Slashdot Mirror
Amazon's 3D Smartphone As a (Useful) Gimmick
Steve Patterson (2850575) writes It's rumored that Amazon will launch its own 3D smartphone on June 18. While it may be compelling, a sexy 3D feature won't catapult Amazon into the lead of the cut-throat smartphone category. If this were true, the EVO 3D, introduced two years ago by HTC and the W960, introduced by Samsung four years ago, would have been top sellers rather than niche products. However, a smartphone that renders 3D images does present an internet retailing opportunity for Amazon. It would be useful to Amazon in selling tangible consumer merchandise, just like Amazon's Kindle Fire tablet was designed to improve Amazon's merchandising of ebooks and video streaming products. What else would you like to use a 3D phone for?
Amazon has deals with lots of network operators around the world, giving Kindles download access on their networks. I'd happily live with gimmicky 3D if I could check my emails for free without hunting down airport wifi.
primarily, it will be used for 3D sexting.
secondly, it will be used for watching tiny movies.
You know what it won't be used for? Reading Hachette books or ordering Warner Bros DVDs and BluRays.
When I purchased Amazon Prime.
Fuck your porn.
Oh, wait.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
I keep cutting my fingers on my 2D smartphone. And it sucks when I lay it down on a flat surface.
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
An unspecified feature for an unannounced product, but we already know exactly what's wrong with it and why it will fail.
It will be epic
p0rn, duh
Because Slashdot has such a great history of predicting product success.
Hell if you want to impress me, make a 2D phone. That'd be pretty cool unless you drop it on it's side and chop off your foot.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is kinky.
My old phone is an LG Thrill. Geat phone when it was released. Had a 3D camera so you could take 3D pictures. Reasonable 3D rendering ON THE PHONE. That's the problem. You could take 3D pictures but only people with another LG Thrill could view them in 3D. You couldn't even share just one of the two images from the stereoscopic image since neither image was actually "correct" when viewed alone. You had to view the 3D images on an LG Thrill. Dumb.
Oh yeah. It also had the ability to play 3D games. I don't play games so that was another useless feature. Also, I'm sorry but the idea behind 3D movies, games, what have you is to make the experience "immersive". It's really hard to feel immersed when you have this little teeny, tiny smartphone screen. Lifesized 3D on a wall sized 4K screen is immersive.
Cheers,
Dave
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.
Ben
Your comments were negative and depressing, not cheerful.
Will I have to wear red/green or polarizing glasses to recognize anything on my phone? Will I have to carry spare cardboard glasses if I want to show a girl at the bar my latest photos?
thegodmovie.com - watch it
Making 3D video phone calls?
Maps could be made much easier to read with 3D as you could focus on a "layer" much easier and see buildings/etc in relief to get a better view of landmarks.
You use your phone to make calls? When were you born grampa, the 20th century?
That does it. I'm slamming down the receiver on you.
While it may be compelling, a sexy 3D feature won't catapult Amazon into the lead of the cut-throat smartphone category. If this were true, the EVO 3D, introduced two years ago by HTC and the W960, introduced by Samsung four years ago, would have been top sellers rather than niche products.
If that was a logical conclusion from the lacklustre sales four years ago, then nothing new would ever get off the ground.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
A 3D phone is much easier to hold than a 2D phone.
-- Cheers!
for porn. What else?
If Amazon wanted to sell me things, they would not have chosen to engage in sub-ethical business practices.
They are simply going to have to get by without my custom.
They feared that it could be used to suppress protest or support unpopular rule.
The 3DS has the same problem, it can take 3D photos, but you can only see them on the 3DS. I have used that feature on my 3DS exactly 4 times (mostly just to show to other people it is there.)
3D movies are a fad but 3D photographs can be quite spectacular. Unfortunately, viewing is an issue requiring either a special viewing device or expensive printing. It's a shame but it is what it is.
I bought a 3D camera based on some pictures taken with my daughter's 3DS. I had also played with creating some 3D pictures with a "snap, two paces right, snap" method. There's definitely something that the added depth brings to some scenes (some more than others) that isn't present in a regular picture. It requires a little thought about the composition though so may not be so useful on a phone mostly used for instagram pictures.
If you have a way to view 3D at all, hop over to Phereo.com. I think some of my pictures are under the same name as here.
When I view the stereoscope images off camera, they "don't match" with regard to color. Just a slightly different hue but very noticeable. A 2D shot of the same scene matches neither of the stereoscope pair and matches the "real" colors.
Stereoscpic photography has been around for a long time. It just takes shooting the same scene twice but from two slightly different points. My family at one time had a 35mm film camera that had two lenses,etc and could be used to take stereoscopic photograph pairs. You needed a special viewer to view them to get the 3D effect and you burned twice as much film but it was really cool. The lenses were about as far apart as an adult's eyes.
How far apart were the levses on your 3D EVO? The twin lenses on the Thrill are only maybe half an inch apart. Don't know if LG had to resort to some other trickery to get 3D effects with the lenses that close.
Cheers,
Dave
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.
Ben