Friday, December 16, 2011 - 3:00pm
You no doubt have seen stories in both the tech and the mainstream media about how Amazon is going to somehow correct the problems with its Kindle Fire tablet/e-reader.
At the risk of Amazon proving me wrong about Fire a second time (more on the first time in a bit), I suggest that Fire, in its current form, can't be fixed.
For instance, Amazon can't send out external volume control buttons to every Fire buyer. They can't move the bottom sleep switch so you don't keep hitting it accidentally while just balancing it in your hand.
But to me, these are niggling issues. What Amazon won't be able to fix is the heightened expectations it raised in the months prior to anyone actually getting their hands on a Fire — especially in its supposed "revolutionary" Silk mobile Web browser, which turns out to be as revolutionary as a silk hankie.