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Amazon Fire Phone

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Re: Amazon Fire Phone

#61

Post by mech4bg »

gambiting wrote: post #30

So hang on....are you telling me that $199 is the cheapest price WITH A CONTRACT?? Obviously things are different in the US,but in UK it's almost unfathomable to be paying anything for the phone if you are getting a contract. Sometimes the latest iphone will have an upfront cost of 29 pounds, but it's rare.

That's normal in the US. The difference here is that there is no specific price point you have to get on - I've been moving up and down with how much I pay each month on my contract, which I couldn't do in Australia. The contract termination fees are also much lower, and if you're on family plans the month to month costs can go down drastically.

Re: Amazon Fire Phone

#62

Post by frik »

How does the Mayday on-device tech support work?

  Amazon expert will appear to help you via live video
Will it be a Siri/Cortana like AI agent or a human from a Amazon call center?

Re: Amazon Fire Phone

#63

Post by pbhjpbhj »

talles wrote: post #28

Kinda unfortunate for Firefox OS guys. Amazon's Fire Phone OS is called Fire OS... definitely gonna confuse some folks...

Sounds like a trademark case waiting to happen but looking it seems neither "firefox os" nor "fire os" is trademarked in EU or US.

Re: Amazon Fire Phone

#64

Post by comatose_kid »

Multiple cameras are interesting. It would be neat if the phone could use eye-tracking to auto-scroll content as your eyes reach the bottom of the screen (books would be good use-case - perhaps they are already doing this)

Re: Amazon Fire Phone

#65

Post by evilduck »

MBCook wrote: post #55
mmanfrin wrote: post #7

This seems compelling if you're already sold on the Amazon ecosystem, but not terribly so if you're not -- especially at that price.

As an iPhone user, I already have access to the important parts of the Amazon ecosystem (books, music, movies, TV shows). But I have a superior app store. The only big feature I think could prove important is their live-chat help.

It seems like most of their Firefly feature is also available through Amazon's 'Flow' iOS app

Re: Amazon Fire Phone

#66

Post by asafira »

My two cents: First, I'm actually surprised as to how much they are selling the dynamic perspective, and I think I'm actually more interested in how well firefly works. Dynamic perspective may be very "cool", but I'm not convinced it's not just another fad --- will it change the way I work with my device? Will it empower people? I don't see it as a transformative technology, and it's almost as gimmicky as (if not as gimmicky as) some of the extra "features" you get when you buy a galaxy S phone.

Firefly has a chance though. I've spent some time with google goggles before, and I wasn't super impressed (have they updated it much recently?) --- on the other hand, I've had some success with Amazon's Flow app, in which you point your camera towards a product (in a store, for example), and it tells you the Amazon price for it. Will Firefly work well enough for people to rely on it on the host of use-cases that Amazon gave in its presentation?

Other quick thoughts: Amazon claims some great battery life on the page, but didn't mention it at all in their presentation today. Also, it's kind of weird to think I would have 6 cameras on me at any point in time. Are those cameras accessible to developers, beyond their dynamic display apk? Lastly, how will this compare with google's "Project Tango" efforts?

Re: Amazon Fire Phone

#68

Post by TrainedMonkey »

This phone will find a market amongst amazon addicts. While not bleeding edge, specs are somewhat solid[0].

However what set Kindle Fire apart from competition and allowed it to gain foothold in the market was competitive pricing, I see none of that here. Amazon is obviously making a bet that software they are shipping with the phone will be a killer feature that will overcome the shortcomings, I do not think broader market will agree.

[0] Until you look at the price and AT&T only lock in, considering that, specs are mediocre at best.

Re: Amazon Fire Phone

#69

Post by Zelphyr »

Sounds like this phone does a good job of solving Amazon's problem of getting customers to buy more from them. I don't see how it makes my life any easier though.

3D? Ok, that is really cool. 2D hasn't really been a limiting factor for me though.

One-handed navigation and autoscrolling? Wow, that just sounds terrible. I'm trying to read and my kid bumps my arm. Now where am I on the page? And how do I quickly get back to where I was?

Mayday seems nice but then if the phone is that intuitive I can't see needing it much. Loss leader for them I guess.

Tangle-free premium headset. Finally, a feature I would pay money for. Seriously. Do they sell these separately? Because I want.

Re: Amazon Fire Phone

#70

Post by JohnTHaller »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #54
JohnTHaller wrote: post #42

From my post in another thread: It's $199 with a 2 year contract with AT&T, meaning it's a $649 phone (now confirmed). It's priced with other 'premium' phones like the iPhone 5S and the Galaxy S5 (both $199 with a 2 year contract, $649 off contract at AT&T). Unfortunately, Amazon's other products like the Kindle Fire are anything but premium hardware and software-wise. On the software side this is partially due to th…

How is this remotely competitive in a world full of $179 Moto G's? $219 Moto G LTE's? Or even a $350 Nexus? This seems like a phone from two or three years ago where $650 for a non-premium brand would have been passable. I just bought a Moto G LTE for my wife and its a wonderful phone. I don't see what Amazon would bring to the table for an extra $420. That's almost 10 months of service right there.

I don't think it is. Except for people who buy on-contract and don't know better about the pricing and features compared to other phones. Heck, you're even stuck with Amazon's Silk browser... there's no Firefox or Chrome in the Amazon App Store... so most users can forget about syncing this with anything.
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