Bookending nicely with the story about Amazon’s ad-supported 3G Kindle being its most popular device ever, 9 to 5 Google is running a story on a price point survey Retrevo ran for Amazon’s rumored forthcoming tablet. When asked if they would buy an Android tablet with similar features over a $499 iPad, 31% of those who responded (who were interested in buying a tablet of any kind) said they would buy it if it cost less than $400, 48% if it cost less than $300, and 79% said they would if it cost less than $250.
It looks like big news, especially with the big infographic that heads the article, until you stop and think about it for a moment. “Wow, more people would buy something if it was cheaper. Congratulations, Retrevo, you’ve discovered the demand curve.” And there’s no real way to know if what those people say now will universally translate into what they would do if they were actually faced with a sub-$250 Android tablet.
Still, there are indications Amazon is trying to keep the price down as much as it can (as I mentioned the other day concerning the two-point multitouch screen rumor). And Amazon has been good at lowering the prices of its devices over time. We’ll just have to wait and see what it comes up with.
Isn’t this ignoring what makes an iPad useful as more than a multimedia content consumption device? The many productivity apps? The huge ecosystem? That’s what has kept the current Android tablets from gaining any real ( as opposed to fanboy wishful thinking) traction against the iPad as more than a toy for the anti-Apple gang. Once you get tired of “Angry Birds” and killing the tablet’s battery watching Flash based video what can you do with it that you can’t do with a cheaper ebook reader?