Boyle became an Internet star after she brought the house down last April by singing "I Dreamed a Dream" from "Les Miserables" during her appearance on the television competition show "Britain's Got Talent."

"We were excited when Susan Boyle's album became the top CD pre-order in the United States. We're absolutely ecstatic now that the album has become our largest global CD pre-order," Craig Pape, senior manager of music at Amazon.com, said in a statement Thursday. "Looking at the rest of our global Top 5, you see titles that resonated in their local markets. Susan's album is clearly capturing the hearts of our customers around the globe."

"One of the things that is so unique about Susan Boyle is her ability to touch people around the world," said Steve Barnett, chairman of Columbia Records. "We're excited that 'I Dreamed a Dream' holds the new record for global pre-orders and that Amazon's customers have supported her album in this way."

Coming in at No. 2 on Amazon's Top 5 CD pre-orders of all time are Mr. Children's "Supermarket Fantasy," followed by Ken Hirai's "Ken Hirai 10th Anniversary Complete Single Collection, '95-'05" at No. 3, Norah Jones's "Not Too Late" at No. 4 and Take That's "Never Forget: The Ultimate Collection."

www.upi.com

Kindle for PC features Amazon's Whispersync technology that automatically saves and synchronizes bookmarks and last page read across devices. Whether users read Kindle books on a Kindle, Kindle DX, or one of the free Kindle applications, they can always have your reading with them and never lose their place.

"Kindle for PC is the perfect companion application for customers who own a Kindle or Kindle DX," said Ian Freed, VP, Amazon Kindle. "Kindle for PC is also a great way for people around the world to access a huge selection from the Kindle Store."

Kindle for PC is available for free download:

http://www.amazon.com/KindleforPC

((Comments on this story may be sent to newsdesk@closeupmedia.com))

"We know that Canadians are passionate about books and reading, and we're excited to make Kindle available to our customers there," said Ian Freed, vice president of Kindle. "Kindle enables customers around the world including Canada to think of a book and start reading it in under 60 seconds."

The Kindle Store (www.amazon.com/kindlestore) offers Canadian customers over 300,000 books, including New Releases and Globe and Mail Bestsellers, which are typically U.S. $11.99 or less.

More than 90 top newspapers and magazines are also available in the Kindle Store for single purchase or subscription. Available for the first time on Kindle are Canada's national newspapers The Globe & Mail and The National Post. Additionally, all of Canwest's major daily newspapers will be available on Kindle coming soon. They join top papers such as Le Monde (France), The New York Times, The International Herald Tribune, The Times (U.K.), The Daily Telegraph (U.K.) and The Washington Post.

Customers in Canada can now enjoy the same features that have helped make Kindle the No. 1 bestselling product on Amazon, including:

    <<
    -   Slim and Trim: At just over a third of an inch thin (0.36 inches) and
        weighing just over 10 ounces, Kindle is pencil thin and lighter than
        a typical paperback.

    -   3G Wireless: Readers can wirelessly shop the Kindle Store, download
        books in less than 60 seconds, automatically receive newspaper and
        magazine subscriptions, and read from their library-now in more than
        100 countries and territories including Canada.

    -   Reads Like Real Paper: Kindle's 6-inch electronic ink display reads
        like printed words on paper because the screen works using real ink
        and doesn't use a backlight, eliminating the eyestrain and glare
        associated with other electronic displays.

    -   Stores Up to 1,500 Books: Kindle's 2 GB of memory holds up to 1,500
        books and Kindle books are automatically backed up by Amazon so
        customers can re-download titles in their library.

    -   Read for Weeks on a Single Charge: Kindle's electronic paper display
        sips battery power so users can read for over two weeks with wireless
        turned off and up to four days on a single charge with wireless on.

    -   Read-To-Me: With the experimental Text-To-Speech feature, Kindle can
        read most newspapers, magazines and books out loud.

    -   Automatically Syncs With Kindle and Kindle Compatible Devices:
        Amazon's "Whispersync" technology automatically syncs customers' last
        page read, bookmarks, notes, and highlights across Kindle, Kindle DX,
        and Kindle compatible devices like Kindle for iPhone and Kindle for
        PC.

    -   Read Personal Documents: Read personal documents in a variety of
        formats such as Microsoft Word and PDF.

    -   Instant Dictionary Lookup: Kindle comes with the New Oxford American
        Dictionary and over 250,000 definitions that appear instantly at the
        bottom of the page.

    -   Choose Text Size: Kindle lets readers customize their reading
        preference by providing six different text sizes.

    -   Bookmarks, Notes and Highlights: By using the QWERTY keyboard, Kindle
        users can add annotations to text, as well as highlight and clip key
        passages and bookmark pages for future use.
    >>

Media can visit the Kindle Media Room at http://www.amazon.com/pr/kindle for additional media resources and to request an interview.

About Amazon.com

Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN), a Fortune 500 company based in Seattle, opened on the World Wide Web in July 1995 and today offers Earth's Biggest Selection. Amazon.com, Inc. seeks to be Earth's most customer-centric company, where customers can find and discover anything they might want to buy online, and endeavors to offer its customers the lowest possible prices. Amazon.com and other sellers offer millions of unique new, refurbished and used items in categories such as Movies, Music & Games; Digital Downloads; Electronics & Computers; Home & Garden; Toys, Kids & Baby; Grocery; Apparel; Shoes & Jewelry; Health & Beauty; Sports & Outdoors; and Tools, Auto & Industrial. Amazon Web Services provides Amazon's developer customers with access to in-the-cloud infrastructure services based on Amazon's own back-end technology platform, which developers can use to enable virtually any type of business. Examples of the services offered by Amazon Web Services are Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2), Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3), Amazon SimpleDB, Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS), Amazon Flexible Payments Service (Amazon FPS), Amazon Mechanical Turk and Amazon CloudFront.

Books for the Kindle are sold through Amazon Digital Services, Inc.

Amazon and its affiliates operate websites, including www.amazon.com, www.amazon.ca, www.amazon.co.uk, www.amazon.de, www.amazon.co.jp, www.amazon.fr, and www.amazon.cn. As used herein, "Amazon.com," "we," "our" and similar terms include Amazon.com, Inc., and its subsidiaries, unless the context indicates otherwise.

Forward-Looking Statements

This announcement contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Actual results may differ significantly from management's expectations. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that include, among others, risks related to competition, management of growth, new products, services and technologies, potential fluctuations in operating results, international expansion, outcomes of legal proceedings and claims, fulfillment center optimization, seasonality, commercial agreements, acquisitions and strategic transactions, foreign exchange rates, system interruption, inventory, government regulation and taxation, payments and fraud. More information about factors that potentially could affect Amazon.com's financial results is included in Amazon.com's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and subsequent filings.

SOURCE: Amazon.com

Amazon.com Media Relations, (206) 266-7180, http://www.amazon.com/pr/kindle

The promise to competitors represents Wal-Mart's willingness to pick up the gloves and resume its price battle with Amazon.com or any other online retailer.

Vasquez said a few weeks ago, "If there is going to be a Wal-Mart on the Web, its going to be Walmart.com."

The Post added that even though Amazon.com currently holds the title with its $19.5 billion online business, Walmart.com seems to be catching up quick, growing at a faster rate this year by about 1.4%.

Write to Chip Brian at cbrian@tradethetrend.com

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