When Amazon launched the international version of the Kindle e-book reader last month there was a big hole in the list of countries where people could buy Kindles. Potential Canadian customers were left behind, but not any more. Amazon has announced that Kindles will start to be shipped to Canada. It wasn't Canada's publishing industry that was holding back the Kindle, it was the cell phone industry. According to Amazon "We were shopping around for the best deal on the cost of running its wireless capability." What this boils down to is that Amazon wansn't willing to play ball with Rogers and was waiting for Telus and Bell to launch their GSM/HSPA network.
Wannabe Kindle readers who live in or visit Manitoba or Saskatchewan will find that the wireless features will be no available because the Bell/Telus HSPA network doesn't cover those two provinces, unless Amazon makes a deal with Rogers to use their network in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. That may be change within the next couple of years. Telus is expected to start putting up their own wireless network towers when existing network sharing agreements with MTS and Sasktel expire.
It may not be truly national coverage yet, but anybody who won't have access to the wireless features at first can still hook up to a computer for a sync.
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