Even though I do not own a standalone Amazon Kindle device, I am Kindle user. I use the Kindle application on my smartphone to read books. I considered buying a Kindle, but have not done so yet. I would love to have one, but don’t have the cash to justify reading the books on another device instead of my phone when reading them on my phone works just fine.

Amazon recently introduced a new version of the 3rd generation Kindle. It is nearly identical to the Wifi-only version but shows advertisements when the device is “off” and on the home screen when browsing books and whatnot. For this, you get $25 off the price of $139. This leaves you at $114 for a device with ads vs. $139 for a device without ads. Not worth the $25 right now if you ask me; HOWEVER, I think over time we will see the price come down even further. If it is a viable advertising platform, I think Amazon will get to a “sell the razor cheap but mark up the razor blades” style of thinking. I can see a future where Amazon Kindles are more in the $20-50 range if you agree to advertising and perhaps carry a subscription of some sort (perhaps two or more paid magazine or newspaper subscriptions) on it. This model seems to work for the mobile phone industry. My $700 Android phone only cost me $99 as a result. I bet it will also work for Amazon once they work out the particulars.