With Amazon dropping their Windows Store Kindle app, I’m suddenly finding that my Surface Pro 3 with W10 is not so attractive as a tablet/2-in-1. Reading and browsing the web were my two primary uses of SP3 as a tablet.
I understood that W10 wasn’t ideal in the tablet role. W10 was a step back from W8; although, things improved a bit in the Anniversary update. The bigger problem is the app gap, which is just as bad on “big Windows” as it is with W10M/WP. I just didn’t realize how much the Kindle app meant to me and how much it defined my tablet experience with the SP3 and W10.
I knew Amazon wasn’t actively doing anything with the Kindle app, but it was useable and I could tolerate the lack of new features. I just never expected them to screw us over, or screw MS over, and completely drop the app. I’m curious why MS isn’t courting them as much as they have Facebook to keep their store/UWP app going.
The desktop Kindle app is a joke. It always has been. I’ve never enjoyed using it, even before W8 came along. I tried it again when Amazon announced that they were dropping the store app. It definitely isn’t very touch friendly. For example, I can’t highlight with touch. And full screen mode is a kludge. It doesn’t behave in the way we’ve grown to expect full screen apps to behave since W8.
Does this signal the end of Windows as a viable tablet/2-in-1 OS for typical consumers? While it was never an easy recommendation, this one app removal really changes my entire stance of recommending the Surface line to a “normal” user.
Is this also the beginning of an accelerated end to Windows as a consumer device OS? I sort of feel like it is.