Walmart and Amazon have figured out how to bypass Apple’s mandatory 30 percent cut for apps distributed through the iTunes store, reports The San Francisco Chronicle. Walmart has launched an iPad version of its Vudu online video streaming service using a desktop shortcut that lets customers click an “Add to Home Screen” button on Vudu.com to install an app-style icon on the iPad desktop. Likewise, Amazon unveiled the Kindle Cloud Reader which lets customers read Kindle e-books on the iPad even without an Internet connection. Both services use the HTML5 Web browser protocol and follow on the heels of The Financial Times of London which in June launched a Web-based version for smart phones and tablets to avoid Apple’s fee.

“The flexibility of HTML5 allows us to build one application that automatically adapts to the platform you’re using – from Chrome to iOS,” said Dorothy Nicholls, director of Amazon’s Kindle division, in a statement.

Amazon made its Kindle Cloud Reader compatible with Safari on the iPad as well as Google’s Chrome browser, and plans to add Internet Explorer, Firefox and the BlackBerry PlayBook browsers in coming months.

Read more at The San Francisco Chronicle ^[1].