“I’m sure there will always be dedicated devices, and they may have a few advantages [...]]]> The battle brewing between Apple and Amazon keeps heating up. First, Amazon took aim at Apple’s iTunes market share with its Digital Download service. Now, Apple CEO Steve Jobs has fired a shot across the bow at Amazon’s next-generation e-book reader:

“I’m sure there will always be dedicated devices, and they may have a few advantages in doing just one thing,” Jobs said. “But I think the general-purpose devices will win the day. Because I think people just probably aren’t willing to pay for a dedicated device.”

Make no mistake: the iTablet (or whatever it’s called) is as much a threat to Amazon as it is to netbook manufacturers like Acer. The rumored price-point is $600, which isn’t bad for Apple, considering that fanboys were willing to pay that much for the first-generation iPhone.

via Steve Jobs: Apple Tablet Is Going To Destroy The Kindle (AAPL, AMZN).

There has been much speculation about [...]]]> The iTablet may not exist yet, but don’t tell Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster. He’s predicting that the Cupertino Kids will sell 2 million units at $600 each in 2010 to generate $1.2 billion in revenue. This would represent a 3% gain in Apple’s total revenue for the year.

There has been much speculation about the rumored iTablet, but that hasn’t stopped TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington from pushing forward with his own Internet-enabled tablet, the CrunchPad.

How any of these offerings will impact early tablet-style readers like the Amazon Kindle or Sony eReader remains to be seen, but I’d be surprised if Amazon isn’t busy at work on a full-color, touchscreen version of its popular reading device in anticipation.

via Apple’s $1.2 billion tablet computer – Apple 2.0 – Fortune Brainstorm Tech .