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89-601: The Fire Phone is a discontinued 3D-enabled smartphone developed by Amazon and manufactured by Foxconn . It was announced on June 18, 2014, and marked Amazon's first foray into the smartphone market, following the success of the Kindle Fire . It was available for pre-order on the day it was announced. In the United States , it launched as an AT&T exclusive on July 25. Notable for its hallmark feature "Dynamic Perspective" using four front-facing cameras and

178-419: A "Kindle Phone" which would be free with Amazon Prime membership. Amazon denied these rumors, stating that the company "will not launch a phone this year" and that if it did, it "would not be free". It continued to develop its phone while denying such rumours, and by 2013, it had split into two projects: "Duke" and "Otus". "Duke" was intended to be the higher end device in its portfolio, while Otus would serve as

267-566: A 2023 population of 755,078 it is the most populous city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest region of North America , and the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The Seattle metropolitan area 's population is 4.02 million, making it the 15th-largest in the United States. Its growth rate of 21.1% between 2010 and 2020 made it one of the country's fastest-growing large cities. Seattle

356-532: A 9-year-old riding a bike with his hands in the air" - gimmicks, without much real-world usage. He also stated the battery never lasted for an entire day, a "telephonic cardinal sin". ZDNet 's Zach Whittaker wrote the Fire Phone could be described in 2 ways: a motion sickness inducer, or a gimmicky device at best, but one that has great potential. Unlike other reviewers, he felt the phone was "beautifully constructed" and "easier to hold". Dynamic Perspective, on

445-546: A gateway to Alaska during the Klondike Gold Rush . The city grew after World War II , partly due to the local company Boeing , which established Seattle as a center for its manufacturing of aircraft. Beginning in the 1980s, the Seattle area developed into a technology center ; Microsoft established its headquarters in the region. In 1994, Internet retailer Amazon was founded in Seattle, and Alaska Airlines

534-634: A great frenzy among the technology companies in Seattle but the bubble ended in early 2001. In 1999, the World Trade Organization held its conference in Seattle, which was met with protest activity . The protests and police reactions to them largely overshadowed the conference itself. In 2001, the city was impacted by the Mardi Gras Riots and then by the Nisqually earthquake the following day. Another boom began as

623-468: A low-cost or free (to Amazon Prime members) alternative to Duke. Jeff Bezos later reconsidered, believing only a phone which could set itself apart, could compete against established phone manufactures such as Apple, and a lower-cost, bare-bones phone would hurt the Amazon brand. Although many rumors were not accurate, several final specs, the use of 3D, and the release date were correctly reported. The phone

712-441: A number of technology companies, including Amazon , F5 Networks , RealNetworks , Nintendo of America , and T-Mobile . This success brought an influx of new residents with a population increase within city limits of almost 50,000 between 1990 and 2000, and saw Seattle's real estate become some of the most expensive in the country. Seattle in this period attracted attention as home to the companies opened operations in or around

801-478: A number of theaters in the city exhibiting vaudeville acts and silent movies. He went on to become one of America's greatest theater and movie tycoons. Scottish-born architect B. Marcus Priteca designed several theaters for Pantages in Seattle, which were later demolished or converted to other uses. Seattle's surviving Paramount Theatre , on which he collaborated, was not a Pantages theater. War work again brought local prosperity during World War II , centered on

890-431: A prominent 19th-century leader of the local Duwamish and Suquamish tribes. Seattle currently has high populations of Native Americans alongside Americans with strong Asian, African, European, and Scandinavian ancestry, and, as of 2015, hosts the fifth-largest LGBT community in the U.S. Logging was Seattle's first major industry, but by the late 19th century the city had become a commercial and shipbuilding center as

979-485: A second time at the site of present-day Pioneer Square , naming this new settlement Duwamps . Charles Terry and John Low remained at the original landing location, reestablished their old land claim and called it "New York", but renamed "New York Alki" in April 1853, from a Chinook word meaning, roughly, "by and by" or "someday". For the next few years, New York Alki and Duwamps competed for dominance, but in time Alki

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1068-493: A standalone accessory. Also included with the phone are the USB cable and power adaptor, as well as a quick start guide. The phone is available only in black, but first-party cases can be purchased in black/cayenne leather or black/cayenne/citron/blue/royal polyurethane. Similar to the Kindle Fire tablets, the Fire Phone uses a forked version of Android called Fire OS . The Fire Phone was preloaded with version 3.5 of Fire OS, which

1157-604: A total area of 142.5 square miles (369 km ), 84 square miles (220 km ) of which is land and 58.1 square miles (150 km ) is water (41% of the total area). According to the Köppen climate classification system, Seattle has a warm-summer Mediterranean climate ( Csb ), while under the Trewartha system, it is labeled an oceanic climate ( Dobk ). It has cool, wet winters and mild, relatively dry summers, covering characteristics of both climate types. The climate

1246-407: A user to scroll through a webpage or flip a page in a book by tilting the phone. Photos taken with the Fire Phone are automatically backed up to Amazon's Cloud Drive ; Amazon offers unlimited photo storage for this device. Mayday and Firefly are also selling points of the phone. Mayday is a free, 24-hour customer support service for users of Amazon's devices, allowing the customer service access to

1335-522: Is based in SeaTac, Washington , serving Seattle–Tacoma International Airport , Seattle's international airport. The stream of new software, biotechnology , and Internet companies led to an economic revival, which increased the city's population by almost 50,000 in the decade between 1990 and 2000. The culture of Seattle is heavily defined by its significant musical history . Between 1918 and 1951, nearly 24 jazz nightclubs existed along Jackson Street, from

1424-404: Is based on Android 4.2 Jelly Bean . The fork replaces Google's default UI with a carousel of recently accessed content and apps (called "Home Carousel"), and also serves to promote Amazon's various services. A new feature introduced with the Fire Phone is the presence of "active widgets", widgets underneath the icon showing recent activity and/or information about the app. Pre-loaded applications on

1513-506: Is hilly in some places. Like Rome, the city is said to lie on seven hills ; the lists vary but typically include Capitol Hill , First Hill , West Seattle , Beacon Hill , Queen Anne , Magnolia, and the former Denny Hill . The Wallingford , Delridge , Mount Baker , Seward Park , Washington Park , Broadmoor , Madrona , Phinney Ridge , Sunset Hill , Blue Ridge , Broadview , Laurelhurst , Hawthorne Hills , Maple Leaf , and Crown Hill neighborhoods are all located on hills. Many of

1602-450: Is incorrect and misleading. This led to a large number of one-star reviews being left on Amazon's website, as a form of protest on the part of Greenpeace activists and/or its supporters. Technology reviewer and Internet personality Marques Brownlee stated in his Smartphone Awards video the Fire Phone was the "Bust of the Year", saying; "… it wasn't really a good phone in any way, and there

1691-430: Is non-removable and has a capacity of 2400 mAh; Amazon claims this provides up to 22 hours of talk time and up to 85 hours of standby time. The head tracking "dynamic perspective" camera array used a set of four low-resolution wide angle (120°) IR cameras and IR illuminators, synchronised with a global camera shutter. The computer vision algorithms were executed on a dedicated custom low power processor. According to

1780-445: Is opened. The bottom of the phone has the primary microphone, a micro-USB connector port, and dual stereo speakers with Dolby Digital sound processing. The phone uses a Snapdragon 800 chip paired with an Adreno 330 GPU and 2 GB of RAM . Internal storage is non-expandable, with options of 32 GB or 64 GB. The rear camera is a 13 MP CMOS sensor with an f/2.0 five-element wide aperture lens with OIS . The battery

1869-680: Is situated on an isthmus between Puget Sound , an inlet of the Pacific Ocean , and Lake Washington . It is the northernmost major city in the United States, located about 100 miles (160 km) south of the Canadian border . A gateway for trade with East Asia , the Port of Seattle is the fourth-largest port in North America in terms of container handling as of 2021 . The Seattle area has been inhabited by Native Americans (such as

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1958-491: Is sometimes characterized as a "modified Mediterranean" climate because it is cooler and wetter than a "true" Mediterranean climate, but shares the characteristic dry summer (which has a strong influence on the region's vegetation). Temperature extremes are moderated by the adjacent Puget Sound , greater Pacific Ocean , and Lake Washington . Thus extreme heat waves are rare in the Seattle area, as are very cold temperatures (below about 15 °F; −9 °C). The Seattle area

2047-568: Is the cloudiest region of the Continental United States , due in part to frequent storms and lows moving in from the adjacent Pacific Ocean. Seattle is cloudy 201 days out of the year and partly cloudy 93 days. With many more "rain days" than other major American cities, Seattle has a well-earned reputation for frequent rain: In an average year, there are 150 days in which at least 0.01 inches (0.25 mm) of precipitation falls, more days than in nearly all U.S. cities east of

2136-525: The 1962 World's Fair , for which the Space Needle was built. Another major local economic downturn was in the late 1960s and early 1970s, at a time when Boeing was heavily affected by the oil crises , loss of government contracts, and costs and delays associated with the Boeing 747 . Many people left the area to look for work elsewhere, and two local real estate agents put up a billboard reading "Will

2225-618: The Alaska–Yukon–Pacific Exposition of 1909, which is largely responsible for the layout of today's University of Washington campus. A shipbuilding boom in the early part of the 20th century became massive during World War I , making Seattle somewhat of a company town. The subsequent retrenchment led to the Seattle General Strike of 1919 , an early general strike in the country. A 1912 city development plan by Virgil Bogue went largely unused. Seattle

2314-569: The Duwamish , who had at least 17 villages around Elliot Bay) for at least 4,000 years before the first permanent European settlers. Arthur A. Denny and his group of travelers, subsequently known as the Denny Party , arrived from Illinois via Portland, Oregon , on the schooner Exact at Alki Point on November 13, 1851. The settlement was moved to the eastern shore of Elliott Bay in 1852 and named "Seattle" in honor of Chief Seattle ,

2403-528: The Fire TV , Xbox , Sony PlayStation 3 / 4 , or select Samsung Smart TVs. It can also function as a second screen. The reception to the Fire Phone was mixed. Although reviewers found Firefly and the Dynamic Perspective features to be significant differentiators, they also noticed several drawbacks. Such drawbacks include the 2013-level technical specs (including the lack of Bluetooth LE ),

2492-525: The Kindle line of e-readers . The Fire Phone occupied the number one spot on the "Best Selling" list on Amazon.com, before sales dropped significantly after 2 weeks. Amazon shares dipped by 10% July 24, 2014, one day prior to its launch on AT&T, due to increased losses incurred by the development of the Fire Phone. On July 25, 2014, several AT&T stores reported little to no sales, although several stores experienced increased foot traffic and interest for

2581-663: The Lake Washington Ship Canal (consisting of two man-made canals, Lake Union , and the Hiram M. Chittenden Locks at Salmon Bay , ending in Shilshole Bay on Puget Sound). The sea, rivers, forests, lakes, and fields surrounding Seattle were once rich enough to support one of the world's few sedentary hunter-gatherer societies. In modern times the surrounding area lends itself well to sailing, skiing, bicycling, camping, and hiking year-round. The city

2670-790: The Pacific Ring of Fire , Seattle is in a major earthquake zone . On February 28, 2001, the magnitude 6.8 Nisqually earthquake did significant architectural damage, especially in the Pioneer Square area (built on reclaimed land , as are the Industrial District and part of the city center), and caused one fatality. Other strong earthquakes occurred on January 26, 1700 (estimated at 9 magnitude), December 14, 1872 (7.3 or 7.4), April 13, 1949 (7.1), and April 29, 1965 (6.5). The 1965 quake caused three deaths in Seattle directly and one more by heart failure. Although

2759-759: The Rocky Mountains . However, because it often has merely a light drizzle falling from the sky for many days, Seattle actually receives significantly less rainfall (or other precipitation) overall than many other major U.S. cities like New York City , Miami , or Houston . According to the 2012–2016 American Community Survey (ACS), the racial makeup of the city was 65.7% White Non-Hispanic , 16.9% Asian , 6.8% Black or African American , 6.6% Hispanic or Latino of any race, 0.4% Native American , 0.9% Pacific Islander , 0.2% other races, and 5.6% two or more races . Seattle's population historically has been predominantly white. The 2010 census showed that Seattle

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2848-525: The Seattle Fault passes just south of the city center, neither it nor the Cascadia subduction zone has caused an earthquake since the city's founding. The Cascadia subduction zone poses the threat of an earthquake of magnitude 9.0 or greater, capable of seriously damaging the city and collapsing many buildings, especially in zones built on fill. According to the U.S. Census Bureau , the city has

2937-518: The University of Washington negatively. As schools across Washington lost funding and attendance, the university actually prospered during the time period as they focused on growing their student enrollment. While Seattle public schools were influenced by Washington's superintendent Worth McClure, they still struggled to pay teachers and maintain attendance. Seattle was the home base of impresario Alexander Pantages who, starting in 1902, opened

3026-609: The anti-Chinese riots of 1885–1886 . This violence originated with unemployed whites who were determined to drive the Chinese from Seattle; anti-Chinese riots also occurred in Tacoma . Seattle had achieved sufficient economic success when the Great Seattle Fire of 1889 destroyed the central business district. However, a far grander city center rapidly emerged in its place. Finance company Washington Mutual , for example,

3115-406: The iPhone 4 in 2010, and was codenamed "Tyto" for a genus of owl. Jeff Bezos reportedly "...envisioned a list of whiz-bang features... NFC for contactless payments, hands-free interactions to allow users to navigate the interface through mid-air gestures and a force-sensitive grip that could respond in different ways to various degrees of physical pressure", most of which ultimately did not end up in

3204-480: The 4th quarter. The company's CFO Tom Szkutak indicated its pricing strategy being initially too high was the reason for the product's poor consumer reception. List of 3D-enabled mobile phones Seattle Seattle ( / s i ˈ æ t əl / see- AT -əl ) is a city on the West Coast of the United States . It is the seat of King County , Washington . With

3293-424: The Dynamic Perspective, Firefly and, to a lesser extent, the packaged headphones, but derided the build, design, Fire OS version of Android , specifications, and exclusivity to AT&T. Amazon does not release sales figures for any of its devices, but based in part on its quickly declining prices and an announced US$ 170 million write-down, analysts have judged it a commercial failure. Amazon ceased production of

3382-570: The Fire Phone in August 2015 and discontinued sales soon after. The Fire Phone was rumored to be under development for several years prior to its release. Amazon reportedly started work on the phone in 2010, showing a prototype to AT&T in 2011. The first mention of a possible phone designed by Amazon appeared August 2010 in the New York Times , with a source within Lab 126 claiming; "entering

3471-474: The Fire Phone include Amazon Appstore , Amazon Video , Amazon Music , Amazon's Silk browser, and Audible Audiobooks. Although the phone uses Android, it does not have Google Play Store pre-installed. As of Fire OS 3.6.8, Google Play and Google Services can be easily sideloaded. An update, Fire OS 3.5.1, brought quick app switching (dubbed "Quick Switch" and accessed by tapping twice on the home button), folders (dubbed "App Grid Collections"), pinning of apps on

3560-547: The Fire Phone. Amazon has yet to release official sales figures for the device. According to Chitika Insights, an advertising company, by analyzing ad impressions from July 25 to August 14, 2014 (20 days after the release of the device), the Fire Phone constituted approximately 0.02% of the smartphone market in the United States and Canada. The device's usage share "remained steady but relatively flat". The Guardian later extrapolated based on data from ComScore and Chitika, claiming that no more than 35,000 Fire Phones were sold in

3649-475: The OS under the hood. What’s exposed is the part of the OS that makes the Amazon device comforting and easy to use. (..) That’s why Fire OS is better than Android for the majority of smartphone and tablet users." The Fire Phone has been labeled as the most-polluting phone by Greenpeace , who claims Amazon's servers are powered by non-renewable sources of energy. Amazon disputes these claims, countering Greenpeace's data

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3738-750: The Pacific Ocean) to the west and Lake Washington to the east. The city's chief harbor, Elliott Bay , is part of Puget Sound, making the city an oceanic port. To the west, beyond Puget Sound, are the Kitsap Peninsula and Olympic Mountains on the Olympic Peninsula ; to the east, beyond Lake Washington and the Eastside suburbs, are Lake Sammamish and the Cascade Range . Lake Washington's waters flow to Puget Sound through

3827-683: The Seattle area and has been open to all residents of Washington since 2002. On March 20, 1970, twenty-eight people were killed when the Ozark Hotel was burned by an unknown arsonist. The Wah Mee massacre in 1983 resulted in the killing of 13 people in an illegal gambling club in the Seattle Chinatown-International District . Prosperity began to return in the 1980s beginning with Microsoft 's 1979 move from Albuquerque, New Mexico , to nearby Bellevue, Washington . Seattle and its suburbs became home to

3916-485: The Seattle area for at least 4,000 years. By the time the first European settlers arrived, the Duwamish people occupied at least 17 villages in the areas around Elliott Bay . The name for the modern city of Seattle in Lushootseed , dᶻidᶻəlal̓ič , meaning "little crossing-over place", comes from one of these villages, which was located at the present-day King Street Station . In May 1792, George Vancouver

4005-634: The bigger West Coast city. Seattle had building contracts that rivaled New York City and Chicago , but also lost to Los Angeles. Seattle's eastern farm land faded due to Oregon 's and the Midwest 's, forcing people into town. Hooverville arose during the Depression, leading to Seattle's growing homeless population. Stationed outside Seattle, the Hooverville housed thousands of men but very few children and no women. With work projects close to

4094-493: The city emerged from the Great Recession , commencing when Amazon moved its headquarters from North Beacon Hill to South Lake Union . The move initiated a historic construction boom which resulted in the completion of almost 10,000 apartments in Seattle in 2017, more than any previous year and nearly twice as many as were built in 2016. From 2010 to 2015, Seattle gained an average of 14,511 residents per year, with

4183-631: The city, Hooverville grew and the WPA settled into the city. A movement of women arose from Seattle during the Great Depression , fueled in part by Eleanor Roosevelt 's 1933 book It's Up to the Women ; women pushed for recognition, not just as housewives, but as the backbone to family. Using newspapers and journals Working Woman and The Woman Today , women pushed to be seen as equal and receive some recognition. The Great Depression did not impact

4272-546: The city. In 1990, the Goodwill Games were held in the city. Three years later, in 1993, the APEC leaders was hosted in Seattle. The 1990s also witnessed a growing popularity in grunge music, a sound that was largely developed in Seattle's independent music scene. In 1993, the movie Sleepless in Seattle brought the city further national attention, as did the television sitcom Frasier . The dot-com boom caused

4361-666: The current Chinatown/International District to the Central District . The jazz scene nurtured the early careers of Ernestine Anderson , Ray Charles , Quincy Jones , and others. In the late 20th and early 21st century, the city also was the origin of several rock bands, including Foo Fighters , Heart , and Jimi Hendrix , and the subgenre of grunge and its pioneering bands, including Alice in Chains , Nirvana , Pearl Jam , Soundgarden , and others. Archaeological excavations suggest that Native Americans have inhabited

4450-406: The device eventually was listed as unavailable on the Amazon site. On August 27, 2015, the "Phandroid" website reported that Amazon had discontinued the Fire Phone. The Fire Phone uses a 4.7-inch IPS LCD Gorilla Glass 3 polarized touchscreen display with a pixel density of 315 ppi. Its front features the screen and a rounded rectangular home button below the display. The back, made of

4539-422: The device in order to show a user particular functions of their device. Firefly uses the camera and microphone to identify objects that can be bought from Amazon (such as media) or to scan useful information (such as addresses and phone numbers). An update added the ability to translate text, as well as identify famous pieces of art. The Fire Phone can also send its screen to any Miracast enabled device, including

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4628-598: The early part of the 20th century, and funded many new Seattle companies and products. In 1907, 19-year-old James E. Casey borrowed $ 100 from a friend and founded the American Messenger Company (later UPS ). Other Seattle companies founded during this period include Nordstrom and Eddie Bauer . Seattle brought in the Olmsted Brothers landscape architecture firm to design a system of parks and boulevards. The Gold Rush era culminated in

4717-486: The early years of the city, rode on the lumber industry. During this period the road now known as Yesler Way won the nickname "Skid Road", supposedly after the timber skidding down the hill to Henry Yesler 's sawmill. The later dereliction of the area may be a possible origin for the term which later entered the wider American lexicon as Skid Row . Like much of the U.S. West , Seattle experienced conflicts between labor and management and ethnic tensions that culminated in

4806-466: The expense of battery life and performance.". They also criticized the "limited [Amazon] ecosystem", including the lack of frequently used apps available on other platforms. The reviewer gave the phone a final rating of 70 out of 100. Re/code 's Walt Mossberg opined that the Fire Phone is "perfectly suited for people heavily invested in the company's ecosystem… But to top Apple and Samsung, Amazon needs to do better." David Pierce from The Verge gave

4895-403: The final product. He also "obsessively monitored the product", requiring "even the smallest decisions needed to go by him". Frustration built up over what appeared to Lab126 workers to be extraneous features such as Dynamic Perspective, although they continued to work on the project due to the money being paid to them by Jeff Bezos. Later, in 2012, The Wall Street Journal contended that Amazon

4984-471: The first 20 days. In September 2014, The New York Times reported that sales had been "dismal", and that "analysts say Amazon has sold only a few tens of thousands" of Fire Phones. In October 2014, during the announcement of 3rd quarter financial results, Amazon stated they took a $ 170 million hit due to costs associated with the Fire Phone and had over $ 83 million worth of Fire Phones in inventory, but declined to comment on how this would affect predictions for

5073-513: The first plats for the village were filed. In 1855, nominal land settlements were established. On January 14, 1865, the Legislature of Territorial Washington incorporated the Town of Seattle with a board of trustees managing the city. The Town of Seattle was disincorporated on January 18, 1867, and remained a mere precinct of King County until late 1869, when a new petition was filed and the city

5162-411: The growth strongly skewed toward the center of the city, and unemployment dropped from roughly 9 percent to 3.6 percent. The city has found itself "bursting at the seams", with over 45,000 households spending more than half their income on housing and at least 2,800 people homeless , and with the country's sixth-worst rush-hour traffic. Seattle is located between the saltwater Puget Sound (an arm of

5251-539: The gyroscope to track the user's movements, the phone's Fire OS adjusts the UI so it gives the impression of depth and 3D . Other notable Amazon services on the phone include X-Ray , used for identifying and finding information about media; Mayday, the 24-hour customer service tool; and Firefly, a tool for automatically recognizing text, sounds, and objects, and offering a way to buy recognized items through Amazon's online store. The phone received mixed reviews. Critics praised

5340-401: The hilliest areas are near the city center, with Capitol Hill, First Hill, and Beacon Hill collectively constituting something of a ridge along an isthmus between Elliott Bay and Lake Washington. The break in the ridge between First Hill and Beacon Hill is man-made, a result of two of the many regrading projects that reshaped the topography of the city center. The topography of the city center

5429-399: The home screen, improved photo taking capabilities, sending of high resolution videos via MMS, and improved battery life. Also introduced with the Fire Phone is a three-panel design for apps: the leftmost panel displays settings, the center panel is the main screen for apps, and the rightmost panel is used for "delights" - features specific to an app. The example given at the press conference

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5518-418: The last person leaving Seattle – Turn out the lights." Seattle remained the corporate headquarters of Boeing until 2001, when the company separated its headquarters from its major production facilities; the headquarters were moved to Chicago. The Seattle area is still home to Boeing's Renton narrow-body plant and Everett wide-body plant . The company's credit union for employees, BECU , remains based in

5607-425: The late 19th and early 20th centuries were almost entirely from Guangdong Province . The Seattle area is also home to a large Vietnamese population of more than 55,000 residents, as well as over 30,000 Somali immigrants. The Seattle-Tacoma area is also home to one of the largest Cambodian communities in the United States, numbering about 19,000 Cambodian Americans, and one of the largest Samoan communities in

5696-490: The mainland U.S., with over 15,000 people having Samoan ancestry. Additionally, the Seattle area had the highest percentage of self-identified mixed-race people of any large metropolitan area in the United States, according to the 2000 United States Census Bureau. According to a 2012 HistoryLink study, Seattle's 98118 ZIP code (in the Columbia City neighborhood) was one of the most diverse ZIP Code Tabulation Areas in

5785-620: The miners in Alaska and the Yukon . Few of those working men found lasting wealth. However, it was Seattle's business of clothing the miners and feeding them salmon that panned out in the long run. Along with Seattle, other cities like Everett , Tacoma , Port Townsend , Bremerton , and Olympia , all in the Puget Sound region, became competitors for exchange, rather than mother lodes for extraction, of precious metals. The boom lasted into

5874-407: The mobile phone market… seemed out of Amazon's reach. But… Amazon had not definitively rejected the idea of building a phone in the future." Shortly thereafter, some claimed Amazon might purchase WebOS from Hewlett-Packard , using its software and patents to create an Amazon phone. According to current and former employees of the company, the project for the Fire Phone started after Apple announced

5963-461: The other hand, gave him motion sickness and made the text harder to read. He concluded the Fire Phone had strong hardware, but that the software let it down. James Kendrick, another of ZDNet's authors, expressed that the "feature in Fire OS that makes devices so nice to use is the large carousel toward the top of the home screen (..) Fire OS is similar to iOS in one regard in that it hides the power of

6052-409: The phone a 5.9 out of 10; although praising the phone's picture taking abilities, the "solid" battery life, and "cool ideas like Dynamic Perspective and Firefly", the main drawbacks included the confusing interface, bland design, Firefly's poor accuracy, and the phone's commercialism. He concluded by saying, "Amazon’s first smartphone is a series of interesting ideas in a package that is … much less than

6141-450: The phone's appearance, stating it "looked more like a prototype than a finished product." Unlike The Verge , The New York Times felt the interface was "relatively simple to navigate". The Wall Street Journal ' s Geoffrey Fowler praised Amazon for "attempting to make inroads which might disrupt the giants", saying the smartphone market needed new ideas. All the same, the reviewer compared the phone's features to "the grown-up equivalent of

6230-411: The population, Spanish was spoken by 4.5% of the population, speakers of other Indo-European languages made up 3.9%, and speakers of other languages made up 2.5%. Seattle's foreign-born population grew 40% between the 1990 and 2000 censuses. The Chinese population in the Seattle area has origins in mainland China , Hong Kong, Southeast Asia, and Taiwan . The earliest Chinese-Americans that came in

6319-587: The product teardown site iFixit , the BOM of the Fire Phone is estimated to be approximately $ 205; this figure is higher than the IPhone 5S but lower than the Samsung Galaxy S5 . Included with the phone are earbuds Amazon claims to be "tangle-free"; the earbud tips can be attached to each other magnetically and also have a flat cable in order to minimize tangling. These earbuds can be purchased separately as

6408-586: The production of Boeing aircraft. The war dispersed the city's numerous Japanese-American businessmen due to the Japanese American internment . After the World War II, however, the local economy dipped. It rose again with Boeing's growing dominance in the commercial airliner market. Seattle celebrated its restored prosperity and made a bid for world recognition with the Century 21 Exposition ,

6497-424: The same Gorilla Glass, houses the camera, LED flash, and secondary microphone. The sides of the phone are made of a soft touch plastic. On the top of the phone there is a lock/power button and a 3.5 mm jack for headphones. The left side of the device has 3 buttons made of anodized aluminum: two volume buttons and a camera shortcut button. When the camera button is pressed, the camera app opens; when held down, Firefly

6586-405: The same playing field with Android and Apple flagship smartphones. Six weeks after the introduction of the phone to the market, its price with a two-year contract was cut from $ 199 to $ 0.99 and the off-contract price went from $ 650 down to $ 449. In November 2014 the price for the unlocked version dropped to $ 199 and even further to $ 179 in April 2015. After a further price drop to $ 130 in August 2015,

6675-475: The sum of its parts." Farhad Manjoo of The New York Times compared the phone to "Mr. Pine's purple house" (in which the eponymous character paints his house purple to stand out from others), stating that "Amazon has built a nice, solid, plain white house. You'll love living in it, if you can ignore all the purple." This references the "superficial features" of the Fire Phone, "born of the same superficial impulse", including Dynamic Perspective. He also criticized

6764-640: The underdeveloped OS, its high price, and the exclusivity of the device to AT&T's network. The hardware also received a mediocre reception: while some liked the design, others were concerned about the durability of the glass as well as the thickness and weight. However, the headphones were well received by at least one reviewer from Gizmodo , who said that "all cheap headphones should at least be this great." Engadget ' s Brad Molen stated, "Although Amazon's debut phone isn't bad, per se, but there's little incentive to switch carriers or platforms to buy it. Its unique features don't provide enough utility, and come at

6853-531: The way to their claim passed three scouts of the Denny Party. Members of the Denny Party claimed land on Alki Point on September 28, 1851. The rest of the Denny Party set sail on the schooner Exact from Portland , Oregon, stopping in Astoria , and landed at Alki Point during a rainstorm on November 13, 1851. After a difficult winter, most of the Denny Party relocated across Elliott Bay and claimed land

6942-484: Was abandoned and its residents moved across the bay to join the rest of the settlers. David Swinson "Doc" Maynard , one of the founders of Duwamps, was the primary advocate to name the settlement Seattle after Chief Seattle ( Lushootseed : siʔaɫ , anglicized as "Seattle"), chief of the Duwamish and Suquamish tribes. The name "Seattle" appears on official Washington Territory papers dated May 23, 1853, when

7031-754: Was also changed by the construction of a seawall and the artificial Harbor Island (completed 1909) at the mouth of the city's industrial Duwamish Waterway , the terminus of the Green River . The highest point within city limits is at High Point in West Seattle, which is located near 35th Ave SW and SW Myrtle St. North of the city center, the Lake Washington Ship Canal connects Puget Sound to Lake Washington. It incorporates four natural bodies of water: Lake Union , Salmon Bay , Portage Bay , and Union Bay . Due to its location in

7120-478: Was founded in the immediate wake of the fire. The Panic of 1893 hit Seattle hard. The second and most dramatic boom resulted from the Klondike Gold Rush , which ended the depression that had begun with the Panic of 1893 . In a short time, Seattle became a major transportation center. On July 14, 1897, the S.S. Portland docked with its famed "ton of gold", and Seattle became the main transport and supply point for

7209-526: Was introduced in Seattle in the Fremont Theatre, at a press event held by Amazon's CEO, Jeff Bezos . As a limited time promotion, buyers were offered a year of Amazon Prime and 1,000 Amazon coins with the purchase of a Fire Phone. Amazon's Fire Phone was priced at $ 199 for the 32 GB version and $ 299 for the 64 GB version on AT&T (with a two-year contract). The pricing range puts it on

7298-730: Was mildly prosperous in the 1920s but was particularly hard hit in the Great Depression, experiencing some of the country's harshest labor strife in that era. Violence during the Maritime Strike of 1934 cost Seattle much of its maritime traffic, which was rerouted to the Port of Los Angeles . The Great Depression in Seattle affected many minority groups, one being the Asian Pacific Americans; they were subject to racism, loss of property, and failed claims of unemployment due to citizenship status. Seattle

7387-456: Was no real reason for people to buy it (..) It just didn't really have anything going for it." When asked about the perceived flop of the Fire Phone during Business Insider 's Ignition conference of 2014, Jeff Bezos defended the product, saying it was a "bold bet", and his company had to take such bets in order to stay relevant. He continued, saying it would "take many iterations", and "some number of years" before getting it right, comparing it to

7476-497: Was one of the major cities that benefited from programs such as the Works Progress Administration , CCC , Public Works Administration , and others. The workers, mostly men, built roads, parks, dams, schools, railroads, bridges, docks, and even historical and archival record sites and buildings. Seattle faced significant unemployment, loss of lumber and construction industries as Los Angeles prevailed as

7565-448: Was one of the whitest big cities in the country, although its proportion of white residents has been gradually declining. In 1960, whites constituted 91.6% of the city's population, while in 2010 they constituted 69.5%. According to the 2006–2008 American Community Survey , approximately 78.9% of residents over the age of five spoke only English at home. Those who spoke Asian languages other than Indo-European languages made up 10.2% of

7654-687: Was re-incorporated December 2, 1869, with a mayor–council government . The corporate seal of the City of Seattle carries the date "1869" and a likeness of Chief Seattle in left profile. That same year, Seattle acquired the epithet of the "Queen City", a designation officially changed in 1982 to the "Emerald City". Seattle has a history of boom-and-bust cycles, like many other cities near areas of extensive natural and mineral resources. Seattle has risen several times economically, then gone into precipitous decline, but it has typically used those periods to rebuild solid infrastructure. The first such boom, covering

7743-560: Was testing a smartphone, with a screen size between four and five inches. Bloomberg also reported Amazon as looking to acquire patents in order to defend against allegations of infringement concerning the use of wireless technology of the phone. The Verge claimed "multiple sources" confirming the existence of the Amazon phone and it would be announced alongside the updated Kindle Fire and Kindle Paperwhite in September. In 2013, reports claimed Amazon would partner with HTC to create

7832-641: Was the first European to visit the Seattle area during his 1791–1795 expedition for the Royal Navy , which sought to chart the Pacific Northwest for the British. In 1851, a large party of American pioneers led by Luther Collins made a location on land at the mouth of the Duwamish River ; they formally claimed it on September 14, 1851. Thirteen days later, members of the Collins Party on

7921-509: Was the music app: the main panel displays the music playing, the left panel shows navigation and settings, and the right panel shows the "delight" of live song lyrics. Using the four front cameras and the gyroscope, the Fire Phone provides shortcuts based on the orientation of the device. Marketed as "Dynamic Perspective" with actions such as tilt , swivel , and peek , they allow a user to navigate menus/access shortcuts, view notifications, and reveal quick actions respectively. This also allows

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