Kindle Fire - First Impressions

I received my Kindle Fire the day after the official release date. Truth to tell, I've not had a chance to do much with it, but for the sake of currency, here are my first impressions.

I have a Droid X smartphone, so my truly first impression was that the Kindle Fire is a 3X-sized Droid. Perhaps not surprising since the Fire runs the Android OS, as does the Droid.

The Fire fits snugly in the custom designed Malware (sorry!!! "Marware") protective case. Usually with portable devices I purchase an adhesive, protective cover. I did not do that with my Kindle Keyboard and I will probably not do that with my Fire. Big ol' screen, ya know--and it is touted as being extremely tough. We'll see.

If you have an Android phone, you will be immediately comfortable with the Fire's user interface. At times, I found myself reaching for the hardware buttons below the screen that I would find if I were using my Droid. Adjusting to a world of purely soft buttons is going to be a learning curve!

I do not own an iPod Touch (just a 160GB iPod Classic), but I have the feeling that the Fire is like a huge iPod Touch. It is a tablet, yes, but the emphasis is on entertainment. You've got your music, video, and eBooks. I've been a subscriber to Amazon Prime for a while so I already have the ability to stream any of their (many) movies and TV shows free of charge. A search for content using the phrase "Mystery Science Theater" turned up 76 matches. Impressive.

Downloading apps works very much like it does on an Android phone. The difference would be that, rather than tapping the Android Market Place for apps, you'd be tapping the Amazon App Store. There are some disturbing gaps here. For example, Dropbox is not available from the Amazon App Store. I've come across several sets of instructions for getting Dropbox on your Fire, but come on... this should be in the App Store! I've also read complaints to the effect that Amazon's App Store does not offer the latest versions of many programs. To some extent, I applaud Amazon's attempt to put a quality/security filter on the App Store. I just wish that the "major" apps were available in their most current incarnations on a timely basis.

From an ergonomic standpoint, I have few complaints. Using the Fire feels perfectly natural. So far, I've not found a way to install and enable the Swype keyboard, which is my KB of choice on the Droid. At times it seems like the soft buttons at the bottom of the screen are reluctant to respond to my touch--maybe my fingers are too dry... I'm not sure yet.

As for the comparison of Kindle Fire and Kindle Keyboard, I consider these two devices quite separate. If I want to read the text of a novel, I will use the Kindle Keyboard. The battery life is amazing and the screen is beautifully legible in bright sunlight. The Kindle Fire is my multimedia  entertainment device and my portable web browser.

I tend to be suspicious of corporations mining my web presence for marketing data, but I consider Amazon to be one of the "good guys" along with Google. They're all business enterprises so, yeah, they're going to try to make money. As long as all the cards are on the table, I don't have a problem with that. When I read that Amazon's Silk browser caches content on Amazon servers, I'm like yay go, Amazon. They're trying to make the Fire web browser as responsive as possible. Technically, it's storing personal data that, in a perfect world, it should not. But hey, I could sit inside a cave with no electrical power (let alone internet access) and be smug as Shinola in my locked-down egosphere. I'd rather play it a little more loose than that, though. I'm not ready to move to Idaho just yet.

Okay, so... more to come (it says here).

Afraid

 

Blogger is pretty cool. It's nice. It's free. But it's not... um... secure.

Everything I post here is basically visible to the whole g-d damned world. That's not a bad thing if I'm posting, say, recipes. If I'm posting personal baggage that I would prefer only be seen my my friends... this is not the soapbox I am looking for.

I could post such personal outpourings on Facebook or Google. Well, their formatting options SUCK BIG DONKEY DONGS, to put it mildly. Available options... constricting... hard... to breathe....

Since I do web stuph for a living and I've registered a few domain names in my time, I could publish a blog of my own design. I could control access to the blog via logins. This might be the only truly secure solution to my quandary. Would people want to have to enter yet another ID and password to view some dork's pop-capped spittle? Cookies--I could save the login for a while so visitors wouldn't have to log in every damned time! (What about the rights of that little girl! Give me a break--I'm brainstorming.)

Maybe. Maybe that would be okay. I'm not sure.

One thing I know is this: There are precious few people I've blocked on Facebook, Twitter, and GPlus. Precious damned few. But, for the love of Jebus, I do not want those people snooping around my blog. There are some freaky freaks out there and to the extent possible, I'd like to nip their damned stalking in the bud. Nip it in the bud, I say!

It's a little more trouble to set up a secure blog than it is to just slipstream good old Google, but the benefits might outweigh the effort.

The reader will be kept informed of my progress on this issue.

My Approach To Social Media (Apologies In Advance)

My Twitter account is locked. I may be paranoid, but I prefer to have some degree of control as to who sees the ruthless truth that I tweet. From time to time I'll get a follow request from someone who is following 16,000+ people and is followed by a similar mob. Excuse me, potential follower, are you sure you're even remotely interested in anything I have to say? I think not, and I have no desire to be a bump for your statistics. BLOCK.

My philosophy of Facebook connections is even more restrictive. The only people I connect with on Facebook are a) people I know and b) proven MST3K fans. Other people are free to rifle through the White Pages to look for "friends".

I'm still working on my Google+ philosophy. Rest assured that it will not be "open to the world". I only post to people in my Circles. Sometimes I only post to "close friends". If there is any personal revelation in my post, I disable re-sharing.

The uncomfortable side of Google+ is when an innocent, unknown person adds me to their Circles. I refuse to blindly add to my Circles anyone who adds me to their Circles. Just because someone is nice enough to add me to their Circles doesn't mean that I will now consent to sharing my personal life with them. It's rather tame in these early days, but once the Marketers suss out the cracks, we G+ folk are going to be bombarded with spam. I trust that Google will find a solution to this future problem. For now, on Google+, I add no one to my Circles unless I truly know them. So, apologies to all you nice folks that I don't know at present and who decide to add me to your Circles on G+. Once Google+ is a more mature product, there may be a way for me to acknowledge your graciousness.

Google+: Tapping The Brakes

I don't think there is anyone on earth who wants Google+ to succeed more than I do. I'm quite sick of Zuckerberg's secretive dissemination of my personal information to his advertising clients. If Google+ succeeds, it will be because they respect users' privacy in a way that seems genetically impossible for Zuckerberg. I believe that Google does want to be non-evil (which is in direct opposition to Zuckerberg's apparent and gleefully satanic "Subjugate-the-World-and-Drink-Your-Blood" business model).

I would love to abandon ZuckFace and play only on G+, but I have some concerns.

First and foremost: Who can see the content I post on Google+?

I know that, when I post on G+, I can specify a precise list of contacts with whom I want to share the content. If I +mention someone in my post, that person automatically has permission to view the content. I don't really have a problem with that. Maybe Google is thinking, if I post a statement about Paris Hilton, then Paris Hilton should have the right to see what I'm saying about her.

Where the strategy breaks down, however, is that anyone who comments on my original material and +mentions someone else effectively changes my original permission settings to include the +mentioned individual.

To boil this down: Anything you post on Google+ is potentially viewable by anyone on the web.

As fast and loose as ZuckFace plays with your privacy, you are still (as of 10:41 PM EST 2011-07-10) able to know who will see what you post. Likewise with Twitter if you've locked down your account.

I've sent feedback to Google today expressing my concerns about this matter. Until and unless they allow me to specify who sees my posts, I can't participate fully and freely in Google+.

Why Mark Zuckerberg's Agenda of "One Identity" Is Doomed to Fail

It would be very convenient to Mark Zuckerberg (of Facebook fame) if every distinct human being on the planet had exactly one Facebook account that was tied to their real name. Dream on, Mark.

I have previously expressed my distaste for Zuckerberg's expressed desire to reduce all internet users to one-dimensional cutouts to be fed to his marketing machine.

Here is more support for the belief that Zuckerberg's dystopian dreams are doomed to failure. It boils down to Zuckerberg's "bubble boy" business model versus human DNA. Mark Zuckerberg will be humbled. His attempt to define the internet in terms of maximizing his own profitability cannot succeed.

My advice to Zuckerberg: back off and start serving your customers.

Why I Hate Mark Zuckerberg

People used to hate "The Phone Company" even though they used telephones every day. Now people hate Facebook even though they use it every day.

Rather than list every reason that I hate Facebook, let me concentrate on just one: the concept of "identity".

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is fond of repeating the phrase, "You have one identity". Obviously, Mark Zuckerberg approaches human psychology from the viewpoint of marketing.

Everyone has multiple identities--everyone has multiple personalities. When you speak with your best friend, you exhibit an entirely different personality than when you speak with your parents. When you speak to your lover, you exhibit an entirely different personality than when you speak with your boss.

Mark Zuckerberg wants to maximize his profits. In the pursuit of this goal, he is trying to use the power of Facebook to twist us into something we are not. Branding every human on the planet with a unique, unalterable ID tag might be a marketer's wet dream, but it goes against the nature of being a human. If Mark Zuckerberg thinks his ratty little "Facebook" construct can remake humanity according to his own desires, he is biting on a particularly hard chunk of granite.

Mark Zuckerberg's tactics are insidious. When I first signed up for a Facebook account, I dutifully provided them with my real name assuming I'd have an opportunity to choose a "handle" or at least abbreviate my last name before activating my account. There was no such opportunity. And adding insult to injury, I learned that I had to submit an email request to Facebook staff if I wanted to change the name that was displayed to the public.

Don't get me started on how Mark Zuckerberg allows games such as "Farmville" to access your private information and forward it to advertisers and tracking agencies. Even if you've blocked the Farmville application, if you have a friend who plays Farmville, Facebook allows your private data to be sucked up and redistributed.

Facebook: Use, but verify.