NATIVE KINDLE APP FOR PLAYBOOK ON THE HORIZON?

Bonus!

One of the many reasons I wanted the Playbook was for digital books. After RIM diluted the Android opportunity due to legitimate reasons surrounding malware risk in that ecosystem, I was surprised that Amazon had still not developed a native Kindle app for Playbook.

Huge mistake!

The last speculative claim about a Kindle app on Playbook shows up in Google search results as far back as January 2012. C’mon Jeff. That isn’t cool.

No offense to the folks at Kobo but I committed myself to the Amazon ecosystem due to early investments on the iPhone and iPad. Now with the Playbook in my arsenal of devices, I don’t want to start a new ecosystem to access the same books. That said, if price starts to play into this, I am willing to play off different ecosystems but for now, Amazon is my main repository for books. In fact, I’ve been an Amazon customer for so long (like 1999), it’s pretty hard to break free of the Bezos distortion field.

So I decided to write Jeff Bezos yesterday and emailed him to three of the known email addresses. Like before, I received a response from his executive offices the next day. Not bad and very Apple-like. I’ll thank Steve Jobs for setting the precedent.

Thorsten, watch out. :-)

My email to Jeff was pretty straightforward. I discussed my “investment” into their ecosystem, my use of Kindle apps on the iPhone and iPad including Cloud Reader and even described my unfortunate experience and huge disappointment with Kindle Keyboard.

Amazon’s reply didn’t focus on the Kindle Keyboard experience but it did appear to carry some positive news. I can’t say for sure if this is an affirmative affirmative from Tranquility Base Bezos but if Amazon is smart, they’d get the Kindle App ready for Playbook.

Kindle for BlackBerry Playbook is not yet available, but stay tuned. You can view our Kindle apps currently available and discover when we’ve released Kindle for BlackBerry Playbook by following the link below:

http://www.amazon.com/kindleapps

I was instructed to try the Cloud Reader which I didn’t do at the time of the email or as of this writing.

Ecosystem Race

With all the mobile/device launches this week (Google, Windows, Apple, Yahoo!), this really is a race of devices, ecosystems and services. It reminds me of the old triple-play telecom-bundling models that I was party to (when I worked at Bell) and even now as telecom providers struggle to fight against the onslaught of wholesaler entrants that simply compete on price.

In this new world of digital content, platforms and devices, de-bundling has become far more costly than a simple “bill discount” since digital content investments have already been made. And people hate paying up for the “same thing” to make a switch.

Do the right thing Jeff. Get the Kindle Playbook app out to the base. I am sure this will win you some more “likes” in the social media landscape. ;-)