Amazon Needs To Show Me A $99 Kindle

[bminata]

They could remove the wireless option for the $99. A lot of people don't use it anyway.

[Iphinome]

Originally Posted by bminata

They could remove the wireless option for the $99. A lot of people don't use it anyway.

That would mean emailing you the file and possibly losing the evil DRM or making the kindle for pc software sync with the kindle. Again this could put the evil DRM at risk to people who want to break it. Then the publishers who love DRM and hate their customers... excuse me, I meant hate the consumers. Customers implies they're offering some kind of service rather than the corporate mindset of we want money, you give us money now. MONEY NOW or else.

I honestly don't think amazon is in a position to sell a device that acts more like a sony reader. A $99 reader is just going to have to wait till the parts are so cheap that someone can manufacture readers that will generate enough money stay in buisness without having to make any book sales.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by bminata

They could remove the wireless option for the $99. A lot of people don't use it anyway.

It wouldn't save enough. As mentioned upthread, a teardown by industry analysis house iSuppli put the eInk screen and controller at $80 of the Kindle's cost. There is no way Amazon or anyone else can make a Kindle to sell at $99 and make any money on the deal if eInk is one of the components. The price of eInk sceens will drop, but not that far or fast.

And why should Amazon bother to try? What they want is to sell you the books. If you buy a Kindle and read them that way, fine. But if you read them with the Kindle app for PC, iPhone, or Android, also fine, or they wouldn't have released those packages.

Think of the Kindle as priming the pump and helping to create a broader market for the ebooks Amazon wants to sell you and the Kindle makes more sense. Since Amazon uses their own custom form of DRM, unless you are willing and able to break the DRM, you are locked into Amazon as the supplier, which is the real point of their exercise.
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Dennis

[Papi]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

And why should Amazon bother to try? What they want is to sell you the books. If you buy a Kindle and read them that way, fine. But if you read them with the Kindle app for PC, iPhone, or Android, also fine, or they wouldn't have released those packages.

Think of the Kindle as priming the pump and helping to create a broader market for the ebooks Amazon wants to sell you and the Kindle makes more sense. Since Amazon uses their own custom form of DRM, unless you are willing and able to break the DRM, you are locked into Amazon as the supplier, which is the real point of their exercise.
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Dennis

Isn't this precisely an argument that would lead them to sell the kindle as cheap as they can, even loose a bit of money if they have the right to ? To get the consumers who want to read e-books on e-readers and nothing else ? As you mentionned, what they want to sell in the end, is books, it doesn't matter if they make much money on the kindle, as long as the consumer has to buy books from them. I think that's more or less the "business model" for video games, or printers.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Iphinome

That would mean emailing you the file and possibly losing the evil DRM

Why would it mean e-mailing you the file? Currently, Kindle owners who live outside an area of Whispernet coverage download a book to their PC, and then copy it to the Kindle via the USB connection. Why could the same not be done for a Kindle without a wireless connection?

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Papi

Isn't this precisely an argument that would lead them to sell the kindle as cheap as they can, even loose a bit of money if they have the right to ? To get the consumers who want to read e-books on e-readers and nothing else ? As you mentionned, what they want to sell in the end, is books, it doesn't matter if they make much money on the kindle, as long as the consumer has to buy books from them. I think that's more or less the "business model" for video games, or printers.

It matters if they lose money on the Kindle, and trying to make a $99 Kindle would lose money.

Amazon doesn't need to drop the price to $99 to meet their goals. Like I said, the Kindle is priming the pump, but the water is now flowing nicely. Amazon was smart enough to realize that people used lots of things to read eBooks. The iPhone is an enormously popular device, and a natural for reading on the go. Phones powered by Google Android are coming on fast, witness the Motorola Droid, which has put Moto back in the cell phone business. And those devices have the connectivity to get to Amazon and buy/download books, so the "instant gratification" aspect provided by WhisperNet on the actual Kindle is preserved.

Sure, Amazon would like you to buy a Kindle...at a price where they'll make decent money on the deal. They don't need to lose money to gain market share, and won't.
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Dennis

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Sure, Amazon would like you to buy a Kindle...at a price where they'll make decent money on the deal. They don't need to lose money to gain market share, and won't.
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Dennis

If Amazon wanted to lose money on Kindle hardware sales as a means to ramp up ebook sales, the time to do it was early in the game when the biggest complaint was that dedicated readers were too expensive. Yet the Kindle2 was introduced with a 100% markup. They could have easily cut $100 off at that time and *still* made decent money. Instead, they went with market-based pricing instead of loss-leader pricing.

Nothing that has changed since gives any hint that they *what* to get in a race to the bottom; their recent price cuts were reactive and measured. If anything, the last update makes it clear they intend to add value to the readers via Whispernet and social networking features. That pretty much rules out an unconnected Kindle.

Anyway, when it comes to cheap Kindle delivery systems, smartphones and Tablet PCs will fill in the gaps quite nicely so Amazon can bide their time and focus on their dedicated reader gadgets. The recent release of Kindle for Android is particularly well-timed as it appears to run fine on the Pandigital Novel, which runs brings color LCD reading to under $149. That means yet another platform (webpads) to prop Kindle up.

There's lots of ways to build installed-base volume that don't involve giving Kindles away. Though they *have* considered it. Do notice they haven't done it...

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

If Amazon wanted to lose money on Kindle hardware sales as a means to ramp up ebook sales, the time to do it was early in the game when the biggest complaint was that dedicated readers were too expensive. Yet the Kindle2 was introduced with a 100% markup. They could have easily cut $100 off at that time and *still* made decent money. Instead, they went with market-based pricing instead of loss-leader pricing.

They didn't need to do so. They had a far bigger already existing incentive: breadth of content offered. Amazon had (and has) far more books available in electronic form than their competition, with pricing that was attractive, and ways to suggest books that weren't available in electronic form that ought to be. ("I'd like to read this book in a Kindle edition") Amazon's breadth of content and attractive pricing made customers willing to accept vendor lock-in. If they could get any book they wanted for the Kindle at an attractive price from Amazon, who cares that they can only buy from Amazon?

Nothing that has changed since gives any hint that they *what* to get in a race to the bottom; their recent price cuts were reactive and measured. If anything, the last update makes it clear they intend to add value to the readers via Whispernet and social networking features. That pretty much rules out an unconnected Kindle.

I concur. Amazon has no need to race to the bottom.

Anyway, when it comes to cheap Kindle delivery systems, smartphones and Tablet PCs will fill in the gaps quite nicely so Amazon can bide their time and focus on their dedicated reader gadgets. The recent release of Kindle for Android is particularly well-timed as it appears to run fine on the Pandigital Novel, which runs brings color LCD reading to under $149. That means yet another platform (webpads) to prop Kindle up.

Does it indeed? I've been watching Android with interest, because there's no particular reason why what it powers needs to be a smartphone. There are several ARM processor based netbooks in development, with Android as the OS, and Android includes touch screen support.

I suspect the release of the Android port was largely prompted by the success of the Motorola Droid, but the Droid is just the tip of that particular iceberg.

There's lots of ways to build installed-base volume that don't involve giving Kindles away. Though they *have* considered it. Do notice they haven't done it...

Like I said previously, why should they? Amazon wants to make money. They have no need to lose money, or even reduce the amount of money they do make to increase market share.

I'm sure lots of folks would like a $99 Kindle. Okay, I know what's in it for them - a much cheaper Kindle. What's in it for Amazon? "Not enough" or "nothing", so it's unlikely to happen.
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Dennis

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Does it indeed? I've been watching Android with interest, because there's no particular reason why what it powers needs to be a smartphone. There are several ARM processor based netbooks in development, with Android as the OS, and Android includes touch screen support.

I suspect the release of the Android port was largely prompted by the success of the Motorola Droid, but the Droid is just the tip of that particular iceberg.
[/b]

The Droid might be the reason for Kindle for Android but word is it runs fine on the Android-based Pandigital Novel among others.

http://www.the-digital-reader.com/20...l-novel-video/

The end result is a $149 7" color Kindle (of sorts).
I expect we'll shortly see similar products at 5in and $99.
Which is yet another reason why Amazon doesn't need to rush to $99. It would be nice to see a Kindle mini at $99 but its just not needed or likely Not this year.

[Iphinome]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Why would it mean e-mailing you the file? Currently, Kindle owners who live outside an area of Whispernet coverage download a book to their PC, and then copy it to the Kindle via the USB connection. Why could the same not be done for a Kindle without a wireless connection?

Sending you the file and the key to unlock it tends to not be a good way to keep DRM from being broken. But I'm in favor of stripping DRM so if they're willing to send files like that I won't argue.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Iphinome

Sending you the file and the key to unlock it tends to not be a good way to keep DRM from being broken. But I'm in favor of stripping DRM so if they're willing to send files like that I won't argue.

What do you mean "the key to unlock it"? You download the file from Amazon's web site to your PC. You copy the file to your Kindle via the USB connection. There is no "key" - the file has DRM, exactly as it does as if you'd had it sent wirelessly to your Kindle. What do you mean when you talk about a key?

[Iphinome]

Originally Posted by HarryT

What do you mean "the key to unlock it"? You download the file from Amazon's web site to your PC. You copy the file to your Kindle via the USB connection. There is no "key" - the file has DRM, exactly as it does as if you'd had it sent wirelessly to your Kindle. What do you mean when you talk about a key?

I mean something to tell the kindle how to read the file despite the drm. I don't know exactly how the kindle DRM works I haven't researched it but there are limited ways to do these things at least limited offline ways. To keep the file from being read on unauthorized devices you'll need to encrypt it somehow. To decrypt it you'll need a key. The kindle could have keys in firmware like a dvd player but that would mean the same key could open any file so any kindle could read any drm kindle book.... not effective. The could send the drm'd file tot he kindle wirelessly and send the key wirelessly and hide the key somewhere in the filesystem where people won't be able to see it. They could give each kindle a unique key and drm files to one kindle only before they send it.... I suppose that would allow emailing files but then the same files wouldn't work in kindle for pc software, a second one would have to be emailed for that....

My point however was emailing a drmed file and also means to read the file put both halves of the drm right in the greedy little hands of the consumers. Publishers wouldn't like that. Not that I'm sure they like anything.

[HarryT]

The Kindle uses MobiPocket DRM. Each Kindle has a unique "PID" (an alphanumeric string) which Amazon know. When you download the book to your PC, you have to specifiy which of your registered Kindles (if you have more than one) it is destined for, and the file is then encrypted for the PID of that specific device. It's no different to downloading any other DRM-protected Mobipocket book; not sure why you say that the publishers wouldn't like it?

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Iphinome

I don't know exactly how the kindle DRM works I haven't researched it but there are limited ways to do these things at least limited offline ways.

The kindle in fact uses one of the "limited" offline ways.
Kindle DRM is *not* tied into the wireless. Kindle does *not* "phone home" to validate licensing like other connected DRM schemes. (XBLA, for example.)
Rather, Kindle DRM depends on the reader's serial number and/or user account.

DRM is *not* the reason Amazon is unlikely to do an unconnected reader; the reasons are economic (Kindle is a storefront first, a reader second) and strategic (social networking via Kindle is clearly part of Aazon's longer-term strategy for selling Kindle and ebooks) and a wireless-free Kindle would be dependent on PC access to buy books (killing the "built-in storefront" aspect) and would lack the real-time sync and networking features.

Wireless connectivity is not indispensable but it *is* a key component of what a Kindle is. Given the minimal cost add-in from at least WiFi (under $10), it seems unlikely Amazon will give up connectivity on a Kindle reader any time soon.

[SensualPoet]

There is likely to be some news / movement re: Kindle 3 or other Amazon e-reader plans released on Thursday July 22 when Amazon announces Q2 corporate results and has a chat with financial analysts.