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Amazon.com Inc., the world’s largest Internet retailer, said it will sever ties with its affiliates in California if the state enacts a new law that requires the company to collect taxes on online purchases. California Governor Jerry Brown signed legislation yesterday mandating sales-tax collections by Web retailers, including Amazon, on purchases by state residents. The state’s pending budget plan counts on $200 million from the law. In an e-mail before the bill was signed, Amazon said the legislation was “unconstitutional and counterproductive.”

Amazon.com Inc. on Thursday said that, after less than four years of selling electronic books, it's now selling more of them than printed books. The online retailer said that since April 1, it has sold 105 e-books for every 100 printed books, including printed books for which there is no electronic edition. The comparison excludes free e-books, which would tip the scales further if they were included.

Overstock.com said it has been released from Google's "penalty box," which pushed it down in search results as a punishment for the retailer's efforts to game the search system.

Amazon.com, apart from being a major online retailer of books, DVDs, music, games, apparel, and other merchandise, also has a small business of providing cloud and other Web services. It offers Web services like cloud computing and cloud storage service offerings, in which it competes with bigger players like Google, Microsoft and Salesforce.com. Amazon also owns and operates websites such as Audible.com, IMDB.com, and Shelfari.com.

Rumor of this buyout has been zipping over the web all weekend, but Amazon has finally confirmed: It's acquired Quidsi, the parent company of online retail sites Diapers.com, Soap.com, and BeautyBar.com. The deal is remarkably similar to the one it did last year with Zappos, purveyors of footwear to the Internet-minded.

Verizon Wireless will begin selling Apple's iPad at its 2,000 retail stores nationwide on Oct. 28, the companies announced Thursday.

Buried in a story on Best Buy's retail strategy, CEO Brian Dunn mentioned a startling fact: Internal estimates showed that the iPad had cannibalized sales from laptop PCs by as much as 50%.

The electronics retailer believes it can rebuild its brand and attract customers by bringing the Web.

Walmart has revealed that it will begin selling the 16GB iPhone 3GS for $97 this week, more than $100 off of Apple's $199 suggested retail price.

Walmart is set to make a play for your living room. The company has acquired online movie service Vudu, just over a month after rumors about a deal first surfaced.