to bring up the options bar, tap the menu icon and select “Book Extras.”
Archive of Personal Documents: Your personal documents are stored in the Amazon Cloud and available for redownload at any time from the Docs content library on your Kindle Fire. Just as with Kindle books, Whispersync automatically syncs notes, highlights and furthest page read for personal documents.
Print Replica Textbooks: Students can buy thousands of print replica textbooks to read on their Kindle Fire and save up to 60% off the list price of the print textbook. Print replica textbooks maintain the rich formatting, color and layout of the print editions, with features including notes and highlights, zoom and pan, linked table of contents, real page numbers, and Whispersync of notes, highlights and furthest page read.
Reading View for Amazon Silk: With Reading View on Silk, the content that you’re interested in is elevated above the clutter in a reading-optimized, single screen view (even for multi-page articles). The full page is still available in the background, allowing you to easily toggle back to a traditional view to see other interesting features on the page.
Movie Rentals: The rental period for movie rentals downloaded to Kindle Fire now starts when you starts watching the movie, rather than at download.
Additional Enhancements: Faster re-connect of Wi-Fi after your Kindle Fire has been asleep, and general performance enhancements.

In related news, it was just reported that big box retailer Target will stop carrying Kindle tablets on May 13th, likely due to competition, with the tablets being a sort of merchant in itself, making the browsing and purchase of all things Amazon very simple.

According to AppleInsider, Munster visited one of the two Target stores that play host to Apple’s mini-stores, and found the experience favorable. He noted that the selection was significantly less than what might be seen at an actual Apple Store, and that the Target mini-store did not sell any Macs, but neither of these facts is surprising.

While around 40% of U.S. Best Buy stores have Apple’s standalone displays set up, only two Targets and one Walmart have the mini-stores. Given the success of the concept in Best Buy’s stores, and the generally greater popularity of both Walmart and Target, it’s a fair bet that the mini-store presence will prove successful, and that more and more Walmarts and Targets will be getting their own little Apple store.

[Image credit: ifoAppleStore]