We've known for a while that Amazon's Fire Phone is this year's version of the Microsoft Kin or the Facebook-centric HTC First — that is, it's a phone that is destined to go down as one of the biggest bombs in smartphone history. CNET takes a look at Amazon's earnings report released on Thursday and brings us some new numbers that show us just how big of a flop the Fire Phone has really been.
Before Microsoft and Sony announced their new consoles, rumors had begun running rampant in regards to what these new systems might be capable of achieving. Would physical copies of games become relics of the past as digital downloads took their place? Would our lives be monitored by compulsory motion-tracking cameras? As it turned out, the future of gaming was much less exciting (and much less terrifying) than we had imagined, but the new generation has only just begun.
Samsung seems to know that it's stuck using another company's platform for its smartphones and tablets for the time being since its user base has come to expect Samsung devices to have tight integration with Google apps and services. However, that doesn't mean Samsung is giving up on its long-term goal of breaking free from Google's influence. The Wall Street Journal reports that Samsung sees the burgeoning smartwatch market as the best way to drum up enthusiasm for its Tizen mobile platform and that it's been courting manufacturers to make Tizen-based smartwatches just as Google has been courting OEMs to make devices based on Android Wear.
The brutal numbers behind Amazon’s massive Fire Phone flop