Quote:
Originally Posted by OtterBooks
Upgrading the device's primary technology isn't quite settling imo, and that's what I think they're gonna do next gen. I doubt enough people are willing to trade in their K3 by the millions to get rid of the keyboard. Even people who dislike it have acclimated to zone it out. Amazon needs to hit a home-run with the Kindle's primary experience.
They want to assert unequivocal superiority, and merely matching their competitors with a touchscreen and new CPU won't do. Just IMO; time will tell.
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I think you are right about this. It seems to me that at the low end, Kindle competes on price & convenience, not on features like touch. They pretty much own convenience, so that leaves price. They seem to be competing on price with the K with Ads. Adding new features would probably mean making it harder to compete on price. I'd love it if the basic Kindle went touch, but I don't think it will happen (and personally, I wouldn't replace my current K3 with it unless my current one breaks.) Instead, I expect the K with Ads to continue to be the lowest priced EBR.
Amazon's objective is probably to move the one Kindle-owning family to the multiple Kindle owning family. That's done best with (1) keeping the price of the basic Kindle lower than every other EBR, and (2) coming up with a premium Kindle to sell to people who already own a Kindle. The low priced Kindle puts a Kindle in the kids' stockings for Christmas. A premium Kindle is, well, a nice toy for mom & dad.
Right now, there is no real premium Kindle. The K3 with 3G is not it - no one who owns a Kwifi will buy a new one just for 3G. But the KDX isn't the premium Kindle either - too costly for no color, and it lacks wifi. I have a KDX and I rather like it, but I acquired it when I lost my original K3, figured I'd try out a bigger Kindle, then found out that if I had just one Kindle, it really should be the smaller one. I kept the KDX out of inertia, mainly.
I'm thinking that the next Kindle offering will be (1) a K3 sized (i.e. 6 or 7 inch screen) color tablet Kindle, but with touch and wifi, for around $250, and (2) a DX sized color Kindle, also with touch and wifi, at $399. I think that the combination would seize a large part of the premium market from both B&N and Apple, while enabling Amazon to get a Kindle in every reader's hands at the low end.
The only thing I have no clue about is whether either or both of these hypothetical devices will have 3G as well as wifi. I kind of think that the larger size might.