People at Amazon very, very busy

by Dennis Johnson

The Amazon tablet is definitely getting nigh. Everybody says so.

The people at PCMag.com, for example, who report that “Amazon is ordering enough tablet components from Taiwanese manufacturers to assemble up to 800,000 units a month and the unnamed device could start shipping in the second half of 2011.” Let’s see, the second half of 2011 would be — why, less than two months from now. Which would mean Amazon has shown Obama-administration-like ability to keep a plan secret.

Digitimes, meanwhile, issued a report — written in heavily accented English — saying that “Amazon internally plans to reduce Kindle’s market price to attract consumer demand from the education and consumer market, while will push tablet PC using its advantage in software and content resources.” Er, that means it’s going to slash holy hell out of Kindle prices when it releases the tablet.

Meanwhile, everyone also seems to be in agreement as to why Amazon is doing this: because Apple has gotten on its nerves.

As the headline to MSNBC.com report put it succinctly, “Amazon.com’s new tablet would be the anti-iPad.”

A Forbes report says Amazon could, conceivably, kick Apple’s ass: “While the hardware probably won’t be anything special, Amazon’s services might give it an edge. While no one has managed to best the iPad’s tight integration of software and hardware, Amazon’s online music, movie, and digital book services rival — and in some cases surpass — Apple’s own.”

A Time magazine report puts it all together, and throws in a reference to the other big player, Barnes & Noble:

This latest rumor contends that Amazon will use “its advantage in software and content resources to challenge iPad2,” while cutting the price of the standard Kindle e-book readers. That would make this tablet seem more like a full-fledged tablet than a tablet/e-book reader hybrid like the Nook Color.

Meanwhile, don’t think Amazon is leaving any competitive stone unturned: another Forbes story says a color Kindle is on the way for Christmas time.

Dennis Johnson is the founder of MobyLives, and the co-founder and co-publisher of Melville House.

10 Comments

August at 2:07 pm on May 5, 2011

This will be interesting to see how ‘competitive’ Amazon and Apple really are, given that Apple, generally speaking, doesn’t give a damn about ebooks, and has enough in their cash reserves to buy Amazon outright a couple times over. (Recent estimates suggest Apple has enough cash reserves to continue to function for something like 7 years without a single dime in revenue. I think it’s a mistake to think of these two companies as playing on the same field.)
August at 2:07 pm on May 5, 2011

This will be interesting to see how ‘competitive’ Amazon and Apple really are, given that Apple, generally speaking, doesn’t give a damn about ebooks, and has enough in their cash reserves to buy Amazon outright a couple times over. (Recent estimates suggest Apple has enough cash reserves to continue to function for something like 7 years without a single dime in revenue. I think it’s a mistake to think of these two companies as playing on the same field.)
Rachel K. at 4:12 pm on May 5, 2011

True, it will be hard for Amazon to truly compete, but Apple seems to pander to such a specific crowd that Amazon may have a shot at a decent audience. What I’m most interested to see is what will happen when Kindle prices get even cheaper. That may have a bigger impact on the industry than the launch of their new “anit-iPad” product.
Rachel K. at 4:12 pm on May 5, 2011

True, it will be hard for Amazon to truly compete, but Apple seems to pander to such a specific crowd that Amazon may have a shot at a decent audience. What I’m most interested to see is what will happen when Kindle prices get even cheaper. That may have a bigger impact on the industry than the launch of their new “anit-iPad” product.
Ricardo at 5:49 pm on May 5, 2011

Competition is the consumer best friend. At least on a capitalistic world.

In this case, the more competition Apple has, the less they will abuse their customers. The less competition, the more Apple can get away with abusing their customers.

Being a consumer, I would welcome any competition.
Ricardo at 5:49 pm on May 5, 2011

Competition is the consumer best friend. At least on a capitalistic world.

In this case, the more competition Apple has, the less they will abuse their customers. The less competition, the more Apple can get away with abusing their customers.

Being a consumer, I would welcome any competition.
August at 1:53 pm on May 9, 2011

“Apple seems to pander to such a specific crowd that Amazon may have a shot at a decent audience”

Apple sold 40 million iPads last year. Forty. Million. That’s ten million more than the entire netbook market, for example. As in, every single sale from every single netbook manufacturer put together, and twenty times what the second most successful tablet is projected to sell. And the only people who have looked at it in terms of being an ereader are a handful of publishers and book blogs. Everybody else sees it as a portable computing platform, including Apple. Let me ask you this: do you really think Amazon is going to eat a meaningful chunk of that pie
with an ebookstore and a secondhand OS?
August at 1:53 pm on May 9, 2011

“Apple seems to pander to such a specific crowd that Amazon may have a shot at a decent audience”

Apple sold 40 million iPads last year. Forty. Million. That’s ten million more than the entire netbook market, for example. As in, every single sale from every single netbook manufacturer put together, and twenty times what the second most successful tablet is projected to sell. And the only people who have looked at it in terms of being an ereader are a handful of publishers and book blogs. Everybody else sees it as a portable computing platform, including Apple. Let me ask you this: do you really think Amazon is going to eat a meaningful chunk of that pie
with an ebookstore and a secondhand OS?
August at 2:24 pm on May 9, 2011

I’m all in favour of competition, I just don’t think it will come from Amazon. They’re an online retailer whose reputation as a device manufacturer isn’t all that great. They’ve sold cheap, single-purpose hardware w/ a clumsy UI on the strength of a decent marketplace for a single thing. The problem is that their marketplace for ebooks, while stronger than Apple’s is really their only strong point here. Apple’s online marketplace outpaces them (and everybody else) by an order of magnitude for every other thing you use a tablet for, *and* they’ve got the best hardware and UI people in the industry, more or less. Amazon will have to learn a lot of hard lessons very, very quickly if they want to compete, and I don’t think their race-to-the-bottom mentality is going to get it done (especially not while the public is becoming increasingly aware of Amazon as a corporate bad actor).
August at 2:24 pm on May 9, 2011

I’m all in favour of competition, I just don’t think it will come from Amazon. They’re an online retailer whose reputation as a device manufacturer isn’t all that great. They’ve sold cheap, single-purpose hardware w/ a clumsy UI on the strength of a decent marketplace for a single thing. The problem is that their marketplace for ebooks, while stronger than Apple’s is really their only strong point here. Apple’s online marketplace outpaces them (and everybody else) by an order of magnitude for every other thing you use a tablet for, *and* they’ve got the best hardware and UI people in the industry, more or less. Amazon will have to learn a lot of hard lessons very, very quickly if they want to compete, and I don’t think their race-to-the-bottom mentality is going to get it done (especially not while the public is becoming increasingly aware of Amazon as a corporate bad actor).

May 5, 2011

People at Amazon very, very busy

by Dennis Johnson