Apple News, Analysis and Podcasts

6 Comments

1. Anonymous ~ February 09, 2011 18:28

   "It will still be extremely popular amongst the tech geek media and geeky users alike, but mainstream users will gravitate to phones that work without the need to tinker, tweak or "modify" the OS." Spoken like a real Apple user who got no clue. Guess the world got several billion "tech geek media and geeky users" as you will see. #

2. ignatius reilly ~ February 09, 2011 20:15

   are you kidding? webos doesn't have a bat's chance in hell. you forgot about the developer ecosystem, and the entire services stack. never mind experience working with the operators #

3. Brian ~ February 09, 2011 22:19

   Little doubt that iOS is #1 right now, but WebOS #2? Haha I know like 2 people with a palm phone. Everyone with a smartphone has either apple or android. The few blackberry users are corporate types who are issued one. There is the rare Win7 phone but it's more like a unicorn along with WebOS. Bottom Line - Get Real #

4. Mike ~ February 10, 2011 06:46

   Good analysis, but for this to pan out HP will have to get serious about software and create an iTunes-like program to manage the content on it's new shiny tablet. And from experience with hp junk-ware on their laptops I hope the palm acquisition has taught them something. #

5. joe ~ February 11, 2011 16:30

   Wow, talk about reality distortion, buddy. #

6. Mark Reschke ~ February 11, 2011 17:20

   "Joe" Thanks for the comments and links. We clearly understand Android is being mutated to work on cell phones, ebook readers to web surfing toaster ovens, to deliver us a ton of amazing "activation" stats, but this is today. Tomorrow, with two major players going with completely vertical solutions (Apple and HP), the game is likely to change over the next 3 years or so. RIMM is also another successful vertical solution, although they are likely to be acquired in the next year or two. Android continues to get hurt - and it will only get worse - by the carriers and handset makers. Throwing on "crapletes" and racing to the cheapest lowest-end hardware is going to deliver the consumer that deflated netbook experience... Manipulating the OS to the point the users cannot tell Android device from Android device isn't good either. Don't get me wrong, the geek user thinks this is cool, because the phone is a hobby device, something to tweak and manipulate and control and hack away on. That's fine for the techno-folk, but it's not the mainstream user. Making matters worse for Android, handset makers appear to be moving the way of Samsung, in not upgrading the OS. Basically, you buy an Android phone and that's it. Want the new Android OS? Then buy a new handset. Platforms have upward mobility, but Android handset makers don't make a dime giving you upward software mobility. They have zero interest in doing that for the customer, rather, they have every motivation to outdate your current device ASAP you will buy another one. This is the same game Microsoft and their hardware vendors play on the PC side of the house. Microsoft makes one pay through the nose to buy an OS update, in order to please the HW vendors in getting people to buy new HW for the latest bloated OS. If your answer is that people can do all sorts of things with Android, and the store on this website is probably the best for gaming, but this store is better for business tools, or updating the OS can be done by going to xyz website, and then all they need to do is, bla, bla, bla. Then that's a geek user and that's cool by us. It's just not the mainstream user, and over time we don't see Android hanging as well as vertical solutions. We see Android still being a very viable player, probably in the low-end, but HP and Apple are likely to take away the high-end, non-free devices that people see value in. #

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