Amazon doesn't just sell smartphones anymore — it makes one. In news that should surprise exactly no one, Jeff Bezos has officially unveiled Amazon's first cellphone, the Fire Phone. It joins the Kindle Fire tablets, Kindle ebook readers, and Fire TV set-top box in Amazon's ever-growing lineup of devices. Amazon's been in the device business for ten years, Bezos reminded the crowd in Seattle, with the first Kindle coming fully seven years ago.
The Fire Phone has a 4.7-inch HD display, aluminum buttons, a Qualcomm processor, Adreno 330 graphics, and 2GB of RAM. Bezos mentioned a lot about the phone's build, from the injection molded connectors to the chamfered edges. There's a set of stereo speakers that Bezos promised are better than your average phone, and a good set of headphones that won't tangle. (That last bit sounds impossible, but we'll have to wait and see.)
There's also a 13-megapixel camera, an f/2.0 lens, and optical image stabilization. Bezos said, again, that camera performance was hugely important. He compared it to the iPhone 5S and the Samsung Galaxy S5, saying that no matter the situation the Fire Phone will take better photos. There's a quick-access shutter button on the side, and unlimited cloud storage for your photos. That's where Amazon has an advantage, really, its ability to do cloud storage cheaply and well.
The announcement comes after weeks of buildup, including an open invitation from Amazon to an event showcasing "an amazing new device," a teaser video filled with people having their minds blown by a device that was just off-screen, and a, well, unique package from Amazon last week. Rumors of the company's smartphone ambitions began more than two years ago, and there has likely been a phone for that long — recent reports say the phone has been heavily delayed. But it's here now, the star of the Seattle event Amazon threw for press, buyers, and developers.
During the announcement, Bezos took time to mention that when Amazon first launched the Kindle, it was met with something of a tepid response. That has, he took care to note, changed in a big way. The same thing happened with Kindle tablets, he said — and he not-so-subtly implied that the same might happen with the new phone.
via The Verge, developing
