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I think it's quite clear, Google has to choose: either Chrome OS or Android. Because of this schism, tablet support for Android was delayed, which was one of th
by Jun8 16y ago
I think it's quite clear, Google has to choose: either Chrome OS or Android. Because of this schism, tablet support for Android was delayed, which was one of the biggest strategic blunders of Google, letting Apple entrench itself firmly there. Google often has competing projects and they have to attitude "we'll just let them duke out, let the data decide which is better." When you're talking about adding this or that button on the home page this is OK, but when you're dealing with huge industry-scale bets, this approach is appalling.
Google's misguided approach here not only hurts them but others, like Motorola and carriers, who have bet big on Android success. I think they should put all their forces behind Android. They'll need all they've got to beat Apple.
- jnovek 16y agoIt's not at all clear to me why they have to choose. ChromeOS seems to me like an experiment completely unrelated to Android -- "Can we use computers without any desktop software at all?" Like any technological stretch it's highly likely to fail, but not because of Android, because its hypothesis has been proven false.
- Jun8 16y agoExactly, it's "an experiment [mostly] unrelated to Android." My point is that it's sucking valuable resources from Android in Google and what's worse it's dividing the mind-share within the company. Look at Apple, one OS, one approach, one mind. They're throwing everything they've got to it. I think Google must do the same. Android already has made great progress, why not push it to the hilt.
- jnovek 16y agoGoogle isn't Apple. Google is experiment driven. Similar advice several years ago might have been, "Google needs to stay they hell away from E-Mail! They're a search company." I don't think it "costs" Google anything to have many projects going at once -- they're optimized for that.
- Jun8 16y agoYou're right. The point was that this not Google's initiative alone, a lot of device manufacturers are riding along too. In hardware business you cannot experiment like that.
- ZeroGravitas 16y agoWhy does Google (and unrelatedly Nokia) keep getting dinged for having more than one OS? Apple has at least two, Microsoft has at least two. Where does the obviously false folk belief that one OS is the ideal number come from?
- ceejayoz 16y agoApple and Microsoft have two, but one's a touch/mobile OS, and the other is a desktop OS. You wouldn't run OSX on an iOS device, and you wouldn't run iOS on an OSX device. You might, however, run Chrome OS on a tablet that's built for Android, or Android on a Chrome OS netbook. Google has made two potentially competing OSes, and that's the big difference.
- eru 16y agoMicrosoft used to have the DOS line (e.g. Windows 98) and the NT line.
- jonknee 16y agoI'm not so sure that's the case--if the ChromeOS team is sucking valuable resources from anyone it would be the Chrome team.
- spot 16y ago"Because of this schism, tablet support for Android was delayed" reference please.
- Jun8 16y agoI don't have an internal memo or something to prove that, of course :-) But think about it, why didn't they include support for large screens in Froyo at least? This delay caused hardware manufacturers to delay Android tablets, that's why there's no good Android contender to iPad now (other than some Chinese manufactured junk). I think Google was still caught in thinking Android solely in terms of a system for phones and pushing Chrome OS (and untested OS, still under development) for larger devices.
- spot 16y agotranslation: "i made it up".
- Jun8 16y ago+1 for the touche! Thanks for your keen eye for exposing made up comments in a funny way. I talked to people at Google, just developers not themanager of Chrome or anything, so I cannot be sure what they are thinking. People I talked had the same feeling, though.