Can Amazon stand above the fray and make sense of the Android / tablet mess?

Interesting.  If you had asked me who would be building a tablet, Amazon wouldn't have been in my top 10 responses, but I think it makes a lot of sense. 

Nice "we want to rule the world" letters to the shareholders...

 

_Man_

 

This would be interesting.

 

I spent a couple hours playing with my dad's Kindle. I searched, found, downloaded, and read the trial chapter of John Scalzi's "Old Man's War". Then, after my dead bought a Philip K. Dick short story collection, read two short stories. I was fairly impressed. After getting over the device's physical awkwardness (after nine months of iPhone use), it was a pleasant experience. The device-store integration is part of what I like so much about my iPhone. And the ability to trivially get free and paid content onto the device meets or exceeds my expectations.

 

And as I've considered the comments in the "How to Beat Apple" thread, and my own "you've got to be awesome" opinion, I feel that it's not about individual hardware or software features, but the collective experience. Apple gives me a world to play in, software, hardware, content that all work together easily. And I can also put my own stuff in too, easily (be it ripped DVDs or Kindle books).

 

And then there's my experience with Verizon, seeing what happens when company with no sales-reason to be a good retailer tries to become a retailer: FAIL, as the kids say.

 

So Amazon: they've got it all. They're a killer retailer and are known for high-quality customer service. They've got fingers in all media and have been running the largest ebook store for a couple years now. And they recognize that they're essentially a giant online, web-services supercomputer with a retail store bolted on; that portends the ability to launch a full-featured "cloud" system to service mobile devices. They've got some experience with cell carriers, having negotiated the Kindle's free wireless access. And they've got experience in actual hardware, with the Kindle.

 

Amazon could do it, perhaps. But I won't guess if they can really pull it off. It will be interesting to see. :)

They don't have it all. But they have a culture of providing excellent customer satisfaction and of selling affordable things to zillions of people. Couple that with Android, and you might have a real jump up in Android's total system.

Is the Tegra slower, comparable, or faster than the iPad's A5?

I will agree with this.  Amazon's customer service is pretty impeccable.   I have never had anything where I couldn't have Amazon sort it out quickly.  I order from them on a weekly basis and it's like clockwork.   Their Prime membership is one of the best "opt-in" policies out there outside of the Costco card I've found anywhere.

Huh...  If they're just outsourcing the whole thing, design and all, then it probably won't be much better than other tablets already out there now...

 

_Man_

 

I was going to speculate that Amazon isn't a software house and wouldn't fork Android, at least not immediately. But then I just saw a DaringFireball about Amazon possibly having a dedicated software team working on a substantial variation of Android designed for their own goals.

http://daringfireball.net/linked/2011/07/14/siegler-amazon-tablet

 

The WSJ article seemed silly in its discussion of potential tablet pricing. Apple too could sell the iPad at cost and make it up on content sales. But they don't because they like big profits. And by that reasoning, Amazon could presumably sell the Kindle for even less, making it up on book sales. But they don't, seeing as they still haven't broken $99. So will Amazon sell a tablet at cost and make it up off MP3 and Kindle sales? I'm skeptical.

I hope they do fork Android and make it better, but keep it compatible enough w/ (and open to) whatever good stuff already exists in the Android ecosystem.  If nothing else, would be good to at least have some of the Google core apps, including Maps and Navigation -- yeah, turn-by-turn GPS on a tablet seems excessive, but hey, I'd like to keep an open mind about that, especially if I end up going for something on the smaller side.

 

I probably wouldn't want what B&N did w/ the Nook Color for a full-fledged Amazon Android tablet.  They can call it whatever they want (and just marginize the Android name for all I care), but it needs to not block/lock-out the entire rest of the Android world like was done by B&N for their NC (for the most part so far sans rooting the device).  Of course, I guess the current Amazon (Android) App Store already points to them not likely to go down the B&N route...

 

_Man_

 

Why is every rumor: they'll sell each unit at a loss and make it up in volume? We're talking about Amazon, not the international Bank of change, right? The  Kindle's aren't  sold at a loss, are they? Why would Amazon take a bigger loss on tablets? Will they make so much more money on selling media than Apple does  that they can justify a loss leader hardware device?

Well, if you already have some sort of sizeable following and no real competition, you can probably afford to do it w/out some sort of loss leader, but if you're trying to break into a market that's already dominated by some industry giant and have not been known for delivering great products of this type, then that's a whole other story and you probably need to seriously consider options like going the loss leader route me thinks.

 

That's not to say Amazon can't possibly succeed w/out using the loss leader approach, but it's certainly gonna be a big uphill battle for them.  And if you consider the fact that they're *already* using the loss leader approach to plant seeds (via daily free app offers) for their entry into that market, there's certainly some probability that they may just continue down that road to some extent w/ the eventual hardware product (at least for the near term).  Maybe all the seeds they're planting (along w/ the rest of the Android world) will be enough to help them jump into the tablet market w/out selling the hardware as a loss leader... or maybe not...

 

_Man_

 

Good to have more details on it, but doesn't really sound like what I'll likely get at least in its first incarnation anyway -- sounds too much like a Nook Color, except it'll probably run more smoothly and will have more apps, but w/out any memory/storage expandability despite the very limited built-in capacity...

 

_Man_

 

Hehheh...  Well, it would be worth considering for my wife perhaps, if we didn't already have a Nook Color.   But since it sounds to be a bit too much like the NC w/ some moderate diffs, it's not likely to be compelling enough for us -- that's really all I meant by that comment.

 

Anyway, I'm definitely very interested to see how Amazon's approach and offerings play out in actual practice and will not rule out the possibility of owning one of their tablets some time down the line... although I must admit to being a tad disappointed to hear that they probably won't be bundling Google Maps and Nav (not that Apple offers a full bundle w/ the best parts of Google Nav on its iOS devices either, of course)...  I wonder though how their eventual(?) 3G(?) offerings will work out (eg. w/ the wireless providers) since these devices will have internet access which their non-Android Kindles do not...

 

_Man_

 

Putting my two cents in here because I'm technically illiterate and want to get notices of future postings/updates (hopefully) from you guys on Amazon's tablet - pros and cons.

If I'm not misunderstanding you, Man, the Kindle 3 actually does have internet access. Slower than molasses and a nightmare to navigate, but it's there. Amazon portrays it as 'experimental', and encourages people's opinions. Maybe a beta/dry run for the tablet?

I'd love it if Amazon was able to somehow keep its e-Ink feature on a tablet, but as long as I can access the 'net, watch videos and download books in the great outdoors, I'll be reasonably happy - at the right price! The iPad is too rich for my blood.

Andrew,

 

If the rumored info from that Tech Crunch report is accurate, then Amazon's upcoming Android-based offering may well suit you best amongst what are expected to be available in the near future, except (as I was wondering in my allusion) it's unclear how 3G internet access would fit into the business model and, more importantly, what it'd mean to your own bottomline.

 

I took a quick look at the current Kindle, and the internet access that currently offers seems limited to use of WiFi, not the mobile wireless data access I was talking about, eg. 3G data service via one of the big telecom providers, which is what you'd probably need for "the great outdoors".  If you need to use 3G data service for that, then that's probably gonna add a whole lot to the cost of ownership based on current business models unless Amazon somehow manages to swing some other sort of deal w/ the telecom providers to make it much less expensive to the end-user.  The rumored price diff of the hardware would likely be rather small compared to the cost of data service in the grand scheme of things, so you may still be best off simply choosing the more expensive device (eg. iPad) in the long run as long as it's clearly the best by a sizable margin...

 

If, OTOH, you're like some of us and already own something -- however inferior (or not) to the iPad or iPhone -- that works fine enough right now, then that would likely impact how you view the current/upcoming offerings -- and that's why I compared this rumored Android-based Kindle to the Nook Color in the way that I did (even though I'm guessing the Amazon offering will likely have significantly more pros than cons vs the NC)...

 

And for your own personal shopping research, maybe you might want to check out the Nook Color in person at a B&N store to get a sense of what Amazon's offering might feel a bit like, if that Tech Crunch report is correct.  I'm sure the Amazon device experience won't be quite like the Nook Color just as the iPad is not quite like one of the standard Android tablets, but you'll probably get a sense of what to expect (except I'm guessing it should likely offer a better, smoother experience) since it sounds like it'll be targeted to compete directly against the NC, which is basically old tech that it should easily leapfrog at this point...

 

_Man_

 

Edited by ManW_TheUncool - 9/5/11 at 3:02am

One more thing about the 3G internet access thing.  If the Tech Crunch rumor is correct, including how much Amazon's offering will rely on the Cloud, then perhaps, there's some likelihood that Amazon will actually work out some other sort of business model w/ the telecom providers to make the data access less expensive to the end-user -- perhaps, it'll be at least partially subsidized by Amazon's own products and services... or maybe not...

 

_Man_

 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004HZYA6E/ref=s9_pop_gw_g349_ir06?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=1CA14CBHYSHXJJ10B983&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1263340922&pf_rd_i=507846

Thanks very much for the info, Man. I keep forgetting about the wireless connectivity, which again the Kindle 3 does offer for free (the $189 model sells for $139 if you accept ads, which only appear after you close down the device - so far it's either been Visa or Amazon itself). Price was again the factor in choosing the Kindle over an NC, but I miss color. Web pages look really weird in b/w!

However, some rumors have it that free 3G will be contingent on how much of a loss (apparently a given) Amazon will be willing to bear on its tablets. If it doesn't come free, I'll just have to rely on Wi-Fi accessibility and fall back on whatever I've saved outside those areas. Depends of course on price, but I'd rather pay a little more upfront for the unit than suffer another monthly bill (your second paragraph seems to imply that 3G comes free with the iPad - is this correct?)

Finally, CBS reports today that a German court has ordered Samsung to pull its Galaxy 7.7 from an electronics fair in Berlin. Sales of the tablet were already banned after Apple claimed the Galaxy copies its iPad. Article quotes an electronics trader as saying the charge is exaggerated, that "these products can't be made any other way." (Makes me wonder if Gutenberg ever sued later manufacturers of printing presses, but then his invention was itself an adaptation of existing technologies....:).

(On the Samsung issue, it's just an injunction for now. The court will rule on Friday on the merits. That'll be interesting...!)