[Tuttle]

The fact that amazon reserves the right to change doesn't change the fact that it is free. It would be silly for amazon to guarantee it free for life and then the next day someone figures out how to tether it and get free 3G internet on their computer for the life of their kindle. It just doesn't make sense.

I use my kindle as an ereader, and still I've saved over the amount of money my kindle 2 cost in May 2009 ($359) only in the free web browsing. In certain situations it has been very relevant (telling people the power is out in the building, checking email for an important email when away from wifi, etc).

Don't avoid the kindle only because it might eventually cost you something, because its not something that its designed to be good at anyways. If you're getting a kindle for the web browser you'll be disappointed.

So simple answer, yes it is free.

 

[denodan]

Don't count on it staying that way though

I think they're currently collecting data on usage and seeing how it works out.

So true. I am new here and getting a Kindle 3, with case and light built in.

I don't think the extra in price is worth it for the 3G version, so getting the Wifi version because 90% of the time can access through Wifi anyway and get full access.

Here in New Zealand, with 3G most of the web you cannot browse, so very limited, with Wifi you can access the lot.

I believe in time they Amazon may charge a monthly fee, or as has been said with apps they will charge you, but 3G won't remain free, this is why I chose the Wifi over the 3G as it's much better for web browsing and full access, whereas 3G is very limited over here.

I suspect Vodafone will start charging bandwidth fees, as in November here, Vodafone are going to be the carriers, so bet we get charged a fee.

You certainly will if you want full access to the web browser, as most things your locked out allready. Although you can access Amazon to download books.

I dont want 3G knowing in the not to distant future you will pay for this service.

The big advantage with the wifi version is you have greater access to the web, can access books just like the 3G version, most of Mc Donalds stores and many others have free hot points and not paying a fee, most of the time have Wifi access anyway.

The only thing wifi does not have is download books while your away from your wifi connection, or hot point, other than that, why pay $50 extra for something that will not remain free.

 

[gpamelac]

The kindle browser is a expertimental browser and not very good for surfing the web.
It not as good as most smartphones for browsing the internet.
Donot count on the kindle for web surfing.
It is limited to mainly text sites with black&white images.
You canot see any video so I use my kindle as a ereader for ebooks ONLY
and I use my cellphone & 3G for checking email and my facebook quickly.
I can check weather,news also quickly.

 

[SamIam]

I really hope they keep it free

 

[Duane Gundrum]

I suspect it will be free for some time to come because many Kindle owners are like me. We use it to read books and newspapers. I rarely use it for the web features that it has (although I have every now and then, but pretty rarely). So, overall, I think they get a good return by most of their users, as I suspect most are like me in that the device is for reading specifically.

 

[Zero]

I barely use the 3G for web browsing.  Most of my browsing away from my computer is on my iphone.  But I do like having that "feature" there and paid the extra $50 to get it, and would be really disappointed if it wasn't free anymore.

 

[mcostas]

The kindle browser is a expertimental browser and not very good for surfing the web.
It not as good as most smartphones for browsing the internet.
Donot count on the kindle for web surfing.
It is limited to mainly text sites with black&white images.
You canot see any video so I use my kindle as a ereader for ebooks ONLY
and I use my cellphone & 3G for checking email and my facebook quickly.
I can check weather,news also quickly.

I think charging for the interweb would result in losing business as the web feature is rather cumbersome, to put it mildly. I use it in emergencies to check things like the news. Web pages are not very readable and the type tiny as well.

They would be better off just producing a tablet. You think people complain now, just wait till they pay for what passes as the web on a kindle.

 

[MartyS]

The data usage is minimal since you can't stream audio/video or download much.

The extra hardware to add 3G is not that expensive, so the $50 extra you pay for it is mostly profit for Amazon.  Considering you can only do text and simple graphics in the browser it would take a massive amount of browsing to use up even one gig of data, so I think that $50 would cover all the 3G browsing you could do over the lifespan of a Kindle before you upgrade to the next version (2-4 years?).

Even a twitter app would take forever to eat up enough data to impact, think how many tweets it would take to add up to even just one megabyte of data?

 

[DavidSherwood]

It seems that Amazons pricing model is to charge by content and not general access. This why you pay per-month for each blog you what to read on your Kindle. If you go to their Kindle Development sitehttps://kindlepublishing.amazon.com/gp/vendor/sign-in/192-2564932-2051149?ie=UTF8&originatingURI=%2Fgp%2Fvendor%2Fmembers%2Fkindlepubs%2Fkdk%2Fhome, you will see that Amazon will charge the developer 15 cents / mega-byte and the developer will charge you a monthly subscription fee.
This make sense to me. The Kindle is not a good general purpose web browser. For Kindle Web App to be useful, I think it would have to be specialized. To make the Kindle a good web browser would detract from its primary purpose as an e-reader.

 

[Guest]

Web browsing on the Kindle is so crappy I doubt they will ever have a problem with usage getting too expensive. It's not meant to be a mobile Internet device after all. Most people have smartphones, iPod Touches, Android tablets or iPads for that.