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The Fire phone debacle

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Re: The Fire phone debacle

#111

Post by maherbeg »

mschuster91 wrote: post #102
girvo wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Apple TV doesn't have voice recognition. I wish it did, Siri to control it would be brilliant (and it's a lovely machine regardless). > Pre-authentication seems insecure. Do you mind explaining how? Because I can't see it.

All it needs is the postman confusing two packages (or the wrong phone in the correct parcel) and a stranger has total access to your account.

Do you really think the password is on the device instead of using some sort of revokable token authentication mechanism?

Re: The Fire phone debacle

#112

Post by deciplex »

blisterpeanuts wrote: post #78

In my opinion, Amazon should have gone with a generic budget phone to augment their "Amazon Basics" line of dependable, economical cables, USB hubs, and so forth. I would make it a plain, vanilla Nexus-like phone running vanilla Android with no skins and not tied to any contracts or carriers, but priced $50 less than a comparable Nexus 5 or whatever is the current Nexus. Or else, make it about $400 but throw in a yea…

I'd get this too, providing they really did just make a no bullshit phone with stock Android and no stupid skin like HTC and Samsung phones. I've been using Nexus phones for a number of years, but looking for alternatives now that Google has jumped on board the 'we don't know the fucking difference between a phone and a tablet' bandwagon. An extra app store in addition to (definitely not instead of) would be fine, and I'd probably use it.

But I'm not buying a Fire, obviously.

Re: The Fire phone debacle

#113

Post by rasz_pl »

dotBen wrote: post #83
blisterpeanuts wrote: post #78

In my opinion, Amazon should have gone with a generic budget phone to augment their "Amazon Basics" line of dependable, economical cables, USB hubs, and so forth. I would make it a plain, vanilla Nexus-like phone running vanilla Android with no skins and not tied to any contracts or carriers, but priced $50 less than a comparable Nexus 5 or whatever is the current Nexus. Or else, make it about $400 but throw in a yea…

The whole point of the exercise is not to just ship volumes of units, but build an ecosystem (just like what Apple and Google are doing too) . A budget phone doesn't work because it won't be geared up to play the music and video and all of the other traits Amazon is looking at with it's 'Fire' ecosystem. > Forget the lame Amazon AppStore, or at least provide both -- AppStore and Google Play, and let the customer choo…

>A budget phone doesn't work because it won't be geared up to play the music and video

wait what? do you realize even $40 chinese phones are 2 core 1GHz with dedicated hardware decoders for every popular codec?

Re: The Fire phone debacle

#115

Post by kbrwn »

E-ink is what made Amazon a device company. Copying the Yota phone seems like it would have been a better bet then going with the 3D gimmick. Yota has a really interesting product but hasn't really gained support due to a few issues (there isn't really Android SDK support for e-ink screens) that Amazon could have easily solved.

Re: The Fire phone debacle

#116

Post by killface »

jph wrote: post #14

The Fire phone is a gorgeous hardware success in my opinion -- if you try it, it's fast and sleek. The Firefly scanner is super-convenient for shopping. The show-stopper issue for me is the UI. It feels as if screen elements are sloshing, or hard to find, and the UI is hard to use when I'm in motion. I expect the UI will be easy for Amazon to solve. The phone is a version 1 and a strong debut -- even if it didn't sel…

Someone who isn't me helped work on this portion of the project. The system UI was written and re-written a half dozen times. They tried to do it internally, they tried design agencies, they tried consultants, and all failed miserably. Not because they sucked, but because the Amazon management team was nearly impossible to deal with. Developers would get conflicting requirements from multiple stakeholders, who would then argue like children. You had managers who would throw a tantrum if they didn't get a pet feature in. Etc, etc.

The last I heard, they basically downloaded the android OS, and re-wrote all of the system UI framework components. Of course, this meant that most android apps broke because they failed to make all of the options functional, so they spent somewhere around twice the time fixing issues as they did writing them.

Re: The Fire phone debacle

#117

Post by LordHumungous »

blisterpeanuts wrote: post #78

In my opinion, Amazon should have gone with a generic budget phone to augment their "Amazon Basics" line of dependable, economical cables, USB hubs, and so forth. I would make it a plain, vanilla Nexus-like phone running vanilla Android with no skins and not tied to any contracts or carriers, but priced $50 less than a comparable Nexus 5 or whatever is the current Nexus. Or else, make it about $400 but throw in a yea…

I have one, its called the Moto G. It comes with near stock Android, it costs $200 without a contract, and I freaking love it. To see the future of cell phones look at the story PC's: prices will fall and quality will become uniformly high- and margins will become razor thin, except for premium brands (aka Apple). This is a tough, tough kind of market for any company to enter.

Re: The Fire phone debacle

#119

Post by elarkin »

megaultra wrote: post #11
sekasi wrote: post #10

Bold or irresponsible move? Not sure. Given the incredibly low profit margin of most non-iphone smartphones on the market today (I think the average samsung profit margin on a phone is $11) I can't help but wonder what the real source of revenue was planned to be. Increased shopping through mobile? Make your android/ios products better? It just never made any sense, but I guess many successful products don't make ini…

Of course it's for increased shopping through mobile. My daughter bought a Kindle and she admitted her ebook purchases have increased tenfold . Others have told me similar. I'm deathly afraid to get one for the same reason. Frictionless purchases and vertical channel integration makes perfect sense to me.

My ebook purchases also skyrocketed after I got a Kindle. But it didn't rise because the kindle made it easy to buy ebooks, or even because I prefer ebooks (for technical stuff, I actually don't). It's because I was reading a lot more. I went from 1 or 2 books a year (if even) to 1 to 2 books a week.

My experience is anecdotal, but it might be worthwhile to ask your acquaintances why they buy so many ebooks after buying a Kindle.

Re: The Fire phone debacle

#120

Post by ewzimm »

blisterpeanuts wrote: post #78

In my opinion, Amazon should have gone with a generic budget phone to augment their "Amazon Basics" line of dependable, economical cables, USB hubs, and so forth. I would make it a plain, vanilla Nexus-like phone running vanilla Android with no skins and not tied to any contracts or carriers, but priced $50 less than a comparable Nexus 5 or whatever is the current Nexus. Or else, make it about $400 but throw in a yea…

I have seen so many people blame Amazon for not including Google Play, but this is really Google's decision. In order to use Google Play Services, you need to make all of Google's services default and unremovable. This was done specifically so companies like Amazon could not include it on devices meant to push competing services. Even though I use plenty of Google software, I am more than happy to see them have competition. They honestly do not have enough, and I am glad Amazon is working to offer an alternative to total Google control on Android. Android is fine now, but increasing centralization is not going to benefit anyone but Google. Acquiescing and becoming just another company pushing Google services would be a terrible move for Amazon.
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