Kindle Fire - What can a filmaker learn from Amazon?

Today Amazon announced their new tablet, the Kindle Fire.  Jeff Bezos, Founder and CEO of Amazon said on the home page:
"There are two types of companies: those that work hard to charge customers more, and those that work hard to charge customers less. Both approaches can work. We are firmly in the second camp."
This new kindle fire seems to be a glorified kindle, but with a price tag of $199.00 it seems to to follow their commitment to charge customers less.  The tablets have been growing in popularity but there are still many people who don't have one.  With the price tag it has I can see more people having tablets.  
I'm also excited to see what this does to other tablets out there, especially the i-pad.  Granted it doesn't have access to the itunes app store which has the most apps on the market (about 450,000) but it still has plenty of features to make Apple worried.


-Free cloud storage for anything from amazon
-Dual Core proccesor
-Instant streaming to over 10,000 tv shows and movies (if you have amazon prime)
-One month free of Amazon Prime
-The new ultra fast (their words) web browser Amazon Silk


Ok, so Amazon just released a pretty cool tablet that is super cheap.  What does that mean for filmmaker?  Well for one thing there are still many things that a Kindle Fire can't do that an Ipad can.  Indie2zero mentions 10 ipad apps here specifically for filmmakers and FilmmakerIQ has 22 more apps for filmmakers.  My personal favorite is this one.




If anything though, Filmmakers can learn from Amazon.  They took a product that every company is making and then revamped it and made it in a way that no one else has.  They have stepped up their web browser and introduced cloud storage along - and that is all free for you.
Take a look at a genre or style of film that has been done over and over.  Now think about it and keep thinking about it.  How can you change it up to make it different and do it in a way that has never been done before.
My favorite zombie movie ever is Shaun of the Dead.  First off because I love Edgar Wright and his movies.  Secondly because Simon Pegg and Nick Frost are hilarious.  More importantly than any of those was that it was something never done before. Although we have all seen movies of people trying to out last a zombie invasion we had never seen it with an actual romantic comedy element to it.  Thus the Rom-Zom-Com was born.
Now you probably won't buy the Kindle Fire to help you with your filmmaking but you can apply the same principals that they used to make their product.
Make your films in a way that no one has done before.
Make it work better.
Make it so more people have access to it.
Now go out and make it.


P.S. If you are still interested in the Kindle Fire here was a video I saw on how they designed the new web browser - Amazon Silk.