Those sweethearts at Amazon, darlings. They do not give up easily, do they? In 2014, Amazon had tried to get into the smartphone business with the Fire Phone but well, although it did have a very nice 3D interface and very decent hardware, it really did not have enough to stand against those established darlings, Apple and Samsung, and of course, newcomers like OnePlus and Xiaomi. So, well, there was no second Fire Phone and Amazon seemed to have given up on that dream.
Well, we were so wrong.
For, if my sources are right (and they are VERY reliable, sweeties), Amazon is very much working on reviving the Fire Phone. And it is going to be nothing like the first one.
Whereas the first Amazon Fire Phone was clearly a premium product, which went up against the likes of the Galaxy S series and the iPhone, the next Fire Phone is going to be very much a mid, and perhaps even a low, segment offering. The stress is going to be providing a slice of Amazon in your hand, rather than trying to match wits and muscle with the best in the business. What I have been told is that the device is likely to have a large (5.99-inch, in all probability) display with 19:9 aspect ratio and yes, a notch. And it is very likely to run on a mid-segment or a budget processor from Qualcomm (maybe the successor of the Snapdragon 636 or the latest in the 400 series), come with 4-6 GB of RAM and 64 GB and 128 GB of storage. No expandable memory. But the speakers will be stereo and there is a 3.5 mm audio jack when I last checked. And the battery will be close to 4000 mAh, sweeties.
There will be dual cameras on the front and back (no, I don’t know the megapixel count, dearies) and as far as I have been told, there will not be a fingerprint scanner – the dual cameras in front will have a very secure face unlock. I really do not know much about the cameras at the moment, except that they will come with something a lot of people are referring to as “Product ID” – their main purpose will be to identify products and link them to options on Amazon. So if you see something, you can point your phone at it, see its price on Amazon and purchase it. And the integration is going to be much smoother than on the Amazon app on iOS and Android, darlings. This is going to be like rear cameras spotting the product and front cameras using your face to confirm the purchase. How’s that for cameras for commerce, then?
The software? It will continue to be Amazon’s very forked take on Android, with no Google Play store (although Amazon will have its own App Store on board), and will come stocked with subscriptions to all of Amazon’s services – music, videos, e-books, the works. In all probability, whosoever grabs this phone will get a lot of Amazon digital service goodies. This is a phone for shopping, dearies. The display, speakers, and cameras are totally meant for that.
I know I left the best for last, sweeties: the price. Well, it is not going to cost a bomb and in fact could be well below USD 200. This is not going to be a premium phone, darlings. From what people tell me, Amazon is basically bringing the Kindle Fire tablet model to its phone initiative – the Fire Tablets too had started out as competitors to the iPad but are now among the bestselling Android tablets out there simply because they are super affordable and for their price, offer a very good experience, and more important, tie you into the Amazon ecosystem at a very low price. Well, the same principle is driving the new Fire phone – it will be priced at a very affordable price point but would perform very well.
The bad news? This is going to be a US-only device for quite a while from what I know, although it will not be tied exclusively to a single operator. What I DO know is that whichever operator offers it will have to make browsing, purchasing and downloading from Amazon free of cost to the user – so from what I can understand, you can watch Amazon Prime Videos on it (you will get Prime subscription free with it for a year) without having to pay anything extra on your data plan! And before you ask, darlings, no, the data plans will not be crazy expensive either. The whole idea is to keep you in Amazon – happy and content.
Of course, all this is just a rumor. Highly detailed rumor, but not confirmed at all. And for all you know, it might not work out. Times and circumstances change. And we live in such an unpredictable world. But well, if something like this DOES come out, I think it would put quite a spin on the market, wouldn’t it, darlings?
Until we find out for sure, Miaow. And please gossip. It keeps me in business.