ReadWriteMobile

"Backend as a Service" (BaaS) companies provide easily integrated cloud-based backends for mobile app developers. Though not as well known as Software as a Service (SaaS), Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) or Platform as a Service (PaaS), the BaaS ecosystem has quickly evolved from a niche vertical into an important industry segment.

The industry segment took another step toward maturity this week with mobile development platform Appcelerator's announcement of its Titanium 2.0 SDK, with significant backend cloud services tied into it. Meanwhile, Boston-based mobile cloud provider Kinvey also released its platform to the public.

A year into its life, the Amazon Appstore for Android is kind of like the quirky stepchild of the other major app stores. It is not directly tied to a platform, the way Apple's App Store or Google Play are, but it is distinctly different from other third-party app stores like GetJar that are not controlled by a large, trusted brand. Its uniqueness provides both benefits and pitfalls to Android developers, including the chief concern of many app publishers: How am I going to make money off my app?

Back in October, I compared the various online streaming services here and Netflix looked like it had the most offerings. But what if you want to search across multiple providers for your streaming content, and find out which one offers you the best deal? Enter CanIStream.It, a free iPhone app from Urban Pixels that allows users to search for movies. It is a great idea whose time has come.

Today, the culmination of a summer of speculation and hype comes to an end. Amazon has announced its tablet, the Kindle Fire. It is a 7-inch little beast priced at $199 that will integrate all of Amazon's media properties and retail channels into a device that the company will push hard through the holiday season. With that comes the Amazon Android Appstore and the ability to tap into Amazon's resources to push premium apps to the Kindle Fire.

The Kindle Fire is going to be popular. So, what does this mean for the Amazon Appstore vis-à-vis the Android Market? Can Amazon overcome its ugly recent history with Android developers and create a go-to market to place premium apps? That is the subject of today's ReadWriteMobile poll.

Third-party application store GetJar has released a "gold" service that will enable users to download premium Android applications for free. GetJar Gold is designed to give consumers access to apps they would otherwise have to pay for while increasing visibility for developers that may be seeing sluggish sales in the Android Market.

GetJar Gold is akin to what Amazon is doing with its Android application store. The Amazon Appstore features a premium Android app a day and is supposed to share the revenue made from downloads with developers. This has been a controversial program for Amazon and its relationship with developers has suffered. Can GetJar's pay-per-download model pull it off?

In April, the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) warned its members to stay away from the Amazon Appstore because of "significant concerns" it had about the pricing, terms and policies Amazon had in place. And this week, the Appstore was once again in the news after an independent game developer called the store a "disaster" in a scathing blog post filled with complaints.

But are his issues the result of one bad experience or more indicative of an overall broken system? Let us know what you think in this week's ReadWriteMobile poll.

Apple may lose its claim to the term "app store" in its trademark suit against Amazon, makers of the Amazon Appstore for Android. According to reports from Bloomberg and Reuters, U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton is not convinced that Apple has proved consumers would confuse the two services.

Although the ruling is not yet final - Judge Hamilton says she will reread some of the supporting papers - she did say that she is "probably" going to deny Apple's motion. Does this mean "app store" will now officially be a generic term?

Last week, the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) issued a warning to mobile app developers regarding Amazon's recently launched Appstore for Android. The message, simply put: don't use it. According to the letter posted here on the IGDA website, the organization had "significant concerns" about the distribution terms, pricing policies and discounting practices Amazon used when selling developers' apps.

But after a clarification from Amazon which said the IGDA had referenced an older version of the developer agreement by mistake, many wrote off the whole situation as a simple "misunderstanding." But that's not the case, the IGDA now claims. "Amazon's terms, as they currently stand, represent a threat to game developers," reads the latest blog post from the organization.

This week, the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) issued a warning to its members, suggesting they "educate themselves on the pros and cons of submitting content to Amazon." The letter refers to the recently launched Amazon Appstore, a curated market place for Android applications. The issue at hand is the pricing, or rather, Amazon's complete control of the pricing. When Amazon sells an app, it pays developers either 70% of the sale price, or 20% of the list price, whichever is greater.

It's this pricing structure that IGDA finds troubling. But do developers agree? Let's find out in this week's ReadWriteMobile poll.

This morning, Amazon launched its Amazon Appstore Developer Portal, the first step towards the creation of its own Android App Store, which will exist outside the official Google Android Market. The Amazon Store has been the most highly anticipated of all third-party efforts to date, mostly because of Amazon's brand name recognition, business model and potential for marketplace disruption.