Went to buy some music on Amazon and was quite surprised to see the ever present Kindle reader replaced with Android store. I had seen this announcement before that Amazon was going to offer apps for Android devices. Didn't realize it is such a big initiative to displace eBook business. Clicking on the home page link brings you to the app store portal: http://www.amazon.com/mobile-apps/b?ie=UTF8&node=2350149011
More pleasantly surprised to see the typical Amazon in action, selling things at or below cost. Clicked on games and saw Angry Birds Rio. Regular price $0.99. Amazon price, $0.00!!!
Went to buy it and instead of a cart on the right, there is a space to type in your phone number. I did that and instantly had a txt message on my phone. And a pop up video on the PC browser with a video which you must watch or you won't be able to get this working.
The video tells you the easy part: click on the link in the text message. And the not so obvious part: lowering your app security settings to allow Amazon store app to install. Disconcerting to be sure but you can change it back after the Amazon download.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/mpd/permalink/m3K6AP5A471AO1/ref=ent_fb_link
Once there, inconveniently you have to go back and re-select the Amazon link out of the text message and once more download the program. I am afraid Amazon is going to lose a lot of users who won't get this extra step even though it is mentioned in the video above.
Once there, the amazon store downloads. You then need to login using your amazon credentials. After that, I saw my download of Angry Birds waiting for me. From there on, the process was just as easy as it is to buy apps from Android store. Angry birds downloaded.
The Rio edition of Angry Birds seems like a nice step up from the old with more fun and more detailed graphics. But we digress.
I then started the Amazon Appstore manually. The UI is nice, showing tiles with a logo and price under it. The standard Android market app takes up an entire line for each app, showing 7 apps at a time on my phone whereas with Amazon, I see 10 at a time. The display icons are more attractive in Amazon and there are already ratings for each which similar formatting to PC version of Amazon ratings.
Another nice thing is pricing. Google has this stupid thing where it takes monetary numbers from anyone and does currency conversion showing oddball sale prices. Amazon ones is nice for those of us in US as it is all in nice US dollar amounts.
I did a comparison of some of the other apps and prices seem to be the same between the two stores. So it comes down to Amazon giving away some apps to get their foot in the door.
It is great to see Amazon enter this market. It provides competition for apps. Assuming you get through the initial 30 second hassle of installing their app, it is a well done effort. They certainly make it worth your while by giving away some apps. And the cleaner interface shows once again that Google still doesn't quite know how to create well done user interfaces.
I was hoping thought they would charge less than Google's 30% mark up but they are not. All three companies seem to be charging the same amount. Oh well.
More pleasantly surprised to see the typical Amazon in action, selling things at or below cost. Clicked on games and saw Angry Birds Rio. Regular price $0.99. Amazon price, $0.00!!!
Went to buy it and instead of a cart on the right, there is a space to type in your phone number. I did that and instantly had a txt message on my phone. And a pop up video on the PC browser with a video which you must watch or you won't be able to get this working.
The video tells you the easy part: click on the link in the text message. And the not so obvious part: lowering your app security settings to allow Amazon store app to install. Disconcerting to be sure but you can change it back after the Amazon download.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/mpd/permalink/m3K6AP5A471AO1/ref=ent_fb_link
Once there, inconveniently you have to go back and re-select the Amazon link out of the text message and once more download the program. I am afraid Amazon is going to lose a lot of users who won't get this extra step even though it is mentioned in the video above.
Once there, the amazon store downloads. You then need to login using your amazon credentials. After that, I saw my download of Angry Birds waiting for me. From there on, the process was just as easy as it is to buy apps from Android store. Angry birds downloaded.
The Rio edition of Angry Birds seems like a nice step up from the old with more fun and more detailed graphics. But we digress.
I then started the Amazon Appstore manually. The UI is nice, showing tiles with a logo and price under it. The standard Android market app takes up an entire line for each app, showing 7 apps at a time on my phone whereas with Amazon, I see 10 at a time. The display icons are more attractive in Amazon and there are already ratings for each which similar formatting to PC version of Amazon ratings.
Another nice thing is pricing. Google has this stupid thing where it takes monetary numbers from anyone and does currency conversion showing oddball sale prices. Amazon ones is nice for those of us in US as it is all in nice US dollar amounts.
I did a comparison of some of the other apps and prices seem to be the same between the two stores. So it comes down to Amazon giving away some apps to get their foot in the door.
It is great to see Amazon enter this market. It provides competition for apps. Assuming you get through the initial 30 second hassle of installing their app, it is a well done effort. They certainly make it worth your while by giving away some apps. And the cleaner interface shows once again that Google still doesn't quite know how to create well done user interfaces.
I was hoping thought they would charge less than Google's 30% mark up but they are not. All three companies seem to be charging the same amount. Oh well.
