One of the more interesting developments to come out of the fledgling digital content distribution industry in the past year is coming from Amazon.

Yes, that Amazon; the one you're always trying to find $3.01 worth of additional merchandise on so you can qualify for their free shipping. Most people know them best as a bookstore, which reportedly still makes up their bread and butter; the Kindle is their attempt to take these book sales into the virtual world.

Kindle is an electronic book reader, and your gateway to Amazon's electronic book sales arm. It's got all sorts of nifty tech on-board to try to convince you that e-booking it is the way to go, but there's one key point that I'd like to call attention to here: something Amazon likes to call "Whispernet".

This focus-tested name belies an utterly simple move on Amazon's part: Kindle uses Sprint's wireless network to grab new titles from Amazon whenever you buy them, wherever you are. You don't pay a dime in access fees; data charges for are subsidized by your content purchases.

By combining Whispernet with Amazon's pull as a bookseller, the Kindle may just have finally unlocked the elusive e-book market that several players have been trying to build for years. The idea that you can pull these books down no matter where you are, no matter what hardware you have with you (Kindle aside), with no subscription fees clearly wins out over the old PC-tethered models, which had you browsing content and loading up your device at your desk at home.

By now, you're probably asking yourself why I'm talking about this on N-Sider.

Rumors surfaced in October that Nintendo was considering downloadable content in some form for the Nintendo DS. Cory and I discussed the shape such a service might take in Two Sides: DS Download Service. It's occurred to me since, between thinking on the Kindle and the unveiling of Nintendo's Pay and Play service, that the pieces may be laid out for Nintendo to make a bold move on digital distribution of portable games.

The first step is to make the DS work on cell networks. Getting this done may mean a new DS model, or perhaps a SLOT-2 cartridge with a cell antenna inside. Flash storage is also a must, whether it lives on a new DS game card (as I posited in the Two Sides article) or, again, is part of a new DS model.

Next, Nintendo needs to adopt Kindle's key strategy: foot the bill for the wireless charges, subsidizing them with a portion of the cost of the delivered games. Of course, since DS already has Wi-Fi support, the DS Shop can work over this as well; the built-in access fees here would amount to pure profit.

Finally—and here's where Nintendo would be breaking effectively new ground, considering thus-far weak mobile gaming efforts—cell network support should be added to the games acquired through the service (and maybe other future Wi-Fi Connection games as well). A fee would likely need to be charged for this, considering the network access charges; the Pay and Play system could be used to handle this. Of course, Nintendo would need to suspend the need to Pay and Play if the user was playing over Wi-Fi instead of the cell networks.

There are substantial questions inherent to a setup like this, of course. Would it be possible to cover network access fees, sell games at an attractive price, and still turn enough profit to make it all worthwhile? Would the charges for some of the more data-intensive online game styles make the network charges balloon into the stratosphere, making play on the cell networks impossible? Does Amazon hold a patent on Whispernet, which they'd use to sue Nintendo a la 1-Click?

Regardless, I think it's a valuable idea to explore. Nintendo's been a driving force behind liberating gaming from the living room and letting us take it with us wherever we go. I think they're well-positioned to take the next step, if it can be done.