Kindle

Dumb question. How does it access the internet? Who is the service provider is what I really mean. Is it a cell phone thing?
 

belvak

Happy Camper
It's not tied into a cell phone account. Basically, you get free internet connection with ads. If you have a wireless router at home, you can set it up to automatically open with that instead of the 3G. I love mine!!! Here's a link to some info on the wireless and 3G...

Amazon.com Help: Wireless on Your Kindle
 

Bay_Kat

Tropical
It's not tied into a cell phone account. Basically, you get free internet connection with ads. If you have a wireless router at home, you can set it up to automatically open with that instead of the 3G. I love mine!!! Here's a link to some info on the wireless and 3G...

Amazon.com Help: Wireless on Your Kindle

We camp a lot and usually there's not internet, I love that I can still use the kindle for internet.
 
Mine has 3g, and you can get them with 4g also.

It's not tied into a cell phone account. Basically, you get free internet connection with ads. If you have a wireless router at home, you can set it up to automatically open with that instead of the 3G. I love mine!!! Here's a link to some info on the wireless and 3G...

Amazon.com Help: Wireless on Your Kindle

Yeah, I know you don't have to have your own acct. My question is who provides the access? I didn't realize you could use your connection at home though.
 

merc669

New Member
Used to be AT&T if memory serves me (Amazon's Whispernet). I have a global kindle and love it. So I can get books while in Italy. But also tied to my wireless router or a hotel router if 3G not available. It is a GSM device with no advertisements on mine unless I use the experimental and hard to use web browser.

Bill....
 

belvak

Happy Camper
Yeah, I know you don't have to have your own acct. My question is who provides the access? I didn't realize you could use your connection at home though.

Kindle! I guess they figure if you have the models with both 3G and Wireless, you're probably going to be hooked up using the wireless more often than 3G, so it's worth it to them to provide 3G for free. Of course, you also have the ads that pop on the screen if you're not actively reading a book. I just like the fact that if I'm in an area with no wireless connection, I can still use the Kindle to read a book, download a book, or just search the internet!
 

belvak

Happy Camper
Oh, and you can also share the book with your cell phone if you download the free Kindle app. It even syncs the Kindle and the cell phone so that if you read on one, then pick up the other, you will automatically be taken to where you left off. Pretty cool!!
 
Kindle! I guess they figure if you have the models with both 3G and Wireless, you're probably going to be hooked up using the wireless more often than 3G, so it's worth it to them to provide 3G for free. Of course, you also have the ads that pop on the screen if you're not actively reading a book. I just like the fact that if I'm in an area with no wireless connection, I can still use the Kindle to read a book, download a book, or just search the internet!

Kindle has cell phone towers or satellites?
 

Nanny Pam

************
Who is your internet at home?
Do you have a wireless router?

With the router, your kindle will pick up that signal automatically.
 
Who is your internet at home?
Do you have a wireless router?

With the router, your kindle will pick up that signal automatically.

I don't use it at home. I am usually at work when I download a book and there is no wifi here at all. It appears now to be 3G. This is the first time I saw that. Usually is is just a few bars.
 

belvak

Happy Camper
Kindle has cell phone towers or satellites?

I don't know. My guess would be they subscribe to service through a provider, then just make the service available to those people who purchase the Kindle. :confused: Guess it's just magic!
 

belvak

Happy Camper
Here we go!!! It looks like an old article, but I'm sure the process is still the same...

To deliver all this data, Amazon is using Sprint Nextel's 3G (third-generation) cellular network. But Kindle owners will never see a bill for that service, because the cost will be included in the price of the content. It's a rare move that might be repeated as content providers and mobile operators look for successful formulas for making money off high-speed data networks.

Amazon Kindle Finds a New Use for 3G | PCWorld
 

getbent

Thats how them b*tch's R
What kind of Kindle? I have the Kindle Fire and from what I can tell, that only connects through wi-fi.
 
Fire. The lady could not get it to work unless she went to a site with wifi. My Kindle1 works without it.

The Kindle Fire doesn't have 3G functionality, even for purchasing / downloading content.

There are a few possible reasons for that. For one, Amazon did what it could to make the Kindle Fire as low cost to produce as reasonably possible. It still loses money selling them, but it couldn't afford to lose too much per unit and it wanted to be able to get to as low a price point as it could. It wanted to get them in as many people's hands as possible so as to build a larger base through which to sell content. Also, the Kindle Fire has more internet functionality than most other Kindles - Amazon couldn't really provide free 3G service to a device that could use it as much and as freely as the Kindle Fire can. And including 3G functionality such that people had to pay for their own data service might increase the perceived cost of having the device.
 
I'll just put this here:

Target, Unhappy With Being an Amazon Showroom, Will Stop Selling Kindles

Target, signaling its growing irritation with its rival Amazon, announced on Wednesday that it would stop selling the online retailer’s Kindle e-readers.

Target, with almost 1,800 stores, is one of the bigger carriers of Kindles in the offline world, though most of the devices are sold at Amazon’s Web site.

Like other big retailers, Target has been trying to figure out how to stop Amazon shoppers from visiting Target stores to check out products, and then buy them online from Amazon. It is a practice encouraged by Amazon; over the Christmas holiday, for example, the company offered a promotion on its Price Check app that gave shoppers 5 percent off any item scanned at a store.

I've seen some speculation that this move was driven by Apple (i.e. Apple not wanting Target to sell Kindles). I think that speculation is terribly misguided and misses the real issues. There are other retailers that sell both Apple iPads and Amazon Kindles, and I don't think Apple cares (not that Apple could necessarily force retailers to drop Kindles even if it wanted to). For a number of reasons, in the long run the Kindle Fire probably helps Apple rather than hurts it.

At any rate, Target's concerns regarding Amazon are much larger and more important (to Target) than any concerns that other tablet or eReader makers might have. Amazon is a direct competitor for Target, and the Kindle platform - particularly the Kindle Fire - is one of Amazon's big weapons in that competition. Amazon is and continues to want to be a retailer and content seller. That's what it does - the devices it sells aren't sold for their own sake but in order to facilitate other sales. For Target, selling Kindle Fires is somewhat akin to handing out your competition's (e.g. Walmart) sales flyers in your own stores. Target is providing its customers with the vehicle through which Amazon hopes to sell those customers stuff - some of which they might otherwise have bought from Target. I'm actually surprised that Best Buy hasn't made this same move, i.e. stopped selling Kindles. It probably has even more to lose than Target does.

I like Amazon and have a Kindle Fire myself, but I wouldn't be surprised if it sees more of this kind of push back from traditional brick and mortar retailers. Amazon is going after them and their business, which is all fair and good (aside perhaps from the sales tax issue), but there's little reason why those retailers should keep helping Amazon to take business from them.
 
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EmptyTimCup

Guest
I like Amazon and have a Kindle Fire myself, but I wouldn't be surprised if it sees more of this kind of push back from traditional brick and mortar retailers.


I did this a couple of months ago, I browsing in Barns and Noble, about to purchase about a 100 bucks worth of books, the light buld came on, I whipped out my iPhone, used the price check app, and ordered most of my stuff from Amazon ..... and still spend 50 bucks on magazines
 
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