I mean, free for as long as the cellular infrastructure exists is still pretty damn good
"I'm happy with my Kindle 2 so far, but if they cut off the free Wikipedia browsing, I plan to show up drunk on Jeff Bezos's lawn and refuse to leave."
Perhaps in a few years, Bezos will be in his moon base, equally drunk, and send an email to Randall saying "I'd like to see you try!".
Yeah, that was before they started turning off networks like analog TV and stuff, so we didn't think much about that functionality just disappearing.
It didn't actually let you browse websites, did it? The one I had would only load the Amazon store and download books.
You had to click through a few menus to use it, but yes (I think it was called “experimental web browser” or something). Worked internationally too, I used it to look up some stuff when I was on vacation in Turkey in 2010.
The 3rd generation at least had an 'experimental' web browser that let you go wherever you wanted.
The 2007 Kindle also had a basic web browser.
As I recall, browsing was an "experimental" feature (I had a second gen I think?) and it was nearly unusable for most purposes.
It was good enough for Slashdot on the beach, so it was enough for me.
Their experimental web browser was the only reason I kept mine...
Free web browsing when international + e-mail access through gmail. The proxy used to be able to get you through the Great Firewall of China...but that stopped after some years.