Kindle Review – Kindle Fire Review, Kindle 4 Review

Newsweek has a good interview with Mr. Bezos. This is the part that really stood out in my mind -

Q: Steve Jobs once predicted Kindle would fail because “people don’t read anymore.”

A: Well, I believe that reading deserves a dedicated device.

For people who are readers, reading is important to them. And you don’t want to read for three hours on a backlit LCD screen.

It’s great for short form. This is a really important point—that we humans co-evolve with our tools. We change the tools, and the tools change us, and that cycle repeats. 

Related was this snippet from another question -

And then for the Kindle device, we want that to be the world’s best purpose-built reading device.

It’s not a Swiss Army knife. It’s not going to do a bunch of different things.

We believe that reading deserves a dedicated device, and we want Kindle to be that device.

It’s pretty obvious that at this stage Mr. Bezos and Amazon are committed to the concept of the Kindle as dedicated reading device.

However, reading isn’t just about dedicated readers.

The Divide between readers and also-readers

The existing reader and reading market is evolving and we are seeing two clear sub-markets emerge -

1. eReaders focused on people who read.
2. Devices that also let you read.

The way Amazon is addressing these sub-markets is -

1. The Kindle as a dedicated reading device for people committed to reading.
2. Kindle for PC, Kindle for iPhone and other Kindle apps piggybacking on devices that also let you read.

It’s not a bad strategy.

However – Is it the best strategy to capture the most and the most lucrative readers?

What would be the best strategy to capture readers?

It’s all well and good to use Kindle for PC and Kindle for iPhone to tap into the market segment of readers that will not buy a dedicated eReader.

However, Could there be a better strategy?

1. The first obvious one is an anti-strategy. Amazon could totally ignore everyone except dedicated readers. It’s not really a good option.
2. The second is to convert the Kindle into a multi-purpose device or take it in that direction. The risk here is that you lose your core readers – and they are the most lucrative. So this strategy is ruled out too.
3. The third is to create a separate Kindle line that is basically a multi-purpose Kindle. This is not a bad option.
4. The fourth is to stop making hardware and partner up with Apple and other big multi-purpose device manufacturers. This is a particularly bad strategy as the Kindle is already doing well.

 The only two viable strategies seem to be -

1. What Amazon is currently doing i.e. Kindle Books on all platforms, dedicated Kindle eReader.
2. Keep the Kindle as is. Create a separate Kindle line that caters to people who also read.

The downside with the former is that someone else has control.

Is Control over your destiny worth creating a multi-purpose device?

First, let’s just establish that we aren’t saying Amazon will kill the Kindle.

1. Amazon seem pretty sure that they will always have a Kindle that is a dedicated reading device.
2. They have no reason to kill a successful product.

That being established, we can look at the problem with selling Kindle books for the iPhone and multi-purpose devices.

Someone else controls the device.

For example -  

1. With Kindle for iPhone Amazon doesn’t use in-app purchases as they would have to give Apple 30% of sales.
2. Kindle for PC is much better but still not ideal as the PC manufacturer could install a rival as the default eBook store.

That’s not really a comfortable place to be in – Google owns Android, Apple owns the iPhone, and either could lock out Amazon (it’ll be done in a politically correct way so the pretension of doing nothing wrong can be maintained).

Will Amazon introduce a multi-purpose device in 2010?

Amazon managed to make the Kindle a hit and get a lot of control over its destiny. It now has experience creating, designing, selling and supporting hardware.

Perhaps it’s time Amazon released another hardware product.

There are no downsides because at worst it’ll fail. Amazon will still have the Kindle and it will still have the Kindle Apps for different platforms.

The upside, on the other hand, is huge. 

Amazon could introduce one or more of -

1. Kindle Phone. 
2. Kindle Reading Tablet.
3. Kindle Electronic Pen.
4. Some amazing or strange new device.

Any customers it gets are its own customers i.e. no having to send people to the iPhone browser to buy ebooks, no worrying about whether Google will flip the kill switch in Android.

There are just too many benefits for Amazon to pass on this.

Amazon really ought to add a few multi-purpose devices to the Kindle line 

There’s little doubt that the significant upside and the limited downside means the best strategy for the Kindle is -

1. Keep growing and building up the current Kindle lines.
2. Introduce multiple multiple-purpose devices – either as part of the Kindle family or as a separate line.

If Amazon doesn’t make a move they leave things up to their competitors -

1. If Android wins they’ll lock out all other eBook sellers. They won’t do this ‘in an evil way’ – they’ll simply make the Google Editions store the default and the first result on searches.
2. Apple are threatening to get into eBooks and they’ll use the same ‘our product is the default, everything else is hidden’ option.

On the surface the ‘open’ strategy being used to attack Amazon seems like a strong defence for its Kindle Apps. The ‘open and good’ companies could never lock a competitor out, could they?

Actually, they could – as long as they did it in a non-obvious way or did it gradually.

For Amazon, offence is not just best form of defence, it’s the only form of defence. We’re definitely going to get a Kindle Phone.

Filed under: kindle Tagged: | kindle future, kindle purpose