Amazon buys Kindle-competitor Stanza

For a long while, Stanza was the iPhone's answer to the Amazon Kindle. The free ebook program became one of Apple's more popular apps by allowing users to tap into 100,000 books and periodicals.

Now, Kindle and Stanza are now under one roof.

Amazon bought Lexcycle, the year-old company behind Stanza. The announcement came through a Lexcycle blog post today.

This purchase shows Amazon's commitment to digital books, a market that it dove into in 2007 with the $399 Kindle e-reader. The online retailer pushed deeper with a $50 price drop, second-edition hardware, expanded library of e-book titles, its own Kindle app for the iPhone, and now the acquisition of Stanza.

"We are not planning any changes in the Stanza application or user experience as a result of the acquisition," says the Lexcycle announcement. "Customers will still be able to browse, buy, and read ebooks from our many content partners. We look forward to offering future products and services that we hope will resonate with our passionate readers."