Amazon is partnering with independent hotels and resorts to offer a prepaid booking service via a new site. The initial rollout will feature select locations within hours of New York, Los Angeles and Seattle. The online retailer is expected to collect a standard 15 percent commission for prepaid bookings. Amazon Travel is likely to mirror existing hotel booking sites with pricing details, room availability and photos, and is expected to launch as early as January 1, 2015. Continue reading Amazon Plans to Tackle Travel Services with New Booking Site

Facebook announced its new shared photo albums feature yesterday that allows as many as 50 “contributors” to upload 200 images each to the same album. That means the shared albums can be as large as 10,000 photos in total. Previously, users were only able to upload photos to albums they had created, while albums were limited to 1,000 images. The new feature may affect photo album apps such as Albumatic and Flock. It is also similar to Google+’s Party Mode, which lets users share photos and videos. Continue reading Facebook Unveils Shared Photo Albums, Ideal for Group Events