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I understand where the author is coming from but I disagree completely. Imagine trying to build a smartphone 15 years ago, that would be really hard. You nee

I understand where the author is coming from but I disagree completely. Imagine trying to build a smartphone 15 years ago, that would be really hard. You need a decent screen you need a good cpu etc. All of that is off the shelf now. Anyone can buy it and its cheap. (esp in volume) In a market in China (I dont remember the name) there are vendors upon vendors who sell all sorts of electrical parts, gadgets etc. You can literally walk down the isles and pick the parts you want in your new smartphone. So hardware wise, now is a good time. Sure you wont get as polished as the big players right away, but prototypes or a limited set sure. Now software. There is quite a bit of software that will run on the arm board. With all the hacking on the android platform (sadly a lot more than on the Windows or Apples phones), you can (if you want) at least create a very customized different Android based OS if you want. (would make updates a bitch). But you can also get some version of linux working and I am sure some other strange os. But there has never been a time when it was easier to get some dev boards, and start writing the next mobile OS. Its something you can get started on at home now for less than $1000. As far as the cloud services and integration that has never been nearly as easy. We have all sorts of providers with stable and "open" APIs. Providers like MS azure provides a full stack. Database, Data storage, device sync, messaging, computation etc. and they are not the only ones. I cant think of how much building and setting up all that cloud stuff would have cost in itself. Its out there now, and if you are tesing and writing your app, or have it deployed with low values its very cheap. Sure you wont have your own Music store right away (but licensing is the biggest issue there) but you can piggy back Amazon mp3. So we have good access to cheap hardware. We have development tools, boards and compilers. We have excellent possibilities cloud sync, integration, etc. We have open source operating systems we can hack at, learn from and understand how things work. As others have pointed out the future is probably pure data phones. That is a great market to attack right now. Forget the 1984 "phone" part and the nobody really uses anymore SMS.

gnaffle 13y ago
But that's the thing though, companies like Apple pretty much ignore the whole "phone" and SMS thing, Apple has even shot the operators in the back with iMessage. You're right that it's easy to make a phone nowadays with off the shelf components, like the article mentions that's exactly what the chinese/asian OEMS are doing now. The question is whether you will be able to make something that can compete with Apple / Google / Samsung. Even HTC is having a hard time doing that with some pretty decent phones.
- ThinkBeat 13y ago
  That is very true. I do feel that the best phones out there today as far as sales maybe the iPhone and the Samsung S4? Will in 5 (?) 10 (?), be like the first iPod, big clunky and obsolete. And the huge phone makers of yesteryear: Nokia, Blackberry etc are now small. I can easily see in a 10 years period a a new player entering the market with success. (if they can keep from being bought by the big 3). Facebooks phone partnerships so far have sucked. Maybe they will find something better. Maybe it will be someone else. Or maybe no one will :( I am still hoping for a new PC os :o
  - victorhooi 13y ago
    What's wrong with the existing PC OSes? =). In the free/open space, we already have fifty billion variants - Linux, the various BSDs (FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD), GNU Hurd, ReactOS, OpenSolaris, Haiku etc.)... Do you want more? I mean, I get the whole diversity thing, but after a while, I suspect you get diminishing returns...
    - ThinkBeat 13y ago
      I didn't actually know that GNU Herd was stable yet so that is actually cool I will install that later on (VM) We do have a lot of great Unix inspired operating systems and they are doing an amazing job. I count OS/X in that category too, though its debatable. Then we have Windows, the big giant. I would really like to see them do a Windows NT Squired, NT NT, a new generation that can break compatibility. Haiku I am a little excited about. I remember how cool the BoBoxes were many years ago when I saw a demo. How far ahead of Windows it was back in those days. Dont forget about LoseTheOS/Temple. I dont care what people say about the genius who made it. Its a crowning achievement. It is exciting because it isnt, and was never intended to be a be all do all OS for everyone. It has a purpose. I would like to see more in Plan9.
paulftw 13y ago
Following the same logic we'd have something better than windows8 dominating the market by now. It's so easy to bring a new desktop pc or a laptop to market. Where are new disruptive desktop OSes? Where were they when the market was still growing?

gnaffle 13y ago

But that's the thing though, companies like Apple pretty much ignore the whole "phone" and SMS thing, Apple has even shot the operators in the back with iMessage. You're right that it's easy to make a phone nowadays with off the shelf components, like the article mentions that's exactly what the chinese/asian OEMS are doing now. The question is whether you will be able to make something that can compete with Apple / Google / Samsung. Even HTC is having a hard time doing that with some pretty decent phones.

ThinkBeat 13y ago
That is very true. I do feel that the best phones out there today as far as sales maybe the iPhone and the Samsung S4? Will in 5 (?) 10 (?), be like the first iPod, big clunky and obsolete. And the huge phone makers of yesteryear: Nokia, Blackberry etc are now small. I can easily see in a 10 years period a a new player entering the market with success. (if they can keep from being bought by the big 3). Facebooks phone partnerships so far have sucked. Maybe they will find something better. Maybe it will be someone else. Or maybe no one will :( I am still hoping for a new PC os :o
- victorhooi 13y ago
  What's wrong with the existing PC OSes? =). In the free/open space, we already have fifty billion variants - Linux, the various BSDs (FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD), GNU Hurd, ReactOS, OpenSolaris, Haiku etc.)... Do you want more? I mean, I get the whole diversity thing, but after a while, I suspect you get diminishing returns...
  - ThinkBeat 13y ago
    I didn't actually know that GNU Herd was stable yet so that is actually cool I will install that later on (VM) We do have a lot of great Unix inspired operating systems and they are doing an amazing job. I count OS/X in that category too, though its debatable. Then we have Windows, the big giant. I would really like to see them do a Windows NT Squired, NT NT, a new generation that can break compatibility. Haiku I am a little excited about. I remember how cool the BoBoxes were many years ago when I saw a demo. How far ahead of Windows it was back in those days. Dont forget about LoseTheOS/Temple. I dont care what people say about the genius who made it. Its a crowning achievement. It is exciting because it isnt, and was never intended to be a be all do all OS for everyone. It has a purpose. I would like to see more in Plan9.

paulftw 13y ago

Following the same logic we'd have something better than windows8 dominating the market by now. It's so easy to bring a new desktop pc or a laptop to market. Where are new disruptive desktop OSes? Where were they when the market was still growing?