Kindle Review – Kindle Fire Review, Kindle 4 Review

It’s a rather interesting question to think about - Will there be 10,000 Kindle Apps when the store first launches? Will there be just 150?

1. Let’s say there are 20 companies Amazon has given the early bird privilege to (including Electronic Arts and Sonic Boom). They make an average of 2.5 apps – That’s 50 apps right there.
2. Let’s say another 100 companies (including game companies and iPhone app companies) make an average of 1.5 apps – That’s another 150 apps.
3. Next, let’s throw in 1,000 developers who take a shot and make an average of .7 apps (because a lot of them drop out) – That’s 700 kindle apps.
4. Finally, we have 10,000 enthusiasts and interested people who make an average of .2 apps each. That’s 2,000 kindle apps.

It’d be fair to assume that quality drops as we go from invited companies to enthusiasts. That means we could be looking at 200 quality apps from companies and 2,700 apps of varying quality from developers and enthusiasts.

That’s 2,900 kindle apps at launch. Really think that’s close to the most likely scenario.

What’s the worst case scenario?

In the worst case scenario everyone waits to see how the Kindle App Store does or they are busy coding for the iPad. That would mean -

1. 10 invited companies that contribute 25 quality apps.
2. 40 companies that contribute 60 quality apps.
3. 300 developers that contribute 210 apps of varying quality.
4. 2,000 enthusiasts who contribute 400 apps of varying quality.

We might see the Kindle App Store debut with just 700 or so kindle apps. It wouldn’t mean failure – just a very slow start.

How much overlap will there be?

It wouldn’t be a surprise to see 5 or more each of -

1. Chess App.
2. Sudoku.
3. Crosswords.
4. Screensavers app. 
5. Hangman.
6. Twitter Client
7. Facebook Client.

There’s definitely going to be a lot of overlap and there may be just 25% to 50% unique apps.  

It’d be nice if there were a site that let us know that The New York Times was creating a crosswords app – that way the other 10 people building one would know what they were up against.

What pricing will apps use? What will people pay?

Perhaps a lot of people code free apps and spoil the revenue potential for everyone else. Perhaps everyone prices apps at really low prices and that makes profit scarce.

The other problem is that a lot of the apps for which people would pay well ($5 or more) are ruled out – No Folders, No PDF reader, and No ePub Reader.

How much will people pay for Chess? How long before someone comes in with a $1 chess app? How long before someone codes a free version?

How would you estimate all these things?

Developing a kindle app is a black hole -

1. We don’t know how many other people are coding apps.
2. We don’t know how many other people are coding the exact same app.
3. The exact Kindle App Store debut date isn’t known.
4. Pricing of apps is an unknown.
5. What people will pay for apps is unknown.

It’s really quite difficult and it wouldn’t be a surprise if people just took cues from the iPhone App Store and priced everything at $1.

What do you think - How many apps will we have at launch? What price will people pay? How many apps will be sold? Will people keep buying apps or will it be a short term spike in interest?

Filed under: kindle app review Tagged: | amazon kindle apps, kindle app store