• Forbes, Fast Company, Thursday, July 29, 2010 10:40 AM

Amazon's next-generation Kindle is a slim white or carbon-colored e-reader that has double the storage space but is 15% lighter and inches smaller in width and height than the Kindle 2. It will sell for $189, the same price as it predecessor, and have both 3G wireless and WiFi capabilities, Andy Greenberg and Elizabeth Woyke report.

Writing in Fast Company, Da n Noscowitz says that Kindle 3's most impressive new feature is the screen which is, "bar none, the best e-ink screen I've ever seen. It's fantastically sharp, with excellent contrast (Amazon claims 50% better contrast than any other e-ink display on the market), and it refreshes noticeably faster (Amazon says 20% faster) than the previous generation."

There's also a WiFi-only version that will sell for $139 as "Amazon's Anti-iPad," as the Forbes headline has it. Amazon has no intention of trying to compete with the iPad's bright and colorful multi-touch display, according to Russ Grandinetti, vp of Kindle content. "We're not really focused on that," he says. "We're really focused on building a purpose-built e-reader ... on making this device better."

Amazon also reports that e-books now outsell hardcover books by 80%, and that it sold three times as many e-books in the last quarter as it sold in the same quarter last year.

Read the whole story at Forbes, Fast Company »