21 ms·

The Android Opportunity

173 points by superjohan 17y ago

RyanMcGreal 17y ago
A well-written piece from an avowed fan of Apple. What makes Gruber not a mere fanboi is his willingness to take valid criticisms of Apple seriously.
- lacker 17y ago
  I'm confused by this comment. In this article Gruber is saying how much better iPhones are than everything else. He doesn't seem to take the biggest criticism of "no fixed keyboard" seriously.
  - jvdh 17y ago
    He has taken the "no fixed keyboard" argument seriously. He wrote about it a number of times. He came to the conclusion that (when implemented well) there is not much of a difference, except user preference. http://daringfireball.net/2009/07/mobile_phone_keyboards http://daringfireball.net/2009/07/mobile_phone_keyboards
    - lacker 17y ago
      It just depends on your definition of "taking it seriously". For example in that article Gruber says Most people can thumb-type just as well, if not better, on an iPhone as they could on a BlackBerry. I prefer the iPhone to a Blackberry overall, but the argument that there is no advantage to typing on a Blackberry is just not true. Here's a better analysis: http://msgnet.org/2008/08/blackberry-vs-iphone-simplified/ http://msgnet.org/2008/08/blackberry-vs-iphone-simplified/
      - unalone 17y ago
        That's not an "analysis". That's an opinion just like Gruber's - who, incidentally, has much more in-depth articles regarding thumb-typing than this one, which treats it as an incidental issue.
georgekv 17y ago
"A monoculture benefits no one in the long run, because it’s competition that drives innovation." I found myself agreeing with this statement strongly.
- nkurz 17y ago
  To the contrary, I found myself shaking my head. Why is it in Apple's interest to be forced to constantly innovate simply to maintain market share? To say that 'a monoculture is not in the consumer's interest' make perfect sense, but why wouldn't Apple prefer a case where it has no strong competition? Their goal is profit via market share, not innovation for the sake of innovation.
  - Calamitous 17y ago
    Which is precisely why competition is so important. With no drive to innovate, they could saturate the market and park the technology where it is for decades (think Microsoft). By being forced to innovate, they (or a competitor) can drive consumption up by obsoleting the current wave of technology.
  - three14 17y ago
    Because companies that get complacent seem to lose the ability to innovate, so you get ten years of steady profits, and then finally someone eats your lunch. Anyway, I have an ethical problem with companies maximizing profits at the expense of doing anything useful. Why not innovate even when not necessary? You can call it R&D and not be blamed for wasting shareholders' money.
  - unalone 17y ago
    Their goal is profit via market share, not innovation for the sake of innovation. Apple's goal is making good products. If they wanted shitloads of cash, they could have sold out at any time in the last decade. Instead, they try to make things that people will love. If Apple has no competitor, they'll continue to innovate, have no doubts. However, they might not innovate in all ways at once, meaning they might not focus on annihilating all their weaknesses. If they've got a competitor, suddenly there's incentive to beat their rivals in every way possible, and the resulting products are even better.
stcredzero 17y ago
I hope that someone over at Palm reads this and uses it as a playbook for the Pre. Actually, I hope that someone over at Palm already thought of all this, and that this is their playbook. And others as well. The platform you need to beat in this plan is not the iPhone. It's the jailbroken iPhone. Make something that the real tech-heads and first adopters cheer, and they will be your beachhead. Do that, and you can get droves of the rest to follow you! As usual, the hard part is not the idea, it's the execution.
- jgfoot 17y ago
  Actually the Pre has all the features the article is recommending for Android: Over-the-air calendar, contact, and email syncing through Google services; background-capable apps; and no centralized App Store under one company’s ironclad control. (OK, there's no app store at all, although precentral.net and others are already distributing homebrew apps that can be installed if you download Palm's SDK).
  - stcredzero 17y ago
    I wonder why Google isn't doing an App Store?
    - jcl 17y ago
      Did you mean to say "Palm" instead of "Google"? Android has the Android Market, which is like the App Store.
      - danudey 17y ago
        Palm has an app store, it's just devoid of content.
jsz0 17y ago
Probably the single biggest growth stunting problem with the Android platform is the lack of a good advertising campaign. Google, and the handset makers, are allowing Apple free reign of the air waves. If you didn't follow technology it might be easy to believe Apple is the only company selling SmartPhones with third party apps. Google needs to spearhead the campaign and show off a few different Android handset and some applications and generally put their stamp of approval on it. They certainly have the money for it. The lack of aggressiveness on the part of Google with the Android platform has made me question their commitment to it from day one. There are many examples of a first mover taking an insurmountable lead in an emerging market. Google should fight now or it may be a lost cause. Apple is selling A LOT of iPhones.
- Goladus 17y ago
  I wouldn't say advertising campaign specifically, so much as basically little marketing campaign targeting actual phone-buyers at all. I didn't hear about the Palm Pre via those creepy advertisements I saw a pile of tech reviews and youtube videos for it.
mattmaroon 17y ago
He's missing the #1 area where you can compete with Apple (at least for now) and why I think the Palm Pre will do well: carriers. Most people, even high-end smart phone users, choose their carrier first and their phone second. You'd lose sight of that reading TechCrunch or Engadget too much, but talk to people in middle America and you realize it's overwhelming. Be it due to laziness, marketing, employer discounts, customer satisfaction, not understanding how simple number portability has made it, whatever. I'd bet for every person who has bought an iPhone there are 1 or 2 who at least would consider it if it were on their network. The Palm Pre and Android are both at a huge advantage here. That may not be true when Apple's deal with AT&T runs up though, but for now it's easily the biggest competitive edge available.
- qhoxie 17y ago
  Most people, even high-end smart phone users, choose their carrier first and their phone second. I think there is a lot of truth to that, but I also have seen a big shift since the iPhone. Countless friends and colleagues of mine have said something along the lines of "I would never use AT&T if it were not for the iPhone."
  - mattmaroon 17y ago
    The numbers indicate that it's a small shift at best. People switch carriers every 3-4 years on average (usually citing employer discounts, pricing plans, family networks, etc,) meaning that for any given phone, you'd expect 25-33% of purchasers to be new customers. The iPhone is somewhere between 30-40%, meaning that it's probably outperforming the average by 5-10%, which is great but not indicative of a sea change in consumer habits. It's probably more effective at keeping people on AT&T who would otherwise have left than in bringing new people on.
    - stcredzero 17y ago
      Hmm, aren't you forgetting the mathematics of compound interest? A 5 to 10% conversion advantage over your competitors, combined with a higher retention rate -- this is going to really hurt competitors after several years. After 10 years? Ouch! It's a good thing that AT&T sucks so much. Otherwise, the iPhone would be unstoppable.
andreyf 17y ago
Emphasize that Android apps are background-capable, and that there is no centralized App Store under one company’s ironclad control. There are no tales of rejected Android apps because there are no rejected Android apps. As much as Apple mucks things up, it isn't without reason that Apple made the apps-in-foreground-only design decision and put so much effort into controlling what software goes on the device. Unless the Android is going to be marketed to people who care to check which of their background processes has a bug and decides to eats up their battery every once in awhile, there's a big advantage to having apps "just work", even if distribution of those applications is a pain for developers.
jrockway 17y ago
As a recent Android convert, I am confused by all the "issues" that people keep mentioning. Everything on my phone Just Works. When I change the color of a calendar on Google Calendar, the color on my phone's calendar widget changes. When I change a contact on my phone, GMail and Google Voice update almost instantly. When I dial a number on the normal dialpad, my call is automatically routed through Google Voice. When someone who is not in my contacts calls me, a little message pops up with the White Pages lookup results. (This is a third-party app.) When I feel the need to tweet a picture, I click a button, the camera turns on, I take the picture, write some text, and my picture and tweet are posted. When someone messages me on Google Talk, and my computer's Jabber session is idle, my phone makes a noise and I see their message. I was on the train today, and wanted to catch up on HN. I read five or six articles, and all of them rendered perfectly in the included browser. Basically, this is what I consider an absolutely perfect phone experience. I could not be happier, as an end user. (And as a developer, I am really really happy.) I am just confused as to what these iPhone converts are doing. I think they are expecting an iPhone clone instead of a completely different smartphone. One more thing. I found this comment especially ignorant: Android suffers from the same issues that have plagued Linux on the desktop for years: the lack of integration between software and hardware, buggy and under-featured applications, a lack of attention paid to user experience issues. The encouraging openness and bits of innovation in Android are overshadowed by mediocrity. What does this even mean? I see perfect integration between my apps (and the Google apps on my computer), and of course, the underlying OS kernel has no effect on the user experience unless it is really bad.
- lacker 17y ago
  People who switch to an Android after using an iPhone for a long time are going to interpret anything different as poor UI design. That said, I think the iPhone browsing and app experience is superior, whereas the Android email and chat experience is far superior due to background tasks and the notification tray.
- rimantas 17y ago
  I am just confused as to what these iPhone converts are doing. That's exactly why iPhone is superior (so far): it is not about what, it is about how
UpFromTheGut 17y ago
From a business perspective, making a Porsche-caliber android phone doesn't make too much sense for Google. As far as I know, their business objectives include 1) getting as many possible people online with their cellphones searching the web & clicking ads, 2) stealing Windows Mobile market share, 3) and selling android apps to as many people as possible. And I believe, in that order. Besides, I like being able to replace batteries, sim cards, and sd cards on my g1. edit:formatting/typo
- Ras_ 17y ago
  I think that Windows Mobile is effectively in the deadpool. With Microsoft signing a deal with Nokia to include Office into Nokia phones, and Nokia's announcement to ditch Symbian in favor of Maemo there's no room for somewhat outdated Windows Mobile. Android, Apple, Maemo... there's already too many smart phone platforms to develop for. Since MS dropped the ball with their Mobile OS, They might try to adapt their strategy by partnering with Nokia and getting exclusive rights for some software groups (pre-installs) or some other deals. Most likely exclusive search engine deal.
randallsquared 17y ago
Er, when the G1 came out, it was already ahead of the iPhone for many purposes: copy/paste, background apps, real keyboard. The newest iPhones have one and a half of those (push notifications being worth some fraction of real background apps), and if they came out with an iPhone with a hardware keyboard, I'd consider buying one. In the meantime, though, I'm waiting for the Motorola Sholes. :) I just hope they don't mess that up.
BRadmin 17y ago
"There are no tales of rejected Android apps because there are no rejected Android apps." I wonder if all of these mini-controversies actually help Apple and the iPhone. It's another headline, another conversation piece, and like Gruber says, most / many people aren't all that unhappy with the App Store. The only reason they're stories and relevant in the first place is because of the iPhone's insane popularity -- the App Store rejection articles seem to further promote such instead of actually hurting it.
ruslan 17y ago
I guess the only reason why ppl think "iPhone is cool" is just because of slick multi-touch GUI, there's nothing else superior in iPhone per se. I have been programming for both platforms for quite a while and, you know, I find Android's Java less evil than all that iPhone's Obj-C stuff randomly mixed with tons of C wrappers (CoreFoundation) for regular POSIX. I find Android SDK more advanced because, 1) less code does more, 2) it's pretty standard Java whereas iPhone/MacOS is a mind explosive mix of C, C++ and bogus ObjC, c) testing/debugging cycle for Android is significantly shorter and d) Android app deployment is almost instant. Is there any reason why some vendor cannot implement same multi-touch input on their hardware ? Is it strictly patented ?
- dkokelley 17y ago
  The G1's hardware does support multi-touch, but Apple requested that it be disabled. http://digital.venturebeat.com/2009/02/09/apple-asked-google-not-to-use-multi-touch-in-android-and-google-complied/ http://digital.venturebeat.com/2009/02/09/apple-asked-google... The Palm Pre supports and uses multi-touch in the same manner as the iPhone. It would seem that multi-touch isn't Apple's sole intellectual property, though they have IMO implemented it the best.
  - ruslan 17y ago
    It's so frustrating when progress gets stuck against someone's greed. I think Google should make Android open source so everyone could commit their code to support features despite the will of Apple or mobile carriers. And this will also invite smaller vendors to use and populate Android.
    - dkokelley 17y ago
      Android is open source (http://source.android.com/ http://source.android.com/). The hardware is proprietary (AFAIK). People have run MT demo applications. It's so frustrating when progress gets stuck against someone's greed. I would actually argue that greed has driven the majority of progress over the last century.
  - 17y ago
acg 17y ago
Google were always going to have a tough act to follow. What Apple have pulled off with their platform is nothing short of amazing: but they have used technology they had, and adapted. Google is inventing a lot of the stack, and aren't rolling out on a single device.
forkqueue 17y ago
And the manufacturer to do this? Nokia. Frankly, if the N97 only ran Android and had a better touch screen it'd do most of what this article recommends.
- Ras_ 17y ago
  Nokia is committed to Maemo. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maemo_(operating_system) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maemo_(operating_system) Here's the announcement: http://www.ftd.de/technik/it_telekommunikation/:Strategiewende-Nokia-verliert-Vertrauen-zu-Symbian/551805.html http://www.ftd.de/technik/it_telekommunikation/:Strategiewen...
  - pavlov 17y ago
    It's not an "announcement". Quite the opposite: Nokia has explicitly denied FTD's report that they would be abandoning Symbian. However, phones equipped with Maemo 5 are definitely coming to the high end of Nokia's range. (Symbian's strength is that it works with substantially cheaper hardware than any of the competing smartphone OSs, which is great for Nokia, as they are particularly strong globally at the lower end of the market and in emerging markets.) The important point is that Nokia is adopting the Qt toolkit across the range. Both Symbian and Maemo will have Qt at the top of the stack by 2011. At that point, the underlying operating system won't be particularly relevant to application developers anymore: C++ software written to Qt (with the upcoming Orbit touch UI framework) will be just a recompile away from being ported to Symbian.
    - Ras_ 17y ago
      Important correction. Incredibly I've managed to miss that one.
  - patrickas 17y ago
    Nokia is actually committed to Symbian. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbian http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbian They denied the "announcement" made in that article: http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20090812-702406.html?mg=com-wsj http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20090812-702406.html?mg=...
alain94040 17y ago
Here at FairSoftware, we are watching closely which platform developers are most interested in, and iPhone is almost 10X ahead of Android. I have been thinking for a year that Android would catch up, but I still don't see real signs.
- jamesbritt 17y ago
  "Here at FairSoftware, we are watching closely which platform developers are most interested in, and iPhone is almost 10X ahead of Android." Why do you think that is? The sense I get from people interested in iPhone dev is that they think they'll make good coin from their apps.
  - cpr 17y ago
    Well, in our case (indie iPhone developer), I wouldn't touch the combinatorial explosion of testing on random hardware with random features with a 1000' pole. Also, I hate Java--though it has GC, it's still basically a static language, and horribly verbose to boot.
gsiener 17y ago
Is no one trying to get Android working on an iPhone? Surprised I haven't heard anything about that yet.
c00p3r 17y ago
Just wait while it will be relatively easy to replace WM on devices like this - http://www.htc.com/www/product/touchpro2/specification.html http://www.htc.com/www/product/touchpro2/specification.html - like the process of downloading and installing (replacing windows) linux in 90's.
davidw 17y ago
I think going head to head with Apple on the high end is a mistake. Google just isn't geared up to ever produce stuff that's quite as beautiful as what Apple consistently manages. On the other hand, there's a ton of space below that, and a ton of space to make Apple clamber ever higher up the value chain in order to capture the margins they want, keeping them out of the mainstream market.

173 points by superjohan 17y ago

A well-written piece from an avowed fan of Apple. What makes Gruber not a mere fanboi is his willingness to take valid criticisms of Apple seriously.

lacker 17y ago
I'm confused by this comment. In this article Gruber is saying how much better iPhones are than everything else. He doesn't seem to take the biggest criticism of "no fixed keyboard" seriously.
- jvdh 17y ago
  He has taken the "no fixed keyboard" argument seriously. He wrote about it a number of times. He came to the conclusion that (when implemented well) there is not much of a difference, except user preference. http://daringfireball.net/2009/07/mobile_phone_keyboards http://daringfireball.net/2009/07/mobile_phone_keyboards
  - lacker 17y ago
    It just depends on your definition of "taking it seriously". For example in that article Gruber says Most people can thumb-type just as well, if not better, on an iPhone as they could on a BlackBerry. I prefer the iPhone to a Blackberry overall, but the argument that there is no advantage to typing on a Blackberry is just not true. Here's a better analysis: http://msgnet.org/2008/08/blackberry-vs-iphone-simplified/ http://msgnet.org/2008/08/blackberry-vs-iphone-simplified/
    - unalone 17y ago
      That's not an "analysis". That's an opinion just like Gruber's - who, incidentally, has much more in-depth articles regarding thumb-typing than this one, which treats it as an incidental issue.

georgekv 17y ago

"A monoculture benefits no one in the long run, because it’s competition that drives innovation." I found myself agreeing with this statement strongly.

nkurz 17y ago
To the contrary, I found myself shaking my head. Why is it in Apple's interest to be forced to constantly innovate simply to maintain market share? To say that 'a monoculture is not in the consumer's interest' make perfect sense, but why wouldn't Apple prefer a case where it has no strong competition? Their goal is profit via market share, not innovation for the sake of innovation.
- Calamitous 17y ago
  Which is precisely why competition is so important. With no drive to innovate, they could saturate the market and park the technology where it is for decades (think Microsoft). By being forced to innovate, they (or a competitor) can drive consumption up by obsoleting the current wave of technology.
- three14 17y ago
  Because companies that get complacent seem to lose the ability to innovate, so you get ten years of steady profits, and then finally someone eats your lunch. Anyway, I have an ethical problem with companies maximizing profits at the expense of doing anything useful. Why not innovate even when not necessary? You can call it R&D and not be blamed for wasting shareholders' money.
- unalone 17y ago
  Their goal is profit via market share, not innovation for the sake of innovation. Apple's goal is making good products. If they wanted shitloads of cash, they could have sold out at any time in the last decade. Instead, they try to make things that people will love. If Apple has no competitor, they'll continue to innovate, have no doubts. However, they might not innovate in all ways at once, meaning they might not focus on annihilating all their weaknesses. If they've got a competitor, suddenly there's incentive to beat their rivals in every way possible, and the resulting products are even better.

stcredzero 17y ago

I hope that someone over at Palm reads this and uses it as a playbook for the Pre. Actually, I hope that someone over at Palm already thought of all this, and that this is their playbook. And others as well. The platform you need to beat in this plan is not the iPhone. It's the jailbroken iPhone. Make something that the real tech-heads and first adopters cheer, and they will be your beachhead. Do that, and you can get droves of the rest to follow you! As usual, the hard part is not the idea, it's the execution.

jgfoot 17y ago
Actually the Pre has all the features the article is recommending for Android: Over-the-air calendar, contact, and email syncing through Google services; background-capable apps; and no centralized App Store under one company’s ironclad control. (OK, there's no app store at all, although precentral.net and others are already distributing homebrew apps that can be installed if you download Palm's SDK).
- stcredzero 17y ago
  I wonder why Google isn't doing an App Store?
  - jcl 17y ago
    Did you mean to say "Palm" instead of "Google"? Android has the Android Market, which is like the App Store.
    - danudey 17y ago
      Palm has an app store, it's just devoid of content.

jsz0 17y ago

Probably the single biggest growth stunting problem with the Android platform is the lack of a good advertising campaign. Google, and the handset makers, are allowing Apple free reign of the air waves. If you didn't follow technology it might be easy to believe Apple is the only company selling SmartPhones with third party apps. Google needs to spearhead the campaign and show off a few different Android handset and some applications and generally put their stamp of approval on it. They certainly have the money for it. The lack of aggressiveness on the part of Google with the Android platform has made me question their commitment to it from day one. There are many examples of a first mover taking an insurmountable lead in an emerging market. Google should fight now or it may be a lost cause. Apple is selling A LOT of iPhones.

Goladus 17y ago
I wouldn't say advertising campaign specifically, so much as basically little marketing campaign targeting actual phone-buyers at all. I didn't hear about the Palm Pre via those creepy advertisements I saw a pile of tech reviews and youtube videos for it.

mattmaroon 17y ago

He's missing the #1 area where you can compete with Apple (at least for now) and why I think the Palm Pre will do well: carriers. Most people, even high-end smart phone users, choose their carrier first and their phone second. You'd lose sight of that reading TechCrunch or Engadget too much, but talk to people in middle America and you realize it's overwhelming. Be it due to laziness, marketing, employer discounts, customer satisfaction, not understanding how simple number portability has made it, whatever. I'd bet for every person who has bought an iPhone there are 1 or 2 who at least would consider it if it were on their network. The Palm Pre and Android are both at a huge advantage here. That may not be true when Apple's deal with AT&T runs up though, but for now it's easily the biggest competitive edge available.

qhoxie 17y ago
Most people, even high-end smart phone users, choose their carrier first and their phone second. I think there is a lot of truth to that, but I also have seen a big shift since the iPhone. Countless friends and colleagues of mine have said something along the lines of "I would never use AT&T if it were not for the iPhone."
- mattmaroon 17y ago
  The numbers indicate that it's a small shift at best. People switch carriers every 3-4 years on average (usually citing employer discounts, pricing plans, family networks, etc,) meaning that for any given phone, you'd expect 25-33% of purchasers to be new customers. The iPhone is somewhere between 30-40%, meaning that it's probably outperforming the average by 5-10%, which is great but not indicative of a sea change in consumer habits. It's probably more effective at keeping people on AT&T who would otherwise have left than in bringing new people on.
  - stcredzero 17y ago
    Hmm, aren't you forgetting the mathematics of compound interest? A 5 to 10% conversion advantage over your competitors, combined with a higher retention rate -- this is going to really hurt competitors after several years. After 10 years? Ouch! It's a good thing that AT&T sucks so much. Otherwise, the iPhone would be unstoppable.

andreyf 17y ago

Emphasize that Android apps are background-capable, and that there is no centralized App Store under one company’s ironclad control. There are no tales of rejected Android apps because there are no rejected Android apps. As much as Apple mucks things up, it isn't without reason that Apple made the apps-in-foreground-only design decision and put so much effort into controlling what software goes on the device. Unless the Android is going to be marketed to people who care to check which of their background processes has a bug and decides to eats up their battery every once in awhile, there's a big advantage to having apps "just work", even if distribution of those applications is a pain for developers.

jrockway 17y ago

As a recent Android convert, I am confused by all the "issues" that people keep mentioning. Everything on my phone Just Works. When I change the color of a calendar on Google Calendar, the color on my phone's calendar widget changes. When I change a contact on my phone, GMail and Google Voice update almost instantly. When I dial a number on the normal dialpad, my call is automatically routed through Google Voice. When someone who is not in my contacts calls me, a little message pops up with the White Pages lookup results. (This is a third-party app.) When I feel the need to tweet a picture, I click a button, the camera turns on, I take the picture, write some text, and my picture and tweet are posted. When someone messages me on Google Talk, and my computer's Jabber session is idle, my phone makes a noise and I see their message. I was on the train today, and wanted to catch up on HN. I read five or six articles, and all of them rendered perfectly in the included browser. Basically, this is what I consider an absolutely perfect phone experience. I could not be happier, as an end user. (And as a developer, I am really really happy.) I am just confused as to what these iPhone converts are doing. I think they are expecting an iPhone clone instead of a completely different smartphone. One more thing. I found this comment especially ignorant: Android suffers from the same issues that have plagued Linux on the desktop for years: the lack of integration between software and hardware, buggy and under-featured applications, a lack of attention paid to user experience issues. The encouraging openness and bits of innovation in Android are overshadowed by mediocrity. What does this even mean? I see perfect integration between my apps (and the Google apps on my computer), and of course, the underlying OS kernel has no effect on the user experience unless it is really bad.

lacker 17y ago
People who switch to an Android after using an iPhone for a long time are going to interpret anything different as poor UI design. That said, I think the iPhone browsing and app experience is superior, whereas the Android email and chat experience is far superior due to background tasks and the notification tray.
rimantas 17y ago
I am just confused as to what these iPhone converts are doing. That's exactly why iPhone is superior (so far): it is not about what, it is about how

UpFromTheGut 17y ago

From a business perspective, making a Porsche-caliber android phone doesn't make too much sense for Google. As far as I know, their business objectives include 1) getting as many possible people online with their cellphones searching the web & clicking ads, 2) stealing Windows Mobile market share, 3) and selling android apps to as many people as possible. And I believe, in that order. Besides, I like being able to replace batteries, sim cards, and sd cards on my g1. edit:formatting/typo

Ras_ 17y ago
I think that Windows Mobile is effectively in the deadpool. With Microsoft signing a deal with Nokia to include Office into Nokia phones, and Nokia's announcement to ditch Symbian in favor of Maemo there's no room for somewhat outdated Windows Mobile. Android, Apple, Maemo... there's already too many smart phone platforms to develop for. Since MS dropped the ball with their Mobile OS, They might try to adapt their strategy by partnering with Nokia and getting exclusive rights for some software groups (pre-installs) or some other deals. Most likely exclusive search engine deal.

randallsquared 17y ago

Er, when the G1 came out, it was already ahead of the iPhone for many purposes: copy/paste, background apps, real keyboard. The newest iPhones have one and a half of those (push notifications being worth some fraction of real background apps), and if they came out with an iPhone with a hardware keyboard, I'd consider buying one. In the meantime, though, I'm waiting for the Motorola Sholes. :) I just hope they don't mess that up.

BRadmin 17y ago

"There are no tales of rejected Android apps because there are no rejected Android apps." I wonder if all of these mini-controversies actually help Apple and the iPhone. It's another headline, another conversation piece, and like Gruber says, most / many people aren't all that unhappy with the App Store. The only reason they're stories and relevant in the first place is because of the iPhone's insane popularity -- the App Store rejection articles seem to further promote such instead of actually hurting it.

ruslan 17y ago

I guess the only reason why ppl think "iPhone is cool" is just because of slick multi-touch GUI, there's nothing else superior in iPhone per se. I have been programming for both platforms for quite a while and, you know, I find Android's Java less evil than all that iPhone's Obj-C stuff randomly mixed with tons of C wrappers (CoreFoundation) for regular POSIX. I find Android SDK more advanced because, 1) less code does more, 2) it's pretty standard Java whereas iPhone/MacOS is a mind explosive mix of C, C++ and bogus ObjC, c) testing/debugging cycle for Android is significantly shorter and d) Android app deployment is almost instant. Is there any reason why some vendor cannot implement same multi-touch input on their hardware ? Is it strictly patented ?

dkokelley 17y ago
The G1's hardware does support multi-touch, but Apple requested that it be disabled. http://digital.venturebeat.com/2009/02/09/apple-asked-google-not-to-use-multi-touch-in-android-and-google-complied/ http://digital.venturebeat.com/2009/02/09/apple-asked-google... The Palm Pre supports and uses multi-touch in the same manner as the iPhone. It would seem that multi-touch isn't Apple's sole intellectual property, though they have IMO implemented it the best.
- ruslan 17y ago
  It's so frustrating when progress gets stuck against someone's greed. I think Google should make Android open source so everyone could commit their code to support features despite the will of Apple or mobile carriers. And this will also invite smaller vendors to use and populate Android.
  - dkokelley 17y ago
    Android is open source (http://source.android.com/ http://source.android.com/). The hardware is proprietary (AFAIK). People have run MT demo applications. It's so frustrating when progress gets stuck against someone's greed. I would actually argue that greed has driven the majority of progress over the last century.
- 17y ago

acg 17y ago

Google were always going to have a tough act to follow. What Apple have pulled off with their platform is nothing short of amazing: but they have used technology they had, and adapted. Google is inventing a lot of the stack, and aren't rolling out on a single device.

forkqueue 17y ago

And the manufacturer to do this? Nokia. Frankly, if the N97 only ran Android and had a better touch screen it'd do most of what this article recommends.

Ras_ 17y ago
Nokia is committed to Maemo. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maemo_(operating_system) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maemo_(operating_system) Here's the announcement: http://www.ftd.de/technik/it_telekommunikation/:Strategiewende-Nokia-verliert-Vertrauen-zu-Symbian/551805.html http://www.ftd.de/technik/it_telekommunikation/:Strategiewen...
- pavlov 17y ago
  It's not an "announcement". Quite the opposite: Nokia has explicitly denied FTD's report that they would be abandoning Symbian. However, phones equipped with Maemo 5 are definitely coming to the high end of Nokia's range. (Symbian's strength is that it works with substantially cheaper hardware than any of the competing smartphone OSs, which is great for Nokia, as they are particularly strong globally at the lower end of the market and in emerging markets.) The important point is that Nokia is adopting the Qt toolkit across the range. Both Symbian and Maemo will have Qt at the top of the stack by 2011. At that point, the underlying operating system won't be particularly relevant to application developers anymore: C++ software written to Qt (with the upcoming Orbit touch UI framework) will be just a recompile away from being ported to Symbian.
  - Ras_ 17y ago
    Important correction. Incredibly I've managed to miss that one.
- patrickas 17y ago
  Nokia is actually committed to Symbian. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbian http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbian They denied the "announcement" made in that article: http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20090812-702406.html?mg=com-wsj http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20090812-702406.html?mg=...

alain94040 17y ago

Here at FairSoftware, we are watching closely which platform developers are most interested in, and iPhone is almost 10X ahead of Android. I have been thinking for a year that Android would catch up, but I still don't see real signs.

jamesbritt 17y ago
"Here at FairSoftware, we are watching closely which platform developers are most interested in, and iPhone is almost 10X ahead of Android." Why do you think that is? The sense I get from people interested in iPhone dev is that they think they'll make good coin from their apps.
- cpr 17y ago
  Well, in our case (indie iPhone developer), I wouldn't touch the combinatorial explosion of testing on random hardware with random features with a 1000' pole. Also, I hate Java--though it has GC, it's still basically a static language, and horribly verbose to boot.

gsiener 17y ago

Is no one trying to get Android working on an iPhone? Surprised I haven't heard anything about that yet.

c00p3r 17y ago

Just wait while it will be relatively easy to replace WM on devices like this - http://www.htc.com/www/product/touchpro2/specification.html http://www.htc.com/www/product/touchpro2/specification.html - like the process of downloading and installing (replacing windows) linux in 90's.

davidw 17y ago

I think going head to head with Apple on the high end is a mistake. Google just isn't geared up to ever produce stuff that's quite as beautiful as what Apple consistently manages. On the other hand, there's a ton of space below that, and a ton of space to make Apple clamber ever higher up the value chain in order to capture the margins they want, keeping them out of the mainstream market.