Amazon launched four new Kindles this week, perhaps the biggest single launch day in the 17-year history of the company's wildly successful e-reader. One of them even comes in color! It is no coincidence that the launch came about a year after Panos Panay joined the company. Panay, a longtime Microsoft executive who spent years overseeing everything related to Windows and Surface, now leads the devices and services team at Amazon. His big task is to make Alexa, Amazon's assistant, the AI platform of the future. Apparently that's coming soon. Perhaps. But first: e-readers.
In this episode of The VergecastPanay joins the show to talk about how he decided to join Amazon, why people love their Kindles so much, the Scribe's new note-taking features, the new color screen and more. He also comments on the ongoing trend toward distraction-free gadgets and perhaps gives us a hint or two about future AI features.
If you'd like to learn more about everything we discuss in this episode, here are some links to get you started, starting with the gadget news of the week:
And in the lightning round: