Amazon Fire: 6 Key Points
Amazon's Fire smartphone might convince people to buy more stuff from Amazon. But consider these factors before buying the phone.
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Amazon on Wednesday announced its first smartphone, the Fire Phone. Amazon's main goal: Put a specialized purchasing device in the hands of its best and most loyal customers. Amazon believes it can use consumers' insatiable demand for new smartphones to replicate the success of its Kindle line of tablets, which people use to buy many things from Amazon. Amazon made a key mistake in its thinking, however, that could spell disaster for the Fire Phone.
The Fire Phone has lots of strengths. The hardware is decent. It doesn't compete with top smartphones, but its quality and features surpass those of many mid-range and entry-level competitors. It comes loaded with content, and with a free year of Amazon Prime, Fire Phone owners have their pick of movies, television shows, and music to watch and listen to at no extra cost, at least for a while. It has a good camera. The 13-megapixel shooter is good in low light and uses image stabilization to sharpen focus.
The Mayday feature will appeal to the tech illiterate. Can't figure out how to change the Fire Phone's settings? Use Mayday and a live Amazon tech support representative will appear to help, no matter the time of day. Smartphone novices might find Mayday a lifesaver when they get stuck using the phone's features. No other phone maker offers what amounts to 24/7 roadside assistance. It's an insurance policy of sorts. The Fire Phone competes on these fronts well.
The weaknesses have to do with Amazon's long-term thinking. For instance, Amazon obviously spent years developing some of the Fire Phone's technologies. Dynamic Perspective stands out as the most promising, yet most gimmicky, feature. Dynamic Perspective uses four user-facing cameras to define exactly where the owner's head is. The Fire Phone uses this data to create 3D effects in certain parts of the user interface. Dynamic Perspective currently is limited to wallpapers, maps, and screensavers. Amazon was smart enough to offer a software development kit for Dynamic Perspective, but developers have to be convinced to use it. If they don't, Amazon will have spent years creating something that's nothing but a novelty.
Firefly is a great tool for tracking down real-world objects online. Snap their picture with the camera and Firefly offers links to those objects on Amazon's website. It can do the same with audio, such as music and television shows. Amazon put tons of work into making Firefly fast and user friendly. It will certainly serve as a useful tool for finding more information about a great many things out in the world. At the end of the day, however, its main goal is to get people to find things sold by Amazon and to purchase them using their phone.
Another problem is apps. The Fire Phone runs Fire OS, a forked version of Android that is compatible with many -- but not all -- Android apps. This could lead to discontent among users if they find their favorite app isn't supported. Further, the Fire Phone doesn't include the Google Play Store, which is where most Android device owners find their apps, games, and content. It will use Amazon's Appstore instead. Amazon has about 240,000 apps and games in its store, which falls well short of the 1.2 million in the Google Play Store.
The Fire Phone's biggest problem is its soul, if you will. In developing the Fire Phone, Amazon chiefly looked for ways in which to coax consumers to buy more stuff. That's not what a smartphone's primary purpose is or should be. Smartphones are for connecting, for communication, for managing, and for discovering. Yes, they are often used to buy and entertain, but the most popular apps are for keeping owners in touch with the people in their lives. They are apps for texting, email, and social networks.
The smartphone in my pocket already does most of the things the Fire Phone can do. There's something about the Fire Phone's tie-in to a single, giant purveyor of goods that feels icky to me. I'd rather not feel that way about my smartphone, and I'm betting others might feel the same. Still, the Fire Phone offers some cool technology and will appeal to die-hard Amazon shoppers. Click through our slideshow to judge for yourself.
The Fire Phone's Firefly feature lets people take pictures of stuff, find out what it is, and then buy it from Amazon.com. The tool uses object and text recognition technology to determine the identity of these real-world items. Firefly makes it dead simple to buy those things right from the phone by providing a link to Amazon's Web store. Amazon thinks Firefly is so important, it gave the feature a dedicated button on the side of the phone. It can even be used without unlocking the phone.
Amazon's smartphone runs Fire OS, which is different from the standard Android operating system. This image shows how Amazon decided to treat notifications and alerts. The large email icon in the center shows there are four unread messages and then lists them below. Fire Phone owners can triage their email, messages, and voice mail using these tools, which Amazon claims are more streamlined and effective than other phones'.
The Fire Phone puts to use four cameras in order to define where the owner's head is. Amazon spent years perfecting this technology which can plot the X, Y, and Z axis of the owner's face and track it as it moves. Why do this? To add 3D perspective to some aspects of the user interface. For example, the Fire Phone has 3D wallpapers that are deep and rich in detail. In this image, Dynamic Perspective is put to use when viewing a map, which allows users to see behind and around objects, such as buildings and, in this case, the Seattle Space Needle.
There's no question the Fire Phone offers owners a lot of content. It ships with a free year of Amazon Prime. Current Prime customers will see 12 months tacked on to their existing membership. In addition to the free and low-cost shipping on physical goods, Amazon Prime includes access to movies, television shows, and music. Here we see Amazon Prime Music.
Help is never more than an app away on the Fire Phone thanks to Mayday. Amazon debuted Mayday on its Kindle tablets earlier this year. The feature connects users to a live customer service representative who is visible in this image in a chat window near the top. The live assistant can help do pretty much anything, and even has the power to take over the device to make changes if necessary. The best part? Mayday is free and available 24/7.
The Fire Phone runs Amazon's Fire OS, which is a variant of Android. It doesn't include key Android staples, such as the Google Play Store and Gmail. In its place, Amazon put its own app store and apps. That means the Fire Phone is not for invested Google users, as some of the services they know and love might not function properly or at all. Amazon did do a few interesting things with the operating system, however, such as this preview panel that can slide out to provide various tidbits of information and contextual details.
The Fire Phone runs Amazon's Fire OS, which is a variant of Android. It doesn't include key Android staples, such as the Google Play Store and Gmail. In its place, Amazon put its own app store and apps. That means the Fire Phone is not for invested Google users, as some of the services they know and love might not function properly or at all. Amazon did do a few interesting things with the operating system, however, such as this preview panel that can slide out to provide various tidbits of information and contextual details.
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