Kindle updates: As expected, today’s Amazon event included official confirmation for a multitude of new Kindle devices. The Kindle Fire HD will be offered in 7 ($199) and 8.9-inch ($299) varieties, while the company’s e-reader has been rebranded the Kindle Paperwhite ($119 with Wi-Fi or $179 3G/Wi-Fi). The original Kindle Fire ($159) will also receive an update, and Amazon will jump into the data game with a variety of plans for their Kindle Fire HD 4G LTE ($499) starting at $49.99 a year for 250Mb per month. (Photo via The Verge) source
It seems to me that unlike so many other Apple rivals, Amazon actually does a good job with buzz surrounding their events. Tonight, they debuted a commercial during the NFL kickoff that clearly teases out some new Kindles (the current Kindle Touch readers have a silver bezel, not the charcoal one found in the commercial — which looks great).
This isn’t something Apple would do, but that’s fine. No one says everyone has to do everything exactly as Apple would do it (no, not even me) — in fact, I think it’s good that Amazon has their own style.
As a result, I find myself actually interested/excited for what they announce tomorrow. New Kindles? New Kindle Fires (though I disagree with Bryan Bishop, I think the commercial still only shows one size, as was previously reported by CNet — we’ll see)? A phone?!
Who thinks Amazon is going to do something cool today?
» It’s an estimate based off of Amazon’s evasiveness. They said that customers “purchased well over 1 million Kindle devices per week” in the month of December. Sales of Kindle e-books were up 175% from last year’s period between Black Friday and Christmas; so while Amazon may not give us clear numbers, the company seems to be doing well in the fields it created.
» Why is the PlayBook flopping? If you asked RIM, you’d get an answer that sounds pretty jargon-y: “Recent shifts in the competitive dynamics of the tablet market and a delay in the release of the PlayBook OS 2.0 software.” Here’s the English version of that answer: “The iPad, the Nook Tablet and the Kindle Fire.” But that’s just us talking. Meanwhile, RIM has been trimming the price of the PlayBook from an absurd $500 to as low as $199 — in part to clear inventory for the next version of the device, though we’re guessing the fact that other seven-inch tablets are selling for roughly that price doesn’t help.
Kindle and Kindle Fire to have a lending library: The program, which launched today, allows readers to borrow one title at a time per month; when they rent a new title, the previous one will leave their device. Sounds like…not the best plan in the world. The library has over 5,000 titles for readers to choose from, so it’s a little limited. Also, the service is only available to users of Amazon’s Prime service, which costs $79 a year. Stock up! source
This makes Amazon like your ISP. Every site, everything you do online [through Silk] will go through Amazon. That’s a new role for someone like them, and I don’t think it’s at all clear that Amazon can step into that, or that it will be apparent to consumers.Center for Democracy & Technology spokesperson Aaron Brauer-Rieke • Offering up this claim that Amazon will use Silk, which Amazon claims will help speed up Web sites on the Amazon Kindle Fire, as a tracking tool. To that, we say this: Are you guys familiar with this Web browser called Opera Mini? It’s not as common as it once was, but for people using old-school phones, it was a bit of a lifesaver. It made the Motorola Razr, for example, a far more usable phone for surfing the Web, due to the way it handles content — through the company’s own servers, which cleared out all the extra stuff and sped up the sites you were downloading. Sound familiar? It’s exactly what Amazon Silk claims to do. Not buying this whole privacy argument. source (via • follow)
“Fire” still looks cool, though: We kind of hate the pretentiousness of this entire ad. Amazon just released this ad to promote the new Kindle Fire … which appears to imply that a Voltaire quote inspired the name. Steve Jobs is probably cursing the hipster marketers at Amazon for just being so dang indie. How can the iPad compete with that?! source
The Kindle Fire launch today is big news. Amazon is putting out a game-changer: a low-priced tablet with an awesome user interface (UI). We’ve seen cheap tablets placed on the market before, we’ve seen well-designed tablets (cough iPad cough), but never a product that combined the two qualities.
This will be a real game changer. For my fellow journalists, a major question we’re dealing with right now is the multi-platform one. How do we simultaneously produce for print, web, mobile and tablet? For writers, this is a minor issue. For producers, designers and photographers, this is a major one.
Good analysis on what the Kindle Fire means for us content schlubs.
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