Amazon is having a sale on Duke Nukem Forever, Dragon Age Pack, and Spore for the Mac, as well as other titles for your PC-using friends today only. These are the digital download versions that can be downloaded again if anything happens to your Mac or you get a new one.

Electronic retailers such as Best-Buy and Amazon got an early start this Black Friday, offering better deals than Apple’s Black Friday discounts. Amazon is offering up to $150 off Apple computers such as the 1.60GHz 11″ MacBook Air 64GB, for example, and Best Buy also has their share of Apple products on sale, including the iMac, iPad 2 and Apple TV. You’ve got just a couple hours left before Black Friday 2011 has passed you by, so get those orders in now to get significant savings on Apple products.

Despite the app store being a money-making machine for third-party developers, sometimes we need to remind ourselves it hasn’t been the most open of platforms (Google Voice and Adobe flash, anyone?). After Apple’s strict App Store rules kicked in on June 30th, many eBook providers were hit with less than desired changes in store policies. As such, Amazon and other retailers have begun trying to work around Apple’s new rules.

If you buy it on Amazon, they’ll store it for free. That’s Amazon’s new Cloud Drive policy. But that’s not all; they’ve also upped the storage, provided you most commonly use the service to store .mp3 or .m4a files, which now have no storage limit (thus, why all Amazon MP3 purchases are stored for free). And just in case it helps you take that $20 a year step, they’ve added support for iPad too.

Even though the official biography of Steve Jobs, iSteve: The Book of Jobs, won’t be released until March 6, 2012, you can still pre-order the hardcover at Amazon for only $18. You save 40% off the list price and it qualifies for free Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. You can also pre-order the Kindle version for $14.99, which includes free wireless delivery via Amazon Whispernet, and is 50% off the list price.

Amazon has launched a new download store for Mac OS X apps, directly competing with Apple’s own system-integrated Mac App Store. Although Amazon’s new store is merely web-based, it contains quite a few notable apps (some of which aren’t even available in the Mac App Store) such as Roxio’s Toast, Microsoft Office and Quickbooks. Amazon is offering a one-time $5 discount on the purchase of any Mac software with the coupon code.

Google Music Beta is a cloud service similar to Amazon’s Cloud Player. You upload your music to Music Beta and it’s instantly available anywhere you have a connection to the net, including many mobile devices. Music can even keep recent tracks and specified albums available when you don’t have a connection. The only catch, for now, is that it’s invite only.

As (eventually) expected, Amazon’s Cloud Player finally works with iOS devices when accessed through Safari web browser. While the service gives a warning that the browser is not supported, the functionality seems to be flawless. How long will it take for Apple to respond with their own music in the cloud service?

While Apple is busy charging you $1.29 for the latest and greatest chart toppers, Amazon has taken the opposite approach by setting the bar pretty low at just $0.69 for many MP3s on the Amazon MP3 store. Amazon also offers many popular albums at just $5. Add those two facts together and compare to Apple’s premium pricing. Do you get what you pay for?

Now that CES is over, we can get back to our regularly scheduled programming. That means the free apps list is back! And thankfully, this week it’s packed full. Whether you want to watch PBS, keep track of data, get back in shape, find deals on Amazon or just play some pinball, it’s all in the list. Check it out…