Amazon this morning released a version of its Kindle e-book software that works on Mac computers — a small move, but one that underscores the company’s efforts to maintain its share of the market as Apple launches its iPad.

Although e-books sold for the Kindle are locked into Amazon’s ecosystem, the company is keen to emphasize that they can be read on a number of other devices that allow for Kindle software. In its press release announcing the Kindle for Mac, Amazon pointed out that those devices include PCs, the iPhone, the BlackBerry and “soon the iPad.”

Kindle for the Mac allows Amazon to highlight the portability of its products, but an early review from Wired raises questions about how useful people will find this particular reader, at least in its early form. The review calls the free software “pretty bad” and “bare-bones,” although it does say it’s “nice to have a way to read on a computer.”

Apple’s upcoming iPad launch and the company’s deals with publishers have created worries about Amazon’s ability to maintain its hold on the e-book business. The online bookseller has been able to dominate this market because it had the first popular e-book reader in the Kindle and because its agreements with publishers allowed it to sell e-books at a discounted price.

Recent articles in Publishers Marketplace and the <a href="New York Times highlight Amazon’s concerns and detail what the articles say are contentious dealings with publishers over distribution agreements.

But analyst Jim Friedland at Cowen and Company calls the concerns about Amazon’s ability to compete with the iPad “overblown,” saying Amazon’s “superior book buying experience” and customers’ ability to read Kindle books on the iPad will ensure that the bookseller retains a significant share of the market.

Readers, what do you think? How will the entry of the iPad affect Amazon? Would you rather have an iPad or a Kindle — or both?

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