What is Amazon's motivation for creating Silk?
Certainly we can take them at their word that an improved user experience is part of it, but is that the whole story?
2 Answers
Controlling the ecosystem. Amazon is trying to sell a tablet experience that must be competitive with the iPad at key levels--stability, ease of use, and primary features. Since the web is clearly a primary feature, Amazon needs control over the browser to guarantee stability, ease of use, and key features, both now and into the future.
So once Amazon comes to the conclusion that it must have its own browser, it can then ask, "what could we do in crafting this browser to make it better than other browsers (and especially safari on the iPad)?". And I think what they've come up with (using open source software and their own cloud computing infrastructure) seems very smart indeed.
So once Amazon comes to the conclusion that it must have its own browser, it can then ask, "what could we do in crafting this browser to make it better than other browsers (and especially safari on the iPad)?". And I think what they've come up with (using open source software and their own cloud computing infrastructure) seems very smart indeed.
Robert X. Cringely points out here http://www.cringely.com/2011/09/... that Silk is nothing new. He references that technique used for surfing over low band satellite connections but the Opera mobile browser has been doing something similar for a long time.
