The problem is that Amazon hasn’t yet made an “international” flavor of its Kindle app available, so if you live in Great Britain and just grabbed a Kindle, you still can’t take advantage of the awesome syncing capabilities of having the same books on your iPhone.

Except actually, reports Wired’s Gadget Lab blog, you can!

Thanks to the iTunes Store option to choose “none” as a payment method, you can sign up for a US iTunes account with nothing more than an e-mail address (not the one you normally use), a real address and a cellphone number. Any free applications are then available to download, and best of all, when you hook up your iPhone or iPod Touch the application just syncs.

Gadget Lab vouches for the workaround, saying it downloaded books just fine and synced perfectly. You’ll log in to your Kindle account from within the app by using the same info as you use on your Kindle, so there’s no conflict with the dupe account you created in iTunes.

So there you go–until Amazon gets up to speed on an international Kindle app, this is an easy way for you to keep reading even when you don’t have your Kindle with you.

(Works for iPod Touch too, obviously.)

“How To Get the iPhone Kindle App Outside the U.S.” [Wired]
(Photo: Graphic Spirit)

Here’s how to find out whether you have a U.S. or International version of the Kindle 2.

Well, that didn’t take long: someone on MobileRead figured out a way to change the directory where the Kindle 2 looks for its default screensaver images. By default, this directory is hidden on a partition that doesn’t even get mounted on your PC when you connect the K2 via USB, but this hack changes the path to a directory on the accessible section–so you can add all the custom images you want and have the K2 you always wanted.

It’s not an idiot-proof solution, so if you’re kind of iffy when it comes to computers, you’ll probably just want to learn to accept Amazon’s restrictions. However, if you feel competent, click here to see the thread and the downloadable files that will let you hack the Kindle 2.

Thanks to reader Joshua M. for pointing this out in the comments!