Links 07 Sept. Amazon To Try Free Smartphone, Possibly With Own Airtime

From just the one report about Amazon, maybe and maybe not, intending to release a branded smartphone for free we've had a flowering of speculation about what it is that they might be able to do to make such a plan work. The basic idea is most certainly not strange: you can get a free smartphone off most airtime providers these days as long as you sign up for a contract. The question is, what does Amazon have to put in that contract in order to make the free part of the phone work for them?