Mark Bridge writes:

I’m not a big fan of reporting on rumours - I’d rather wait until the real thing happens - but I thought these two stories were too big and too well-defined to ignore completely.

Firstly, it looks as though Amazon will be announcing an Android-powered tablet tomorrow. Called the Kindle Fire, it probably won’t be a direct replacement for the Kindle e-book reader but an alternative. Most commentators suggest we should expect a 7-inch colour screen, a focus on cloud-based services and a pretty heavily customised version of Android.

Mark Bridge writes:

This weekend, you could have picked up a HP TouchPad webOS tablet for $99. Both the HP USA online store and Best Buy in Canada were selling the obsolescent devices at a substantial discount.

Yet over here in the UK, we've seen nothing except a prize draw from The Carphone Warehouse and a less-than-£90 discount from Amazon. And I don't expect anything much better in the short-term.

Amazon.com has launched a new music service called Amazon Cloud Drive, along with web-based and Android-based music players. It enables customers to store music online and then play it on any Android mobile device or web-connected computer.

Customers can save new Amazon MP3 purchases in 'the cloud' and can also upload their existing MP3 or AAC music collection.

Amazon has launched its Android mobile application store today.

Known as the Amazon Appstore (although that's not prevented Apple from taking legal action to protect its own App Store), it's currently only available to consumers in the USA.

The Amazon Kindle eBook reader is now available at all Best Buy UK stores and around 400 Carphone Warehouse shops as well. Pricing is the same as buying the device directly from Amazon; £111 for the WiFi-only version or £152 for the WiFi/3G Kindle.

Best Buy’s US operation has been offering the Kindle since last year.