Report: Amazon Working on 3D Smartphone

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A new report in The Wall Street Journal says that Amazon is working on several new mobile devices, including a smartphone with a 3D, holographic screen that doesn’t require the use of glasses. Rumors of an Amazon smartphone have circulated many times before, but the Web retailer has yet to release a phone.

The Wall Street Journal’s Greg Bensinger reported, “Amazon.com Inc. is expanding beyond its range of Kindle devices as it aims to compete more directly with Google Inc. and Apple Inc. The Seattle e-commerce giant has recently been developing a wide-ranging lineup of gadgets—including two smartphones and an audio-only streaming device—to expand its reach beyond its Kindle Fire line of tablet computers, said people familiar with the company’s plans. One of the devices is a high-end smartphone featuring a screen that allows for three-dimensional images without glasses, these people said. Using retina-tracking technology, images on the smartphone would seem to float above the screen like a hologram and appear three-dimensional at all angles, they said. Users may be able to navigate through content using just their eyes, two of the people said.”

PCMag’s Angela Moscaritolo noted, “The new hardware devices are under development in Amazon’s Lab126 facility in Cupertino, Calif., where they are known as Project A, B, C, and D, or the Alphabet Project. Amazon is reportedly aiming to release some of these devices in the coming months. However, the newspaper’s sources said that some or all might never see the light of day due to performance and financial issues.”

CNET’s Jay Greene added, “Amazon also is reportedly working on a television set-top box that could help drive its Amazon Instant Video business.”

But not everyone thinks a 3D smartphone is a good idea. Wired’s Roberto Baldwin commented, “The latest Amazon smartphone rumor has the yet-to-be-announced phone packing a sophisticated 3D holographic screen. This is a very dumb idea. The last place you want images floating in space is your smartphone…. Some rumors seem too good to be true. This one seems too bad to be true.”