Amazon have had a lot of success with their Kindles are set to follow it with a Smartphone. Quite possibly based on a locked down (forked) version of Android? It may be announced on the 18th June but there are some allegedly leaked pictures about.


http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/04/Amazon-phone-june18/

http://bgr.com/2014/04/15/amazon-sma...one-exclusive/

Looks like it may have some exclusive features........

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencete...June-18th.html

Teaser video on the above webpage.

The 3D stuff made me think the screen will be using similar tech to the Nintendo 3DS.

It will be interesting to see who they team up with for network provision when it is launched. Amazon will shift numbers of these if the price is right so a good capture for one UK provider. They could sell it SIM free but that is probably less attractive and would not allow them to guarantee delivery of Amazon Prime Video which along with Amazon Cloud, Kindle and MP3 music is likely to be part of the overall package.

amazon could become an interesting player in the mobile market if they make the device and the apackage of services attractive. They may lure Prime customers in with offers to establish the sevice.

TechCrunch claims to have identified the technology behind that feature, and it's supposedly Omron's Okao Vision face-sensing system. The Amazon team reportedly customized the Japanese company's creation so that it can be used to show 3D effects on an ordinary LCD screen without special glasses. Instead of relying on accessories, the software depends on four front cameras embedded on the device's corners to track the user's face, as well as on the phone's accelerometer and gyroscope. For instance, if you tilt your face to one side, the interface shows you a hidden panel you wouldn't see if you look at the screen from another angle.

http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/06/amazon-phone-omron/

http://techcrunch.com/2014/06/05/ama...-sensing-tech/

Cool or annoying? Time will tell.......

Looks very cool and could be a game changer if it produces the same reactions from customers when they get hold of it. Looking forward to seeing this launch as Amazon certainly have the marketing clout to shake some innovation out of the majors!

Well its certainly unique to mobile phones. On the Nintendo 3DS you can adjust the effect. If its a success im sure Apple will add it in a few years time and then set about suing claiming they invented it

The basic version of the Fire Phone, with 32 gigabytes (GB) of storage, will cost $199 (£117) on top of a two-year contract with AT&T - the only network to offer it initially - on 25 July.

Fire Phone Amazon says its app store tripled in size over the past year
That is the same price AT&T charges for the 16GB versions of Apple's iPhone 5S and Samsung's Galaxy S5.




http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-27911029

The SIM free price for the 32GB is $649 which will likely translate to £549 here which is the same price as a 16GB iPhone 5S.

I think for someone new in the market, going head to head with the latest iPhone is a bad move, I can't see them selling many.

Does seem an interesting approach for amazon as they have normally go with the lower end of the market. Pitching there phone at the high end and locking to down to one carrier is an interesting move.

Just saw some specs and details:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencete...le-Google.html

Looks impressive - £380 in US without a contract, no details of a UK launch yet.

Yeah it does look like half decent specs surprised they only went for a low quality 720p screen if they hoping compete with Apple and Samsung. 315ppi is pretty low these days will be interesting to see how this does. Unless the 3D is really that good can't see why you wouldn't buy a Moto G LTE over this. I think for the price you get more for your money with HTC or Samsung.

That's £380 without sales taxes. Actual price here is likely to be around £500 - £550.

There have been phones using parallax barrier technology that the Nintendo 3DS uses before and they didn't do that well as it's not very good.

The way this phone is doing 3D is interesting and is hopefully alot better than parallax barrier, I guess we will see.

Oh, you've actually seen one of these in person, so can say for certain that the screen is low quality? Or are you just talking pure numbers, and got the words "quality" and "resolution" confused?

On a screen of that size there is no useful benefit when going from 720p to 1080p.

There's a big difference between the 3D effect that you get through movement, and actual 3D as tried by LG (and a pretty massive flop).

Amazon's system might work a lot better than simply relying on tilting the phone, but the latter already exists and I had a number of live wallpapers that were just like Amazon's demo with the hot air balloon.

It was a nice gimmick, and one I quickly got bored of. So now I don't have it, and I am sure many people have turned off the effect on iOS 7 too.

I really think Amazon has messed up here. I expected a phone that would be dirt cheap and encourage people to sign up to the Amazon eco system (app store, TV, film, music, shopping, books etc) with the Prime account encouraging people to do more shopping and enjoy the unlimited free next day (and even Sunday) deliveries.

But Amazon thinks it can compete as if it's just a normal phone, and then all of the closed nature of Fire OS makes it incredibly unappealing. I buy loads from Amazon, but don't need an Amazon phone to continue doing so, but might have been tempted if it was so cheap I'd be mad not to get one.

Not getting confused we are talking about a screen which is of the quality of a Moto G in terms of both resolution and PPI so it certainly is not a high end screen which for the price it is selling for it should be.

As Jon said in the post above the 3D thing is the entire appeal of this device we have seen quite a few 3D phones come out none has succeeded. Think Amazon would of likely done better if they had aimed for the lower end of the market in terms of price. The phone is around that some of level.

Before my plasma screen gave up it gave stunning image quality. It died, and was replaced by a higher resolution LCD. Which didn't have anything like the same image quality. Resolution does not directly relate to quality of image.

Agreed that it is priced towards the higher end, but doesn't have the full spec, the screen on it is a useless gimmick that won't help anyone. And 4 cameras watching your every move .... no thanks.

Although with that processor, that resolution screen will make games flick along faster than most can with a 1080p display (ie. lower resolution screen improves performance - ie. is better).

PPI only tells you how densely packed the pixels are not the quality of the screen. That's like saying a £300 50 inch TV from Tesco is as good a quality as a top brand at £1000. Sure the PPI will be the same but the picture quality difference will be night and day

The high nits of the screen for example will make viewing in daylight alot better than any current phone in the market.

True enough I just can't see it being that good of a screen will wait see what the reviews say though. It looks like a mid ranged device to me priced as a high end one.

The Moto G has a surprisingly good screen for the money. Not necessarily the best viewing angles, but it's pretty bright.

So far, every phone that has boasted about brilliant outdoor viewing has generally failed when it's very bright outdoors.

Some models, like those with AM-OLED displays, may have a mode to ramp up the brightness but with huge battery drain as a result. Some Samsung and Nokia phones have this, and LG has of course sold phones before that were sold on nits. I forget the name, but it was about the time of the first 3D-screened LG.

Thing is, annoying as it is to have times where you'll struggle to see the screen clearly (but the UI can help with high contrast screens and black on white, rather than the other way around where applicable) I am not sure many people will make their buying decision on that.

They'll be perfectly happy with a far lower brightness when sat on the sofa, on a train/bus or at work.

Doesnt tempt me at these prices.

http://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Fire-Ph...rds=fire+phone

BBC said yesterday that the first version of the phone would be US only - so the same launch plan they followed for the original Kindle.

Over priced portal into a world of Amazonian spam

I wonder who will buy one. If it's not really cheap, I see no incentive even if I use Amazon a lot for shopping.

Books are one thing, but I think you'd sooner read a book on a tablet or 'proper' Kindle.

The TV, film and now music offerings are pretty poor compared to other services.

And already a lot of people are latching on to the fact that it's just a device to make you spend more money with Amazon. That wasn't so obvious with the tablets, but this is more about buying real goods.

Might as well have called the Firefly button the 'Showrooming Key'.