Kindle Review – Kindle Fire Review, Kindle 4 Review

There is some discussion in the New York Times’ Bits Blog on whether or not Amazon will open up the Kindle to developers.

Update: Apparently, this topic i.e. Kindle App Store Pros and Cons was covered on this blog exactly one month ago.

There’s a really easy answer to that – Not Likely.

Look at how Apple is getting treated i.e. Apple are going through a PR fiasco and a FTC investigation because they won’t let Google take over the iPhone with Google Voice.

What pipeline/channel owner in its right mind would open up its platform/pipeline after seeing that.

Amazon will not open up the Kindle because it lets in their Enemies.

Here’s the thing – what’s stopping Google or Barnes & Noble from creating an app that takes over reading on the Kindle?

It’s a trend that’s getting increasingly pronounced i.e.

1. Google Voice was taking over the basic calling function of the iPhone and rejecting it got Apple into trouble.  
2. Google released an IE plug-in that runs their Chrome Browser in IE6. All Microsoft can do is talk about the security implications.

Basically, opening up the Kindle would be letting every ebook retailer and every competitor into the Kindle.

Amazon will not open up the Kindle because it kills unitasking

Read this little para from the Brad Stone NY Times article -

Companies like Facebook or Goodreads could add social features to the Kindle; game developers like Zynga could create non graphics-intensive games like poker or chess for the device.

Let’s look at them in order -

1. Facebook mobile already sort of works. Besides it’s one of the biggest time-sinks ever.
2. Why open up to GoodReads? Amazon would rather have reviews and connections formed through Amazon.
3. Let Zynga create poker and chess? So that people stop reading and Amazon stops making money off of books.

The deal with apps in general is that the overwhelming majority do one of few things -

1. Waste people’s time – spending 20 hrs on a tetris like game. 
2. Hook people into a ‘life resources accumulating’ simulation and then make them buy ‘virtual goods’.
3. Charge people for a higher end app that provides a service or a game that is NOT reading.

Would Amazon rather make -

• 30-50% of $1 on an app that a Kindle Owner spends 10 hrs on; OR 
• 50-65% of $10 on an ebook that the same Kindle Owner buys and reads in less than 10 hrs.

Easy answer, isn’t it?

Good Apps are totally outweighed by Bad Apps and the danger of losing the Kindle

Let’s walk through what would happen if Amazon opened up the Kindle -

Good Beginnings

This is when there would a majority of apps that help reading and improve the kindle reading experience.  

1. Someone (hopefully me) would code a great folders app. Kindle Owners would love it and it’d be a big hit.  
2. A good, reading-helpful feature like a thesaurus would get added. 
3. Organization apps like Tags, Libraries, etc. would get added.

Difficult Middle Part

This is where the first competitor trojan horses would appear and the first attempts to subvert the eco-system.  

1. A few time wasting apps would appear.
2. Competitors would start releasing Trojan horses in the App Store. For example, Sony creating a book search app that lists Sony store titles first.
3. Someone would add in ePub support. Which is exactly the sort of ‘politically correct, altruism as a strategy’ stuff Amazon doesn’t want.

Terrible Ending

The equivalent of Apple’s Google Voice torment –  

1. A company like Sony or Google would have an App that completely takes over buying and reading books.  
2. Some small company would set up a subscription service that lets readers read a million free books from the public domain for $3 a month.
3. Companies would start hooking kindle owners with virtual gifts and other made-up nonsense. Note that some kindle owners have never been exposed to the manipulation tactics prevalent on the Internet.
4. The FTC would start investigating Amazon for why they aren’t letting Google and Sony take over the Kindle (all in the spirit of political correctness).

There’s very little incentive for Amazon to open up the Kindle and start down the slippery slope of losing control to the idea viruses of openness and ‘do the right thing’.

As long as they keep the Kindle closed there is little competitors can do. Amazon has no obvious weaknesses -

1. For all the talk of openness people don’t really care.  Both DRM and format are issues a vocal minority is obsessed with.
2. They get to sell Kindles and Kindle books. They literally own the entire space right from customer relationship to store to product pipeline.
3. At the moment no company has a technologically significantly better product.

Why take a huge risk and let in the Trojan horses?

Filed under: evolution, kindle Tagged: | kindle app store