Amazon Phone Will Reportedly Be An AT&T Exclusive

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This is great news! Well, probably just great news for AT&T customers. Okay, this is probably just great news for AT&T. Everyone else, not so much.

Seven years ago, AT&T scored millions of new customers by being the only U.S. wireless provider to offer the Apple iPhone. That exclusive has long since faded into memory and the iPhone is no longer the market dominator it once was. But it looks like AT&T might be hoping that lightning strikes twice, as a new report claims that the Death Star will be the sole carrier for Amazon’s rumored smartphone and/or sex toy.
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Except the key difference here is, the Amazon phone is likely just another Android phone. This will be the death knell of that device, before it's even out of the gate.
 
Except you will likely need to root it to get a non-Amazon fenced experience. Love Amazon and what they are doing with Prime. Don't care about this phone.
 
I always thought this was a giant mistake for phone makers to lock it in to one company
 
For a company that wants to sell everything to everyone anywhere, that makes absolutely zero sense. Even if ATT offered them truckloads of money, Bezos wants to deliver stuff to people in drones. A guy who thinks like that can't be saying "Oh yea make a phone just for one carrier".
 
kidstechno said:
For a company that wants to sell everything to everyone anywhere, that makes absolutely zero sense. Even if ATT offered them truckloads of money, Bezos wants to deliver stuff to people in drones. A guy who thinks like that can't be saying "Oh yea make a phone just for one carrier".
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Amazon has always played the slow game. This equates to the old "invite only" Google scheme with eventual mass release once enough buzz builds up.
 
kidstechno said:
For a company that wants to sell everything to everyone anywhere, that makes absolutely zero sense. Even if ATT offered them truckloads of money, Bezos wants to deliver stuff to people in drones. A guy who thinks like that can't be saying "Oh yea make a phone just for one carrier".
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Yes he can, he pretty much has to if that plan includes free data sponsored by amazon in some way or another. AT&T isn't the only one with plans to be able to support such things, but they are the only ones with it in place. So right now, AT&T can role with say streaming video from amazon for prime members doesn't count towards your data usage. Verzion will be ready to do that sometime i the near future, but their system is not up and running. AT&T's is.
 
Yes, I'm not saying I have any interest in an Amazon phone, but everyone here is focusing on features and functionality. I'd expect the price point will be the draw. Either lower monthly costs or a $300 phone for under $100.

I wouldn't buy it for the same reason I have no interest in a Fire, I don't want to play in an Amazon fenced sandbox.
 
They will offer Amazon steaming that doesn't count against your AT&T data allowance.
 
mt2e said:
DOA
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Apple ran a similar strategy with the iPhone and Apple has a fraction of the content that Amazon has. I'm not going to run out and buy one, but as far as bundled services under one roof (and price plan) Amazon is the best deal in town (music, movies, ebooks, etc). If there phone offers features comparable to a Samsung Galaxy S5 or other high end Android phone and they allow prime streaming to not count against a user's data plan they will do quite well.
 
This will become the #3 smartphone in market share, behind android and iOS. And it'll reach that spot much quicker than windows phone.
 
DPI said:
This will become the #3 smartphone in market share, behind android and iOS. And it'll reach that spot much quicker than windows phone.
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You think the fact that it is Android and not some new OS would have something to do with that?
 
If you shop Amazon constantly and have a Prime subscription this thing is probably going to be a Kindle on the go with full free streaming of Prime video and music bundled with the Amazon apk market with a new free app every day.
If you're already a part of the Amazon ecosystem this thing should look pretty tempting!
If you're not, then you've very little reason to care.
 
DPI said:
This will become the #3 smartphone in market share, behind android and iOS. And it'll reach that spot much quicker than windows phone.
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I can't fathom how this phone would even come close to the sales numbers of AT&T's most popular single device, much less displace windows phone in terms of market share placement. Short of a miracle, or AT&T/amazon giving the phone away with some substantial amount of account credit for people who upgrade from dumbphones, I couldn't even see this being a blip in the mobile market.

Don't get me wrong; for the most part, I actually really like Amazon, to the extent that I'm wary of their reach. But their tablets... The kindle readers are great. The Fire series tablets are plagued OS-related issues, I would be so hesitant to even consider it for a phone I use all day, much less a device I use for an hour to stream media.
 
Taco said:
You think the fact that it is Android and not some new OS would have something to do with that?
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Its a forked Android, effectively a new OS. There will be no google apps and no Play store.

Put another way, people won't be buying it thinking it "runs Android". They'll be buying it because Amazon.
 
teh_chem said:
I can't fathom how this phone would even come close to the sales numbers of AT&T's most popular single device, much less displace windows phone in terms of market share placement.
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I'll tell you how, the #3 spot for smartphone marketshare is wide open simply because windows phone is such a nonfactor. The interface is terrible, and developers avoid it like the plague. It's dead unless MS one day has a come-to-Jesus epiphany, gets out of the way of their own bloated bureaucracy and rebuilds it from the ground up.

Amazon's smartphone offering will barely have to try.
 
I hope they add some kind of incentive to prime subscribers.

Music/Books/Movies/2 day shipping/Promotional items/PHONE SERVICE all for $99/yr :confused::eek:

....Eh..Maybe
 
DPI said:
Its a forked Android, effectively a new OS. There will be no google apps and no Play store.
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A forked version of Android that artificially blocks Google Play isn't a new OS. Virtually all of the apps in Amazon's Store are in Google Play. It's an Android phone. Indeed if were an entirely new OS with no Android apps, seriously, why would anyone buy it?
 
DPI said:
I'll tell you how, the #3 spot for smartphone marketshare is wide open simply because windows phone is such a nonfactor. The interface is terrible, and developers avoid it like the plague. It's dead unless MS one day has a come-to-Jesus epiphany, gets out of the way of their own bloated bureaucracy and rebuilds it from the ground up.

Amazon's smartphone offering will barely have to try.
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Smartphone marketshare isn't the same thing as smartphone OS market share. Even if they were, exactly how few do you think the Amazon phone would have sell to match the number Windows phones? Now compare that to just the number one selling DEVICE at AT&T over the most recent quarter; that's the uphill battle this thing has.
 
heatlesssun said:
A forked version of Android that artificially blocks Google Play isn't a new OS. Virtually all of the apps in Amazon's Store are in Google Play. It's an Android phone. Indeed if were an entirely new OS with no Android apps, seriously, why would anyone buy it?
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Block Google Play? WTF? If Google decided to pull something like this, the shit would hit the fan so fast no one would be able to dodge it.
 
cdr_74_premium said:
Block Google Play? WTF? If Google decided to pull something like this, the shit would hit the fan so fast no one would be able to dodge it.
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The Amazon os is only built on android; it's still Amazon's own customized os.

And your comment no sense; why would Google block their own services?

Anyhoo, running android had nothing to do with running or having access to Google services. While the frequently come together, android is just the operating system which Google allows use of for free. It's Google services which Google licences to people making devices for a fee. Amazon has zero need for Google services since they want to keep people using theirs.
 
If Google decided to block third party stores on Android, people would bitch forever. Yet it's their OS, and if I were Google I would do it in a heartbeat.
 
Note that I said BLOCK, not bundle. I wouldn't ask Amazon to put Google Play on their phones but, being an Android derivative, I should be able to install Google Play if I want to. Alas, I can't, because it's blocked. Google would get a lot of shit if the roles were reversed.
 
DPI said:
Its a forked Android, effectively a new OS. There will be no google apps and no Play store.

Put another way, people won't be buying it thinking it "runs Android". They'll be buying it because Amazon.
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Technically everything is a fork of AOSP, even the Nexus stuff. Samsung runs a fork. Play store and google apps aren't part of AOSP. So you could argue anything with those ingrained are automatically a fork.
 
cdr_74_premium said:
Note that I said BLOCK, not bundle. I wouldn't ask Amazon to put Google Play on their phones but, being an Android derivative, I should be able to install Google Play if I want to. Alas, I can't, because it's blocked. Google would get a lot of shit if the roles were reversed.
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Look...there is a difference between blocking something, and not licensing it and building support around it. Amazon doesn't 'block' google play in the sense you speak of, and you can even install google services framework on things like the kindle fire hd/hdx etc.

Being an android-based OS has nothing to do with having access to google play/services. They are decoupled entirely. You aren't entitled to having access to google services just because you are running android. The device manufacturer has to license google services from google and build support around it. Lots of low-budget android devices don't include access to google services (and as such are generally cheaper). No one is blocking it, they're just not supporting it. Modders have already supplied ways to install the google services framework on kindle fire HD (and other fire devices), and sideload google play app apk's. Sure, you don't get the unified google device experience, but it's not difficult to get google play apps onto a kindle fire HD (and I assume the phone, unless something drastic has changed).
 
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