Slashdot Mirror
Amazon Kindle Fire Surfaces
MrCrassic was the first of several submitters to write in about the Kindle Fire: "It looks like another competitor has joined the fight for tablet market share. Amazon released specs and pics of its newest offering, the Kindle Fire, which is bound to turn heads at $199. However, I wouldn't sell your Nook Color or iPad just yet. From the article: 'The Kindle Fire doesn't have an embedded camera or a microphone. The device offers Wi-Fi connectivity, though not 3G access, and comes with a 30-day free trial of Amazon Prime, the company's $79-a-year membership service that includes streaming video and free two-day shipping.'"
iPad Killed
Don't forget Kindle touch wifi for $99, about $30 less than nook touch wifi.
Einmal ist Keinmal. What happens but once might as well not have happened at all.
So this is just a $199 color Kindle? Without 3G.
Was I the only one who read the headline and thought it was about exploding lithium batteries?
Just 'cause I like gadgets, I might just buy one... all I do with my iPad is surf the web...so it looks like this will work for me.
I'd like to know a lot more about how "heavily customized" Android is on this thing before buying one.
I'm already sick of hearing people bitch about how it doesn't have a camera and how you can't make Skype calls with it. It's not intended to do that. Amazon is selling it purely as a media consumption device to get you to use all their media services (video, audio, books, etc).
Fail.
Links:
Kindle Fire porn via SlashGear: http://androidcommunity.com/amazon-kindle-fire-hands-on-gallery-20110928/
Enjoy!
If you buy one of everything (wifi models only) that Amazon announced today, it is cheaper than the low end iPad.
My mom always said, "Jim, you're 1 in a million." Given the current population, there are 7000 of me. God help us all!
Can I root it and put the Android App store on it? I know not yet but hopefully someday.
The Silk browser sounds very Opera like from the mobile days.
OMAP 4! That is a pretty hot CPU folks.
Lack of a front facing camera is a negative. Come on this is pure skype candy folks.
My wife as a rooted viewsonic Gtab and it is really nice but it is too big for for an ereader.
The iPad2 is too pricey and too big.
Even if it isn't hackable at $199 I may still get it just because it would be so handy.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Here's the link to the product page on Amazon if anyone is interested.
Perhaps they're bitching that it's yet another device that can act as a roadblock for people who want to climb from consumption to creation. Some people will end up owning only devices for consumption; if they want to create, they'll have to either pony up for something else or just do without creating. And if the market for devices capable of creation shrinks, prices for such devices will likely rise due to loss of economies of scale.
Given the headline, the article was pretty disappointing. Not a bad article (I didn't finish reading it once it became clear no actual flames were involved), just not what i was hoping for...
s/[stupid comments]/[intelligent discourse]/gi
I think the device is pretty decent, but the thing I thought would really have them selling like hotcakes was coming with prime... but I thought it would be more like a year, not 30 days. I don't think 30 days is enough time to really appreciate Prime and get used to random things being practical to get from Amazon because they come so quickly...
I think it should have been at least 90 days.
With it being a 7 inch tablet, and a short Prime trial I'm not sure how it will fare. I think it probably has a much better shot than other Android tablets so far though.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Wheres the scroll buttons on the side for forward/backward? Don't tell me you have to get the screen you're trying to read all greasy.
The other thing that confuses me is the spam version is $40 less than the spamless version. Seriously? They expect to sell $40 worth of advertising to me on that thing? Some of its probably aspirational, assuming you'll get made fun of by your friends if you're so poor you have to buy the spam version.
The other funny part, is true to form, the amazon web page has the tired and stereotypical "woman reading at the beach" photo. Its hard to predict, but if there's one thing this era will be laughed at for, it MIGHT be the "we're gonna get rich by only selling e-readers to women at the beach".
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
It could run on small insects fed on sugar drops and users wouldn't care - so touting it as an Android-powered device seems to be something Amazon is trying to avoid, this is purely a media consumption device... the same goes for the spec, users don't care as long as it feeds them content well. http://www.cmswire.com/cms/mobile/amazons-199-kindle-fire-to-spark-the-tablet-market-012847.php
If he's the Walrus then can I be a penguin please?
That's a feature, not a bug. I don't need a built in camera.
"comes with a 30-day free trial of Amazon Prime,"
Which any Amazon customer can get anyway. Do they take any money off for those who already subscribe to Prime?
Most important for me, does it have memory expansion via SDHC or microSDHC ?
One interesting differentiator with respect to other Android devices is the Silk browser. I'd like to get one in my hands to verify that allegedly reduced page loading time. That's what's killing me when I use my mobile devices.
To do list for Windows
This device lacks a camera and a microphone. As far as I know it still has access to an app store, so if you want to create on it you can use any app that allows you to do so (that doesn't require a camera or a microphone). If you desperately want to create photo based or audio based content there are plenty of cheap options to do so.
Jherico
What can the average user can do to ensure his security? "Nothing, you're screwed"
No Skype, Fring or anything (no mic, no camera). No Google apps, so no navigation, no email (without third-party apps) and calendaring. No mobile internet at all.
Surely not a bad media-tablet and surely cheap, but a tablet computer this is not.
Looks to me as if it would require some major tinkering to turn it into something fun and useful and you'll still have no 3G, no camera and no microphone.
Hrmmm, so the new Apple killer that everyone has been claiming it would be lacks cameras, GPS and storage. It's not even an Android tablet competitor (vs. the likes of the Xoom, Iconia, etc....). And to top it of it's a "transitional" tablet, with the "real" one coming out sometime in 2012. Gah. I was actually excited until I read the specs. If it had at least copied the basic hardware the HP Touchpad came out with it'd have been an iPad killer especially with Amazon's backing and a 199 price, but as it sits it's just a color nook with Angry birds.
I'm going to wait to see if things can be sideloaded onto this. I have a few custom applications that it would be nice to run without having to publish them in Amazon Appstore. I see rumors, but waiting to see if it's true.
I mean really. Who's buying the iPad for the high quality camera and microphone.
And for the extra $300, you can buy a digital tape recorder and a digital camera, and have enough left over for dinner. I'm sure there's a site that can help you find those (except for dinner).
=================
Unix is very user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are.
Sure, we'll give you web access....through our prefect system.
Then there's the hardware spec. 1024x600 screen, 8 gigs internal storage (free cloud storage for *amazon* content) and no camera.
The dual core tegras are nice, but that's about it. I told someone earlier today. This isn't Hiroshima or Nagasaki, it's more like 6:00am on the Normandy (or Dieppe) beaches. The iPad is still going to dominate for a long time, but there might finally be a legit contender on the horizon
There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell 'em.
As far as I know it still has access to an app store, so if you want to create on it you can use any app that allows you to do so
Does it also support sideloading through "Unknown sources" or "adb install"? If not, your ability to create is subject to the application acceptance policy of Amazon Appstore.
It could run on small insects fed on sugar drops and users wouldn't care - so touting it as an Android-powered device seems to be something Amazon is trying to avoid
Average user off the street, like my android phone using sister in law:
Android = expensive little smart phone = have to sign a two year contract = minimum extra $100/month bill to own a "Android Kindle Amazon thing", right?
Two year contract at over $100 plus a couple hundred to buy means its gonna cost around $2000 to have one of these things before loading anything on to it; is it worth two grand?
Also Android = smart phone = battery only lasts a couple hours = gotta charge it every day. Its enough of a PITA to charge my phone every day, now I gotta charge my e-reader every day too?
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
It doesn't look like this thing has bluetooth, which limits its usefulness. While it *does* have a USB port, there's no mention of what types of devices are supported via USB.
Can I plug in a flash drive? A USB keyboard? A printer? -- heck, can I attach this tablet to a USB hub and access all my regular peripherals? Or is the USB port just for charging up the tablet?
See, I'm looking for a nice portable terminal to SSH to my servers -- and while a tablet seems like a good idea for this role, it needs to allow me to plug in a good keyboard, and use this keyboard.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
Perhaps they're bitching that it's yet another device that can act as a roadblock for people who want to climb from consumption to creation.
I have a hack saw and its getting in my way from cutting through a 6x6 </sarcasm>.
People aspiring to climb from consumption to creation should be savvy enough to get equipment that enables them to do so instead of getting equipment such as this which is not intended for that purpose. Fascinating idea, I know!
I like a lot of things about Amazon.
But I don't buy from them because they think the "community" they live in doesn't matter
Cruchpad idea and price point stolen!
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
No, it doesn't require you to be chained to a crappy cellphone in order to use it.
Does that help?
It's pretty clear it was aimed to compete with the Nook Color... comparing it to the iPad/iPad2 is just stupid. http://thisismynext.com/2011/09/28/amazon-kindle-fire-vs-ipad-2-vs-nook-color-numbers/
Lame.
It brings us all sorts of great stuff and it keeps getting cheaper.
In other news health "insurance" has gone up 9% in the past year.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
you can't load your own content directly on it. You first have to upload that to 'the cloud' where it will be inaccessible the moment you lose connectivity. (Yes, I know, every slashdotter has a wifi hotspot in their car and backyard. You all have no objections to paying $10/hour for really slow wifi on an airplane, either.)
Unlike the Nook, you can't put in extra storage with a mircoSD card.
Best Slashdot Co
Drop the frills like GPS and camera. Maybe not enough horsepower for gaming and video. How much of a market will there be for a half-price device?
Its like giving away the razor to sell the blades. Both Apple and Amazon make about 30% on content. They expect to double their return within years with content sales.
Ok, I understand the price point is very good, but this device doesn't even compete with the iPad 1. It basically just competes against the Kindle and the color Nook.
* No video output that I can see (vs the ipad's composite output)
* No TV box streaming solution (vs airplay)
* Is there even any blue tooth for wireless audio?
* No 3G, it is wifi only
* Only 8G of storage (vs max of 64G for iPad 1/2)
* GPS? Accelerometers? Compass? Microphone?
* Short battery life when wifi is enabled. 8 hours is only with wifi turned off. The kindle is made for off-line reading and is great with wifi turned off, but this device is worthless with wifi turned off.
Let alone compete with the iPad 2 with it's front and rear facing cameras for video calls. And both the iPad 1 and 2 have cheap ($25/mo for 2G) 3G data plans for when you aren't in wifi range. I usually don't use more than ~200MB outside of wifi range but it's damned convenient. Even with just my android phone I run Pandora and Google maps in the car all the time, and on longer trips with passengers having the iPad with google maps and internet surfing is great fun.
I use my iPad every day and I guarantee you that while the video might be nice on these devices, you really really want video output solution like Apple's AirPlay and Apple's composite outputs when you want to sit down and stream a show from your pad to your home TV.
Amazon has a ways to go.
-Matt
On second thought, the Prime that comes with this device is not so much about people experiencing shipping aspects, as it is enjoying the free video Prime offers. In that sense 30 days seems like a long enough period of time to decide if you want to pay for Prime to continue getting some free video content.
And more than 30 days might lead you to run up against the limited video content of Prime...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
All the prices I have seen are taking into account the lower priced versions with the on screen advertizing. Is that new to the kindle?
I've a Nook Color and considering its behavior after rooting, I have to think that B&N went out of their way to make their software jive well with rooting. I rooted mine as soon as I could and it's worked well but for a few app compatibility snags with random crap from the Android market....whaddyagonnado?
If Amazon has half a brain they'll play nice with rooting. I'm sure they'll lock down their own apps and cloud access, but why not let their apps run on someone else's Android build? They have to know that as soon as this thing has an easy root, plenty of folks will buy Kindle Fires so they can have a brilliant Android tablet for $200...and they'll still buy Amazon products, because it'll be easy as all get out....just like rooting the Nook Color...unless they're stupid, which doesn't fit their track record.
Bullshit.
The device has 8GB of local storage for when the cloud isn't reachable. And every Kindle so far released lets you load stuff directly onto it via the USB port -- this won't be any different.
Sure, extra external storage would be nice, but let's not lie about the true capabilities.
Learn more about web browsers and the services they can access (e.g., email and calendars) before spouting off.
From what I've read, this is version 1 of the Kindle Fire. It was outsourced to the same folks who did the Playbook. It was rushed to have something out by the holiday season. Meanwhile, they're working on a version 2 which should be much nicer and out in Q1 2012.
Part of me says to wait for the second version, but part of me is drooling over the Fire. No, it's not an iPad and it lacks a lot of the great features that the iPad has, but it doesn't look like it was designed to compete with the iPad. Instead, it looks like it was targeted towards people like me: People who would love to own an iPad-like device but don't want to pay $600+.
I'll wait for the first reviews when people get their hands on the released versions of the Kindle Fire, but I'm definitely keeping an eye on this tablet.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
It was reported that this device was running a forked version of Android, that was heavily skinned. What if that is not the full case. What if it were more of a custom compatibility layer that allows android apps to run on the Kindle OS, similar to how the Playbook does things. Unlike the Nook Color, the Kindle Fire does not have a storage expansion slot and is limited specifically to the Amazon App store. I understand why they are doing this, but I'm wondering if everyone who assumes this will become a rooted device will be disappointed down the road if they find out it's not running a full Android OS underneath the hood like the Nook Color. I think this is an interesting device, and for Kindle owners, the new e-ink models are nice upgrades. I do believe that those people expecting the Fire to be a top of the line Android tablet that can easily/quickly be rooted will be disappointed. The Fire is a media consumption device, nothing more.
It's really an e-reader, a way for Amazon to sell books. In time, they'll probably give those away.
Is there something more useless then a tablet these days?
Get the basics right (UI, wifi, app store, media store) first.
Next year it gets the camera/microphone, tempting people to upgrade.
To a Lisp hacker, XML is S-expressions in drag.
It has a micro USB port, and that's beautiful about it (and the price, of course). That makes it infinitely more expandable than the device it will inevitably be compared against. Who knows, maybe even a camera+mike combo could be connected to it, so you can make Skype calls after all. And connect a nice external storage with thousands of movies. Etc. etc.....
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
This new Kindle has a 2-stage browser : when you request a web-page its content is accessed by an Amazon server that modifies the text and images to be 'easier' to view on the kindle. Doesn't this mean, in practise, that Amazon provides a filter through which all your surfing choices must pass.
Its only a small step away from Amazon (or Government/Big Business/etc) being able to block content that they don't want you to see, especially if you can't root it or install another browser.
I'm going to go off-topic and AC on this one: is anyone else tired of newsprint-style headlines? No articles, no conjunctions, all capitalized words, and an aversion to simple structures like "analysts say prices will fall" in favor of "'prices will fall, say analysts" or even "Analysts: prices will fall".
Take this headline, "Amazon Kindle Fire Surfaces," or as I internally parse it, "[company] [probably product/maybe verb?] [noun?/verb?] [verb?/plural noun?]". It's a phrase you can really only get a handle of after you've gone over it forwards, backwards, and forward again. And God help you if you should read it incorrectly, or even doubt that you read it correctly, because then you probably asked yourself a half-dozen short questions like "wait, who or what is 'Surfaces' and why did they get fired?".
I find myself in this situation every other day, usually because numerous product names and even common English words like cause, sign, deal can be taken as either nouns or verbs once all the "extra" cues are stripped away from the phrase. Originally, newspapers went to this sort of format as a cost-cutting measure, to reduce "wasted" ink. So what are we saving now? Twenty bytes per page served? Is that really helping Slashdot enough to keep this bizarre cultural artifact around? Is there any reason that we shouldn't just capitalize things that _need_ to be capitalized, include articles when they would normally be used, leave other words well enough alone?
Am I alone here, or are there others out there who have similar "parsing" moments with these headlines?
Once I have that knowledge, I'll use the proper tool (usually a computer) to create content.
The point is that people are likely to end up not even owning a computer. Have you read the recent Slashdot stories about an alleged "post-PC" marketplace?
You have broken my already tiny, coal-black, heart Amazon, just broken it in half...
And the lack of 3G and a pricy wireless plan is a problem because...?
Personally not paying for a built-in phone with yet another wireless plan when WiFi and tethering options abound strikes me as a great idea to keep the price down. If 3G was a necessity then the iPod Touch never got the memo. Your typical 3G iPad w/AT&T service is a $1000 tablet very quickly. Compare that to $199, or even $199 + $79, and Amazon fills a niche totally ignored by Apple.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
So can the Kindle Fire do full-res video at H.264 Main Profile?
I'm not sure why the summary puts such importance on the camera and mic.
I have more cameras than I know what to do with since every freaking device thinks it has to have a camera. A mic has a very small target audience. It should be an add on not something standard.
I say way to keep the cost down. Tablets are finally starting to cost what they should. Other than cool and trendy I've never understood why these devices cost more than a laptop or netbook that they are vastly inferior to.
I find being offended by me offensive.
That's because if a solution handles more edge cases, it probably handles the common case more robustly as well.
That is the classic definition of "feature creep", and usually means it is too complex for most people to use or simply does nothing well.
Handling more edge cases means you spent less time worrying about core functionality.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I've seen the 8GB storage widely cited, but does anybody know what the RAM spec is?
Desktops and Laptops are for creating.
And so are tablets. Get used to it; this is the very definition of "post pc" and is already upon us to some degree. I already prefer drawing on a tablet over a computer.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Am I the only one that half-wishes the Kindle Fire has overheating problems?
No camera in the first generation? Smells familiar. Early adopters beware.
Streamed movies, TV shows, a full browser, email, their own Android market with games and apps (yes, including Angry Birds), intelligent magazines designed for the tablet form factor ...
Just a touch more than your typical e-reader. But hopefully you're right about the giving away ...
Still waiting to hear if the USB port can handle e.g. a hub, webcam, keyboard ... if so, and if it had video out options ... FTW, Amazon!
"Ahh! I see you're in that indeterminate Schrodinger state where - oh, uh
But doesn't RIM's Playbook use it's own OS?
I heard one of the issues they had was attracting developers to it to create content.
This new tablet will use Android so it should already have a bunch of content for people to use.
You may not be able to transmit video off the device, but if you have Prime you can simply watch the same video on a computer connected to your TV (not sure if there are other devices that support the Amazon media services yet).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
There were several back in 2010... I'm sure there are more now.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
This is not the android tablet you are looking for.
My Android phone is $40/month, no contract (with 800 voice minutes, and unlimited text/data). Here's a hint: try one of the smaller companies, such as Virgin Mobile, Boost Mobile, or MetroPCS.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
I'm of the idea that perhaps throwing eight billion things into 'ereaders' is pretty stupid. But this isn't really an ereader.
In fact, in my universe, ereaders all have eink screens and no sound or bluetooth capabilities. (If I want to listen to music over bluetooth, I already have a cell phone. Why are people walking around with their ereaders and not their cell phones? No, the fact that 'audio books' exist does not mean there's crossover.)
Tablets, like laptops, are multimedia devices. Sound, video, text, etc. Just like laptops, sometimes they will come with features like microphones and cameras, and sometimes not.
Ereaders are unimedia devices. They get a screen optimized for reading. They get text, and occasionally some B&W graphics. They have slow refresh, because that's still faster than physically turning a page.
I've got nothing against tablets (I'd probably get a laptop instead, but whatever.), but find this weird overlap where we've decided to call cheap tablets 'ereaders', and then bitch and moan because they have the features of ereaders, and not tablets, very confusing. If there's a 'low-end tablet' market, let's call it that instead of 'ereaders', which is just silly. Ereaders are already a thing.
And, yes, sometimes people read books on tablets...and they sometimes read books on laptops, or cell phones, or whatever. Ereaders are just a thing designed to only read books(1) on. The second it starts really being designed for anything else, let's just call it a tablet, and stop this confusion.
1) Well, and things besides books. Access to Wikipedia or even web sites in general makes sense if it has net access, as does offering a store to buy books or a place to subscribe to magazines. Or even an RSS reader. The important thing is the device is for 'reading', and people are not expecting to, for example, visit youtube or use Skype or write novels or whatever.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
Looks like it from the amazon product page. So, still not interested.
Can someone please comment on the external memory expand-ability?
http://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Color-Multi-touch-Display-Wi-Fi/dp/B0051VVOB2#silk
I have problems with the browser architecture. It works like Opera - where the EC2 servers are establishing all the HTTP (and HTTPS) connections for you, and serving them to you as a single connection to your device. We can already see the security implications here.
According to the FAQs (http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html//ref=amb_link_357584342_3?ie=UTF8&nodeId=200775440&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-21-0&pf_rd_r=1SHACNHH8Q4YV5ERK0Z9&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_p=1321395082&pf_rd_i=B0051VVOB2), the browser authenticates HTTPS certificates on their cloud, and send content over a separate, encrypted connection to your device.
I would not use the Amazon Fire for banking or shopping.
P.S. Im sure the architecture will also throw off ad-serving entities, and piss off Facebook, Google, etc.
... if I'm the only one that has been waiting on this move from Amazon since they started building up their cloud services.
Think about it. they have been building up media services forever and then the cloud services. I was talking about this last year with friends and now it's here.
And the killer is they did it even better than that fruit company did it with about the same hardware basis that the fruit company first brought out. wanna bet it gets a revamp with the next release?
The only thing that could kill the deal is the quality of the Fire. Is it a remake of the 1&1 smartpad only slimmer or more like a trimed down Galaxy? Just offer the Fire in a few differing bundles (music bundled with or books or films) and it could just put a hurt on an already flooded market.
interesting days ahead.
IT Admins Group: Where you decide the content
I fully expect a Cyanogenmod port for this within the coming weeks. I'll buy one as soon as a stable release is out.
Paperback dimensions are the following: A) 4.33" x 7.01" B) 5.12" x 7.8" C) 5.32" x 8.51" E-Reader leaning tablets try to be in the above ballpark. The focus is on novels. More specifically, the focus is on genre fiction like romance, science fiction, and mistory. The Ipad is more focused on magazines and newspapers than it is on novels.
Add a GPS, mic, camera, sd for $300 and I'm sold
So Amazon shouldn't try to slim tablet features down to hit a $199 price point
That's not what I meant. If it came off that way, I apologize. My comment was in fact aimed at the whole "post-PC" mentality, where people will decide not to own a computer, instead relying exclusively on tablets like this.
Should economy cars not be built because they are a barrier of entry for those that want a rear view camera and a high fidelity sound system so they can park in a tight spot while their ears are delighted?
Cars are a lot more moddable than tablets. Features like these can be added to a car with aftermarket parts, just like features can be added to an aftermarket PC. If you want a car analogy, it's more like the pundits are claiming that people are going to buy and own only a motorcycle, and people will just accept that they won't be hauling groceries home. There are limits to modding a motorcycle: if you want to carry a trunkload of groceries, you'll have to buy a whole new car, just like people who own only a tablet will eventually have to buy a whole new computer.
Why does this 7" screen $199 device get SO MUCH comparison to Apple's 10" $499 device, but not 1 iota to it's $229 4" device? Seriously. I mean, if you can compare a Fire to an iPad which is nearly twice as big why not compare it to a Touch which is half as small, but at roughly the same price? Yes, I know the Touch is the bastard forgotten step child of the iPhone, but there is almost nothing it can't do at less than half the price of the iPad. I even make phone calls with it all the time over WiFi. And it has a camera, which also does video, and a mic. I never use it with the headphones b/c I never listen to music with it, just email, browsing and games. But I see no reason to upgrade from a Touch to Fire. And I'm not an Apple fanboi, this is my only Apple device, but it works, and it's relatively inexpensive compared to an iPad. And it fits in all my pockets. I'm not bragging, but I haven't seen anybody mention the $229 iTouch all day, and I think it's a better comparison to a 7" $199 device.
I just bought a kindle for somebody who is trying to re-learn reading after a stroke. I didn't see any mention of text-to-speech capability in the new Kindles.
A bit of a fringe use, I'm sure, but it is REALLY nice for this application since the text and the speech are synced. If it weren't for that one feature I'd certainly have gotten a Nook, which at the time was better in pretty-much every regard that mattered.
According to Engadget, it has a 1GHz TI OMAP dual-core CPU. It's not underpowered by any measure.
http://www.engadget.com/2011/09/28/amazon-fire-tablet-unveiled-7-inch-display-199-price-tag/
It's not an e-book reader primarily, it'll play back any movies, music, and Android games/apps just fine.
I like a lot of things about Amazon.
But I don't buy from them because they think the "community" they live in doesn't matter
This is so tiresome. Amazon is not dodging taxes, its customers are. At worst, Amazon allows deadbeats in the "community" to avoid paying taxes if that is what they want to do. Responsible people report and pay their "use tax" for items bought from Amazon.
The only reason to get this would be is if it has a easier to read e-ink screen otherwise it's a low grade half assed ipad.
Yeah I know. But srsly, can I load Ubuntu on it? With a 32GB SD card it might make a nice machine.
thegodmovie.com - watch it
From the product page:
"System Requirements None, because it's wireless and doesn't require a computer."
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
Grr, I hate this. I'm in Canada, and the Fire is unavailable here. And it may *never* be available here because Amazon hasn't negotiated movie and audio rights north of the border.
You may not see any reason to buy it for yourself. But you're not everyone, and others may view things differently for themselves. For example; not everyone has a fancy smartphone and/or an iPad. I really don't understand why you seem so upset about an ordinary consumer electronics device like this. After all, nobody is forcing you to buy it.
What about handling secure (https) connections?
We will establish a secure connection from the cloud to the site owner on your behalf for page requests of sites using SSL (e.g. https://siteaddress.com/ ).
So essentially, they become the man-in-the-middle so they can better cache your HTTPS content? And their browser is programmed to show this is acceptable/secure... What kind of privacy implications does this introduce? Even if their privacy policy says they won't use the data maliciously, cloud computing isn't a bullet-proof system (i.e., leaks, hacking incidents, etc.). Call me paranoid, but if I read this right, this sounds like a frightening idea.
The fact that they are selling these for $199, and it does most of the stuff that people see other tablets perform, a lot of people are going to give this a shot. I predict that this will be the number one electronic holiday gadget by a mile. Most people want to surf the internet, play some games, listen to music, and watch movies. This thing seems to do all of those thing quite well and has an attractive price point. Plus the fact that Amazon Prime has started to leverage itself as a Netflix alternative with cloud storage is going to be seen as pretty cool, that's why they are giving Kindle Fire buyers Amazon Prime free for a month (the first taste is free) to get them on board.
No, of course you don't sell my iPad, because it is mine. The correct phrase is "I wouldn't sell my iPad just yet if I were you". Logic used to be better here back in the days...
Any word on whether a new DX is on the horizon? The Amazon website almost acts like it doesn't exist any more!
I really like reading on the larger screen, but when I compare the weight to my SO's regular Kindle, the DX feels like a brick.
The Fire doesn't really appeal to me, I'd rather stick with eInk.
and it'll be rooted in 3......2......
After I read about Silk, I began wondering if the Fire is actually just a trojan for Silk.
Imagine the power of knowing every click. Knowing what Adverts are clicked, every product that is viewed. Amazon can target the client in a way that will make Google jealous. Will they start selling adverts next? Will they add or change adverts on your page?
Silk is indeed scary.
It's a device to consume (buy) content from the Amazon store.
I doubt one could load your own ePubs, PDFs or MP3s, then again, you only have 8GB of storage.
Lack of 3G undermines the idea of this being a cloud device that's constantly in touch with the cloud.
Do I really want to be reading a Conde Naste 8.5x11 magazine on a 7" display?
People whine about Apple's closed garden...
...And I love it.
I consider my books basically sacred. I never underline or write on their borders, unlike many people.
I do a lot of note-taking with my (regular, 3G, keyboarded) Kindle. It has really changed my way to interact with a book - So much that it even prompted me to write a program (or do you prefer the Debian package?) to be able to more easily use my annotations from the computer.
You see the word "Android" once - when referring to Amazon's App Store for Android, and that's far down in the page.
http://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Color-Multi-touch-Display-Wi-Fi/dp/B0051VVOB2/ref=amb_link_357575542_7?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=gateway-center-column&pf_rd_r=00NAMFF4675KA3CSQ3SB&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1321408942&pf_rd_i=507846
Funny thing is, you see "iPad" in the first feature.
Amazon is following the Apple playbook here: Focus on customer experience, and put your brand first.
The best thing about a boolean is even if you are wrong, you are only off by a bit.
Apple? Maybe a few sales, but there's enough differentiating factors (camera, 3G, etc), and some people would buy a rotting rat carcass if you stuck an Apple logo on it.
Who really suffers? Samsung, Motorola, etc. All those living in their happy little fantasy world where they can sell an iPad alternative for iPad dollars.
In a year, I'd be surprised if the market of Android tablets isn't cut in half.
The best thing about a boolean is even if you are wrong, you are only off by a bit.
Silk sounds like a web proxy client instead of a web browser. It sounds like it won't be able to get to webservers in my house -- like my router or modem status webpages on the private LAN. That sounds seriously limiting. That means you can't use it as a remote for your home automation system unless Amazon's cloud can get inside your house.
And the only thing still missing from the normal kindles, an SD/miniSD/microSD card slot.
No shit. The first iPad came out over a year and a half ago and everyone cried about the no camera. Now Amazon comes out with a smaller display, less on-device storage, and the apple-haters all say "no camera, no problem." Pshaw!
they upgrade their equipment when/if they do make the leap to something more than what they do now.
Provided they have the money to make such a leap. Children in high school, for example, often do not. So do the working poor who bought a tablet for the family because it was cheaper than a PC.
I know that Amazon will be coming out with a 10" one soon, butI don't think that Amazon is going to make the 10" model as competitive on the price front.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I received a personally addressed message from Jeff telling me how they've reduced the price of the kindle and made it all better, for me. Then I went to the US site and found out about the new Kindle Fire.
I hate US companies that think they can fool me into buying an out of date device based on my location...
OK: I get that this is a "media consumption device" as a general thing: Amazon wants you to buy stuff from them, with this as the end-point. That's fine, and causes me no moral misgivings.
HOWEVER: I would like to buy one, if it had more options to actually extend it later. I believe there are now chipsets with GPS, bluetooth, and Wi-Fi on one additional chip, and even a cheap camera would be enough for a lot of the coolest apps that a tablet of this size / power would be perfect for. Sort of like the Nook Color -- if it had a few extra bits, I'd happily pay for it, even if only to reflash.
timothy
jrnl: http://tinyurl.com/c2l8yr / foes: http://tinyurl.com/ckjno5
Children in high school, for example, often do not.
And they shouldn't (unless they work part so that they can buy their own shit.) Parents and/or schools are the ones to provide equipment for them.
"I already bought you a tablet/smartphone/game console. Why do you need a computer too? Do I look like I'm made of money?"
content creation, which is only an edge case of the much general case of content usage.
The fact that this is the case, the fact that the industrialized world has become a consumer culture as opposed to a participatory culture, is my primary complaint. But I'm willing to drop my complaint about this particular tablet the moment that I know that it has "Unknown sources".
The camera use is not only for taking birthday pictures, you can scan barcodes too.
Even Amazon understands this - they are advertising an "app" on TV, that lets you "scan a barcode or qr" and tells you its price and other info directly from Amazon.
The problem is that this app will NEVER be available on kindle, because kindle doesn't do barcode reading. How stupid can that be!
Being "books" its original business, the Kindle with a camera should allow you to scan/capture the ISBN of a book or bar code off a CD or video and give you the chance to purchase it directly from Amazon using your Amazon account. I don't think even the ipods have an app for that.
Mic - same thing, although not that critical...play a song, detect/identify it, allow you to buy it.
That simplicity is what makes apples so great.
What does this has to do with hardware manufacturers
Hardware manufacturers make the choice as to whether or not to cryptographically lock down the products that they sell. There are several devices marketed for consuming that would be capable of being used for creating if not for such lockdown. Hardware manufacturers also make the choice as to how they segment the market and price their products. Video game console manufacturers, for example, charge an order of magnitude more for the creation device than for the consumption device. At prices like these, nobody at home will be able to afford tools for creating; therefore, nobody at home will have tools to create.
Nice how you ignore the possibility of a HS kid going to work part-time
I declined to mention this possibility because high school freshmen, sophomores, and juniors are under age 18 and therefore have severe state-imposed restrictions on how, where, and when they can work. Many states allow no employment at all for children under 16.
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