Now, with the announcement of the Kindle 3, prices have dropped dramatically.

Two models were announced: the WiFi only Kindle (all previous Kindles included 3G capabilities) for $139 and a 3G, traditional style Kindle for $189.

No, these readers do not have color capability–they seem in many ways similar to the previous Kindles, just for less.

Let’s see how these newly priced Kindles do in the market.

Interestingly, Microsoft has had tablet versions of Windows XP dating back to at least 2001.

So it’s not like they haven’t had the market lead for a long, long time. They just haven’t been able to keep it.

In addition to that, I have a lot of misgivings about Windows 7 working well on a tablet computer, as well as the price of that operating system.

However, we shall see, Competition, particularly in tech, is a great thing.

A Fortune article this past week says that buying online is a pain, which is one of the reasons so many online retailers, large and small, have turned to PayPal, Amazon, and Apple to sell their wares rather than their own online shops, even though these can have substantial fees associated.

The reason: in all likelihood if you’re buying online, PayPal, Amazon, and/or Apple already have your credit card information.

There are new solutions on the market (Boku and Zong, neither of which I’d heard of before this article) to assist, using phone numbers to bill, but their fees are even higher.

Somehow, technology must come up with an easy way to solve this soon.

I was in charge of making sure all of that worked. And it did, with varying degrees of headache.

One of the hotspots I used was the Sprint Overdrive, and two others were Clear USB modems with Cradlepoint (or rebranded for Clear Cradlepoint made) routers. . In Hawai’i (or at least O’ahu) we have several vendors of 4G: Sprint, Clear, and Road Runner, although they all appear to be using the same network and the same WiMax technology.

First off: the Overdrive performed very poorly–so poorly in fact that I gave up on it after messing with it for about an hour. The USB modems with Cradlepoint routers performed much better.

When we had a strong signal, the 4G worked well–perhaps not incredibly, but more than well enough for our purposes. We got download speeds approaching two megabits, but that was not really what we were looking for–we also got upload speeds about one megabit, which was what we needed for the video.

The issue, however, is that the speed was very dependent on location–a few feet in a different location would mean speed drop offs of more than 50%. The modems also take much longer to connect than the older but still prevalent 3G modems of which I have one.

For a comparison at home of how 3G vs. 4G fared, see this.

We got the results we wanted but it involved a lot of work and a lot of searching for the best location. So, while I liked the results, I’m unconvinced that at least in Hawai’i, 4G is ready for prime time.

I haven’t tried it myself, but it could be a killer feature (if not its current iteration, perhaps an alternative like what Fring brings). While front facing cameras and video chat have been available on European mobile phones for several years, they have yet to make much of an impression.

However, Apple is selling FaceTime as a way to be connected to your family. If, for instance, there’s a new family member (a baby) somewhere and both you and that family member have iPhone 4s, you can see a lot of that baby even if you’re a world away.

That might be a huge selling point for a lot of potential iPhone 4 owners.

The feeling is that if someone’s location is known, Internet based advertisers can serve up ads based on what’s near you.

Now, if this really is the future of tech, there ought to be a way to capitalize on this monetarily, such as investing in one of these companies, but at the same time, none of them have shown they’re going to be profitable.

Call me skeptical on this future of technology.

And of course, since I was involved, frugality is important.

For the couple of hours we were outdoors, I was in charge of providing WiFi for the group. The wedding also was livestreamed, so Internet access was extremely important. A few WiFi hotspots were needed. While I am known to be a walking WiFi hotspot, It’s different to provide it for dozens of guests rather than a handful of people.

Fortunately, I have friends with similar if not better setups, and two of them were willing to loan them to the cause. That, and local business Hawai’i Photo Rental has a 4G Sprint Overdrive for rent–and offered guests of the wedding (both the bride and groom are avid photographers) a 30% discount.

And that’s how to do WiFi at an outdoor wedding on the cheap.

But recently, Google’s stock price has gone down. Considerably. Year to date, GOOG is down 24.6%; comparatively, the S&P 500 is down 3.6% for the same amount of time, the technology heavy NASDAQ is down 2.3%, and Apple, Inc. (AAPL) is up 25%. Since the market bottomed out in March of 2009, the S&P 500 is up 47.6%, NASDAQ is up 66.9%, AAPL is up 202.7%–and GOOG is up 41.8% (nothing to be ashamed of but lagging the indices and a bit competitor).

All of this despite positive returns, a growing smartphone presence, and new products (albeit I believe that Google TV is doomed for failure).

Still, my faith in Google is unshaken, and I will continue buying into that company for some time to come.

The video rental business in America has changed drastically. VHS tapes are essentially dead. DVDs are slowly giving way to Blu-Ray (after a protracted war with HD-DVD) but is facing stiff competition from streaming online services. Netflix’s initial business model of DVDs by mail is still going strong (their stock has absolutely soared in recent months) but where they’ve really hit home is with their online streaming video. Redbox is doing pretty well with their $1 kiosks. Blockbuster’s brick and mortar stores are not doing so well.

I know many folks who are using Netflix’s streaming service. I’ve yet to hear of a single person using Blockbuster’s On Demand competitor.

I’m a bit concerned that Blockbuster is soon to go the way of Circuit City and CompUSA.

Instead, I like to order just about everything online.

There are things I won’t order online–groceries (which is something that might be more of a Hawai’i phenomenon than anything else) are a primary example–but that might not be forever. I even order pizza online! When I need something from Best Buy, I order it online and pick it up–(sometimes) it’s cheaper and I get a 5% rebate from ShopDiscover. From Apple, I just order it to my door–free shipping for orders over $50 and it comes quick.

It might help my antisocialness to order online, but I think it also helps my efficiency.